Reprinted from the Health District's quarterly publication mailed to district residents (Fall 2003)

It jump-starts your brain in the morning. And helps you unwind at night. It curbs the hunger pangs, yet tops off a full stomach like dessert after a fabulous meal.

But it’s hardly joy when you consider that cigarette smoking kills nearly a half-million people in the United States each year and costs $75 billion a year in healthcare.

In Larimer County, 21 percent of adults smoke.

Even if you don’t smoke, chances are someone close to you does. And if you spend any time with him or her, your health may be at risk, too. Secondhand smoke is linked to respiratory illness in children as well as heart disease and lung cancer in adults.

So, when is quitting time? It’s when the smoker (or chewer) is ready. It’s that simple.

For those who don’t smoke, nicotine’s grip is incomprehensible. To a smoker, a drag on a cigarette feels like accelerating from zero to 60 in a split-second. It’s a rush that feels good. So good, you want to feel it again – and again.

Understanding your smoking past and planning for a smokefree future are the keys to successful quitting, says Jack Vogt, who counsels tobacco users in the Health District of Northern Larimer County’s smoking cessation program.

Here’s the approach he uses:

Ironically, it’s the fear of nicotine withdrawal — the irritability, cravings and depression — that keeps many smokers from quitting. When smokers realize that withdrawal has the same symptoms as smoking (coughing and cravings), quitting becomes less daunting, says Bear Jack Gebhardt, a smoking cessation counselor at the Health District.

Frame of mind, such as diverting attention from the smoking habit and finding other “joy” in life, plays a significant role in quitting, he says.

Liz, 51, who asked that her last name not be used, says she feels she has let down family and friends over 35 years by not quitting cigarettes, even though she’s tried more times than she can remember. The “pack plus-a-day of strong, red Marlboros” has been her companion for all of her adult life, she confides.

Five weeks ago, Liz kicked out her “companion,” thanks to help from the Health District program. It’s not been easy. She still craves a smoke when she’s tired or frustrated, but with the support of a counselor and nicotine lozenges, she’s smokefree.

Shame and guilt don’t seem to work in getting people to quit, Gebhardt says. Most smokers know the health risks associated with smoking.

“I don’t know any smokers who want to smoke,” Liz says.

John Wolfe sees both joy and pain at work. As a respiratory therapist at Poudre Valley Hospital, he sees the most brutal pain smoking can inflict on the human body.

“People know that smoking is harmful to their health and can cause fatal disease,” he says. “But they don’t always realize how much they can suffer before they die. They don’t think about living with a home oxygen system for the rest of their lives, or about being so short of breath they can’t eat or lay down to sleep at night. I’ve seen people with lung disease so bad they begged God to let them die.”

But there’s a bright side to Wolfe’s grim reality. When he’s not tending to people who are sick, he’s busy urging young people to stay healthy by not smoking. His traveling show of two inflatable lungs (one healthy and pink, the other burnt and gray from smoking) makes for great show-and-tell in classrooms across Northern Colorado. When the exhibit draws “ahhs” from a roomful of 10-year-olds, he knows he’s getting his point across.

Rates of teen smoking have declined since the 1990s and that’s encouraging for Wolfe, who is the northern region program coordinator for the American Lung Association of Colorado. To quote a famous cigarette maker, “We’ve come a long way, baby.” While radical at first, nonsmoking flights and movie theaters aren’t given a second thought. By next year, Irish pubs won’t allow smoking and Formula One racing won’t take tobacco ads. Closer to home, bars and restaurants in Fort Collins will go smokefree Oct. 1. That, says Wolfe, is progress.

A final note of optimism: 1 million smokers in the United States manage to quit each year.
“How ever they quit, it’s fair,” says Gebhardt, the counselor. “There’s no right way. And for whatever reason they decide to quit, it’s the right reason.”