Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Need help? Don't know how to embed youtube videos? Can't listen to mp3's on the forum? Problems browsing the Chetboard? Find the solution here!

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby thenorm » Fri Dec 31, 2010 3:30 am

Well, I'm not looking for sympathy. I just want you smokers to Pay Attention and ask yourself why you keep doing this to yourselves not to metion the cash expense of it all. The price of processed tobacco has skyrocketed over the years and the money you spend is helping to pay lawyers looking for ways to put a positive spin on a business that is murdurously unhealthy.

The irritating thing is that there are people in the boardrooms making millions off that which will surely if not kill you will shorten your life and the enjoyment of what life you have.

That, my freinds, is criminal.
It should be a no brainer. I think tobacco if used at all should be like the old plains indians used it. One bowl at a time and usually with a lot of mumbo jumbo as they treated smoking as a religious process and it came with set prayers and small rituals.

That's not likely to happen.

Right now I'm sorta OK. I take two inhalers, one twice a day and the other four times a day and am putting off having to depend on oxygen as long as I can. I'm a stubborn old buzzard.

Rande: re Muskegon (my home town, folks)
I kinda envy you because I love and miss MI but wintertime is not one of the things I miss about it. Spring, early summer and fall are to die for. It's a lovely part of the state...
thenorm
 
Posts: 482
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 8:29 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby RonBloor » Fri Dec 31, 2010 7:50 am

I've heard all the reasons mentioned in the replies to your post Bruce.. I've thought about them and I honestly think that all the reasons that include your personal health or longevity will not help you. In fact I believe they are probably reasons why you will continue. I've been watching your posts for a couple of years now and I'm very much honored to know you through youtube and this forum, so I don't feel that I'm a complete stranger. I've heard you mention that your wife died and that you miss her terribly.. Who wouldn't!!! I have a similar background. I also lost my wife to cancer when she was 43 and our 2 boys were still boys. There isn't a day goes by that I don't feel guilty about her dying and me living. This is of course totally irrational. The fact that I recognize this is probably why I'm still here and not in the nut house (some might not agree).
Bottom line. I don't think you will ever quit to help yourself live longer or better, but you might quit if you thought it would benefit someone else. Think about your loved ones, friends or even people you don't know that might benefit if you quit. Leave your health/longevity out of the equation.
Hopefully still your friend Ron.
Ron Bloor
RonBloor
 
Posts: 440
Joined: Tue Aug 17, 2010 1:22 pm
Location: Toronto, Canada

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby keener » Fri Dec 31, 2010 11:04 am

Jim, Rande, Norm, and Ron:

Thank you for opening yourself up to me, men. Jim, one day at a time sounds like especially good advice. It sort of resonates with me, despite my impatience and tendency to want to do everything at once.

Ron, you are probably onto something, about me needing to quit for someone else's benefit. Ultimately, though, I do believe I have to do it for me.

Norm, I am all too familiar with your points because I have the same condition you have, the same condition that Jerry had. And, as you know, quitting smoking will not change how it will end for us. We will both go like Jerry did, unless a heart attack or car accident or some other unforeseeable takes us out first. The inhalers are helpful to me, and I depend on them, but they are no cure, as you well know. The doctor tells me that quitting will give me a few more percent in breathing ability. But 40 years of smoking (mostly non-filtered cigarettes) has taken its toll. Even the simple acts like recording a YouTube are a big deal for me ... moving the heavy chair to just the right spot, dragging the amp, and so on. (My health is the key reason I didn't attempt to go to CAAS and probably never will.) Anyone who is a smoker and has not reached this point must quit, for you will surely reach this point if you don't, and I assure you that you do not want it. I'd give anything if I could back in time and resist that first cigarette (I wanted a lovely lady who happened to smoke, and figured that, if I did, maybe she would pay attention to me).

I guess if I found out that Jerry didn't quit until the end, then I could quit now and say "Jerry I finally beat you at something," because I could sure as the world never beat him at anything else. I've always been a rebel and always been one who wanted to be better than someone else at something. Tell me I can't do something, and watch me do it. Of course, that doesn't apply when reverse psychology is being used on me ... I can smell it a mile away, and of course rebel against it, too.

Honestly, I don't know what I was thinking. Looking for the easy way of being motivated instead of just doing it, I guess.

With the new year arriving, it is time for me to just quit these dang cigs. 40 years is enough (way too much, actually). Wish me well.
keener
 
Posts: 764
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 9:16 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby stambi » Fri Dec 31, 2010 12:01 pm

Bruce,
I have a friend, he is a doctor. He was smoking 3 packs for a day for long time. I always wander how he can smoke, cause he is a doctor, and must be example for other people. Anyway, one day he was present when some other doctors were examining a dead pearson. That person was heavy smoker and died because of lung cancer . When my friend saw men's lungs, he stopped with smoking that day. It was 15 years ago, and my friend is still non smoker. Sorry for that bad but true story.
Boris Stambuk
stambi
 
Posts: 64
Joined: Sun Aug 22, 2010 3:27 pm
Location: Croatia, Europe

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby thenorm » Fri Dec 31, 2010 12:36 pm

Well, for guys like Bruce and me there isn't much to be done. It is what it is.

But you other guys (and gals) that are still smoking...

Like I said... it ain't rocket science. Trying to intellecualize a deadly drug ingestion is ludicrous.
Quit.
Quit now.
Your life and quality of life depends on it.

One more thing... in case you've forgotten...
After you smoke a cigarette there is an envelope of odor that smells like a very unwashed ashtray that extends around you for about fifteen to twenty feet on all sides. It gradually diminishes but in the interim you Reek.
thenorm
 
Posts: 482
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 8:29 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby PhilHunt » Sat Jan 01, 2011 3:01 pm

I read once on AOL daily news that if you stop now even if you have smoked for years...many years at that, that the body and lungs have a way of healing themselves over time and eventually are back to normal. For smokers- they go through what is called "cognitive dissonance". What that is, is the brain naturally knows that smoking is bad and causes cancer, but the brain also is in a battle with itself because of the addicitive nicotine which makes them crave the cigarette. I heard once that if you can stop for at least one month it's possible to stop for good and that if you smoke after that, it almost makes you sick. My dad was what you call a part time smoker. He only smoked a cigarette once in a blue moon, he wasn't addicted to it. Occasionally I like to have a black and mild cigar (which is pipe tobacco)when I'm hanging out with some guys at work. I've heard that if you are going to smoke, smoke pipe tobacco...it doesn't have all the carcinogens and additives like cigarettes do. It is a known fact that cigarette manufacturers PUT ADDICTIVE CHEMICALS IN CIGARETTES THAT MAKE YOU KEEP SMOKING THEM AND BUYING THEM. IF THEY DIDN'T PEOPLE WOULDN'T BE HOOKED ON THEM!
PhilHunt
 
Posts: 688
Joined: Tue Aug 17, 2010 9:06 am

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby thenorm » Sat Jan 01, 2011 5:34 pm

I read once on AOL daily news that if you stop now even if you have smoked for years...many years at that, that the body and lungs have a way of healing themselves over time and eventually are back to normal...."

I'd read that too. I quit in 1998. 44 years a smoker and, as noted above I have health issues so that bit of business is either wrong or way too optimistic. Maybe the original source had narrower data than what the blurb claimed.

I have no doubt quitting was easier on my lungs and they no doubt tried to heal but 'normal' ain't gonna happen.

My dad had lung cancer. I do not. I just had a chest X-Ray a couple of weeks ago so at least I know I don't have that.

You just take what you get and move on with it.
thenorm
 
Posts: 482
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 8:29 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby thumbslinger » Mon Jan 03, 2011 6:52 pm

This starts and ends badly, but it's the middle that many need to hear.

My Father-in-law was diagnosed with lung cancer, emphesema, liver cancer and to top it all off, his
heart was actually 180 degrees turned. (That happened over his entire life not related
to his smoking/drinking.)

At the time, doctors gave him 6 months. He all but quit smoking. He kept drinking beer though much much less.

Even so, through proper eating and better thoughts, yes, thoughts... he rid his body of all cancers and the emphysema was reduced to not unlike the occasional dry cough during the season changes.

That would have probably been eradicated as well but a different tragedy struck. Their house in Monticello, Florida caught fire and he didn't make it out.

Cutting out all refined sugars and processed foods, which pretty much knocks out most of the restaurants that you can name in under 30 seconds, and eating organically grown fruits/veggies was his ticket. He didn't go vegan nor vegetarian, but any meat whether beef, elk, bison, yak etc was bought from the farmer who fed/grew and processed the animal.

What I learned, which was sealed by his experience, is that:
1. proper nutrition is far more important for the body than any medicine.
2. No matter your beliefs/fixed ideas/hopes/philosophy etc., what you worry about will come knocking at your door.

Focus on the good and what you want.. not that you don't have it,. that it's not here yet...
not that you wished you had it, but rather how great it is to actually have it. It will come.

We're not supposed to be sick, you know? The body can work true miracles but we have to allow it to.

This could certainly cause a storm for many who are not ready to get past the surface of 'life'... music, television, the gov, taxes, jobs, the education system, etc but you can only be responsible for yourself and forgiving yourself and rejoicing that you have a life to experience can take you much further then worrying about the other things or expecting someone else/something else to cure you.

There's no soap box here, just straight facts that happened.

Now, after reading about quitting all those foods, personally, I hope quitting smoking sounds a little easier.
thumbslinger
 
Posts: 60
Joined: Wed Aug 18, 2010 11:51 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby George Beasley » Sun Jan 30, 2011 9:37 am

Bruce,

At CAAS 2010, Bresh told a funny story about Jerry coming over to his house in his later years. Jerry had quit smoking by that time, and was advising Bresh to do the same thing, because it would kill him. The whole time Jerry was dipping and spitting in a waste basket. He told Bresh, "You should just chew tobacco...it's got the same stuff in it as smoking, and it is less harmful". Bresh said, "yeah, but it can give cancer too". Bresh said Jerry spit in the waste basket and replied "but doctors can get to your mouth easier!"

As far as quitting smoking, I am 41, and started smoking on and off when I was 13 or so, picking up a full habit by the time I got out of high school. I tried quitting, unsuccessfully many times. Finally the good folks at Caterpillar where I work put up a sign up sheet down in the smoking area for an instructor-led smoking cessation class put on by the American Lung Association. I decided to go to it, and it was great. It was a 6 week class, meeting once a week. On the first meeting, we scheduled our "quit date" which was about one month away. They had us write down the benefits of quitting smoking, as well as what road blocks we thought we might encounter that would make us slip up. We discussed breathing exercises that help the nicotine cravings pass, and aids to help us get over the addiction.

In the end, I had my doctor prescribe Welbutrin, and I used the nicotine patch, along with nicotine gum. I felt bad when I quit....nervous, irritable, could not sleep well....but the worst of the symptoms of withdrawal were over in about 5 days, and within a two weeks I wasn't even thinking about cigarettes very much. We had follow up meeting to see how every one was doing, which helped as well. I went off the patch as soon as I ran out, and got off Welbutrin in about 2 months. I did chew the gum for about a year, but I would have been happy to chew it for the rest of my life, as it is not harmful. In just a few months, I will have been a non smoker for 6 years.

The moral of the story: get a support group, get information, look at nicotine replacement therapy, and quit.

Good luck!
Thanks,
George
George Beasley
 
Posts: 387
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 9:08 pm

Re: Smoking and our Guitar Heroes

Postby keener » Sun Jan 30, 2011 10:43 am

Hey, George. Thank you for sharing how you quit and also for the info on Jerry. Maybe I can convince myself to do it over the next few days.

Take care
Bruce
keener
 
Posts: 764
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 9:16 pm

Previous

Return to Support

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 9 guests