by Sugar and Vice

Social Smokers – the New Breed

Social smokers are a new breed of people who enjoy cigarettes.  These are the kinds of smokers who bum cigarettes when they are out drinking or buy a pack that will last them an entire month.  If you are a smoker, what kind are you?  Are you the kind who has to take regular smoke breaks at work or do you only light up when you’re at a social gathering?  The latter seems to be increasingly popular amongst young people in particular, according to recent surveys.  Perhaps, the strict ban on smoking in public places has played a role in this, maybe it’s considered more taboo now than in yesteryears or possibly due to the well known health risks. 

 

Overall, the total number of smokers is decreasing, but the percentage of occasional smokers is on the rise.  If someone asks you, “Are you a smoker?”  Your response might be a little vague by answering “sometimes”.  There is a blurred line when you fill out the questionnaire at the doctors’ office if you’re considered a true smoker.  Many people think that if you smoke any cigarettes even (if it’s only on the weekends) that would qualify you as a smoker.  Myspace.com, you’ve probably heard of it, even has a category that states if you are a smoker or not.   Which box are you suppose to check off?

 

Some say drinking and smoking go hand in hand – it’s the best feeling in the world. Social drinking can be compared to social smoking just like alcoholics can be compared to truly nicotine addicted smokers who seem to be a dying breed.  When I think of a true smoker, an older women or man who has an extra deep voice and yellow stained nails comes to mind.  Many occasional smokers started in high school or college and never graduated to become a full blown smoker.  I had my first cigarette when I was 18 years old on a senior high school class cruise just to look cool.  I never became addicted to cigarettes.  Now, I am proud to say, I do not smoke at all, of course. 

 

Most people know when they see a social smoker- they do not get easily agitated when they have to go without a cigarette for a long period of time.  Social drinkers may be addicted to the actual act of smoking, the ritual, the oral fixation, the inhaling and exhaling action, or the social aspect.  It is an almost bonding experience between people who don’t know each other very well.  It forces people to talk to each other as they are standing outside restaurants or office buildings smoking in groups or pairs.  Some consider it a small indulgence on vacations, comparing it to having a fattening dessert.  Whatever the reason, social smoking is the politically term to use.

 

 

Find More Social Smoking Articles

by elycefeliz

The Effects of Smoking and Drinking on Mental Proficiency

Smoking Can Prime the Brain for Later Addiction

An article entitled “Adolescent Smokers Have A Greater Risk Of Developing Alcohol-use Disorders Than Nonsmokers” by Richard A. Grucza, and Kevin W. Chen revealed research findings that are problematic at best. Perhaps the most disturbing was this: research suggests that smoking “primes” the brain for later addiction to alcohol and perhaps other drugs. When added to the following statistic, this information is very disconcerting: alcohol and smoking, when considered independently or in combination, account for more than 20 percent of the annual fatalities in the United States.

Alcohol-Use Disorders

It is common knowledge that many people started smoking and drinking when they were teenagers. According to research findings, moreover, smokers, especially adolescent smokers, unmistakably have a greater susceptibility to alcohol-use disorders (AUDs) than do non-smokers. Therefore, the earlier a person starts to smoke, the more vulnerable he or she may be to subsequent alcohol abuse, alcoholism, alcohol intoxication, and alcohol withdrawal.

Can Teens Quit Smoking Anytime They Choose?

Approximately 25 years ago I had a job as a child-care worker and worked with emotionally handicapped teens. I remember some of the older patients who were allowed to smoke tell me that they could quit smoking anytime they made up their mind to do so. My response to them, even then, was that this may in fact be true, but the longer they smoke the stronger the habit will become. At some point, moreover, the habit will be so compelling that quitting smoking will be extremely difficult. The point: many teenagers who start smoking see this as “no big deal.” Based on the current research, however, they couldn’t be more incorrect.

A Blueprint for Disease and Devastation

If smoking does in fact “prime” the brain for addiction to alcohol and potentially other drugs later in life, what are the consequences? Basically this: teens who smoke, no matter how “innocent” the intent, may be inadvertently constructing and following a blueprint that leads to the misery, broken relationships, financial ruin, psychological problems, and the physical diseases that are characteristic of long-tern drug and alcohol abuse.

Fifty to Eighty Percent of Alcoholics Smoke

According to another article entitled “Long-term Tobacco Use Associated With Dulled Thinking And Lower IQ, Study Finds,” researchers at the University of Michigan found that both smoking and alcoholism result in diminished thinking ability. The Michigan researchers also discovered that 50 to 80% of alcoholics smoke. If 50 to 80 percent of alcoholics smoke, and both smoking and alcoholism negatively impact the brain’s higher functions, then most alcoholics are doing a double whammy on their mental proficiency. Pardon the pun, but this is a sobering thought, especially when teens and young adults are the ones who are doing the smoking and the drinking.

Conclusion

Let us keep in mind that for all intents and purposes every addict starts out as an occasional user who has made an intentional and conscious decision to involve himself or herself with a specific substance or activity. As time goes by and as the person continues to partake of the substance or activity, however, the person makes a transition from being a voluntary to a compulsive user. As a result, and in conjunction with the findings from the two studies outlined above, people, especially our youth, need to be educated and made aware of the risks and devastation than can result from smoking, alcohol abuse, and alcoholism.

Copyright 2007 – Denny Soinski. All Rights Reserved Worldwide. Reprint Rights: You may reprint this article as long as you leave all of the links active, do not edit the article in any way, and give the author credit.

More Smoking And Drinking Articles

Smoking and Reproductive Outcomes, Cigarette Smoking Among Pregnant Women

Women smokers, like men smokers, are at increased risk of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and pulmonary disease, but women smokers also experience unique risks related to menstrual and reproductive function.

Women who smoke have increased risk beginning delay and for major and secondary infertility.

Smoking during pregnancy remains a major public health problem despite increased knowledge of the adverse health effects of smoking during pregnancy. Although the occurrence of smoking during pregnancy has declined steadily in recent years, substantial numbers of pregnant women continue to smoke, and only about one-third of women who stop smoking during pregnancy are still abstinent one year after the delivery.

Women who smoke may have a modest increase in risks for ectopic pregnancy and spontaneous. abortion.

Smoking during pregnancy is associated with increased risk for premature break of membranes, abruptio placentae (placenta separation from the uterus), and placenta previal (abnormal location of the placenta, which can cause massive hemorrhaging during delivery; smoking is also associated with a modest increase in risk for preterm delivery.

Infants born to women who smoke during pregnancy have a lower average birth weight and are more likely to be small for gestational age than infants born to women who do not smoke. Low birth weight is associated with increased risk for neonatal, perinatal, and infant morbidity and mortality. The longer the mother smokes during pregnancy, the greater the effect on the infant’s birth weight.
The risk for perinatal mortality, both stillbirths and neonatal deaths, and the risk for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) are higher for the offspring of women who smoke during pregnancy.

Women who smoke are less likely to breast-feed their infants than are women who do not.

Environmental Tobacco Smoke and Reproductive Outcomes

Infants born to women who are exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) during pregnancy may have a small decrement in birth weight and a slightly increased risk for intrauterine growth retardation than infants born to women who are not exposed to ETS.

Smoking Prevalence and Smoking Cessation during Pregnancy

Despite increased knowledge of the adverse health effects of smoking during pregnancy, estimates of women smoking during pregnancy range from 12% (based on birth certificate data) up to 22% (based on survey data). However, smoking during pregnancy appears to have decreased from 1989 through 1998.
Eliminating maternal smoking may lead to a 10% reduction in all infant deaths and a 12% reduction in deaths from perinatal conditions.

Women who quit smoking before or during pregnancy reduce the risk for adverse reproductive outcomes, including difficulties in becoming pregnant, infertility, premature rupture of membranes, preterm delivery, and low birth weight.
Most relevant studies suggest that infants of women who stop smoking by the first trimester have weight and body measurements comparable with those of nonsmokers’ infants. Studies also suggest that smoking in the third trimester is particularly detrimental.
Women are more likely to stop smoking during pregnancy, both spontaneously and with assistance, than at other times in their lives. Using pregnancy-specific programs can increase smoking cessation rates, which benefits infant health and is cost effective. However, only one-third of women who stop smoking during pregnancy are still abstinent 1 year after the delivery.

Programs that encourage women to stop smoking before, during, and after pregnancy — and not to take up smoking ever again — deserve high priority for two reasons: during pregnancy women are highly motivated to stop smoking, and they still have many remaining years of potential life.

Despite increased knowledge of the adverse health effects of smoking during pregnancy, survey data suggest that a substantial number of pregnant women and girls smoke. Cigarette smoking during pregnancy declined from 19.5% in 1989 to 12.9% in 1998.

Smoking prevalence during pregnancy differs by age and by race and ethnicity. In 1998, smoking prevalence during pregnancy was consistently highest among young adult women aged 18 through 24 (17.1%) and lowest among women aged 25 through 49 (10.5%).

Smoking during pregnancy declined among women of all racial/ethnic populations. From 1989 to 1998, smoking among American Indian or Alaska Native pregnant women decreased from 23.0% to 20.2%; among pregnant white women from 21.7% to 16.2%; African American pregnant women from 17.2% to 9.6%; Hispanic pregnant women from 8.0% to 4.0%; and Asian American or Pacific Islander pregnant women from 5.7% to 3.1%.

In 1998, there was nearly a 12-fold difference among pregnant women who smoke—ranging from 25.5 percent among mothers with 9-11 years of education to 2.2 percent among mothers with 16 or more years of education.

Find More Smoking Prevalence Articles

by termie

Who Are Electronic Cigarette Smokers?

NJOY’s market research comes in the right time to bring together points that many of the interested parties had been putting forward since product was released. While media and government institutions had been swaying and dithering about whether the menace of new smoking technology is welcome or not, the committed smokers were supporting this surprising alternative with their hard earned cash. This new product attracted
great amount of unwanted controversy in form of bitterly opposed pro-smoking and anti-smoking lobby. While engaged parties were opposing each other with overheated exaggerated reactions, it often seemed that opposition to smoking is simply not taking notice of the arguments about new features that electronic cigarettes introduced. It really felt that opposition to smoking still talks about tobacco cigarettes, when it was criticizing the e-cigs. Both the demand and supply of electronic cigarettes has steadilly increased and there are new manufacturers joining in every few months.

 Just one US company, NJOY Inc, it had sold internationally over 300,000 e-cig starter kits and disposables. Each one of those 300,000 e-cigs had replaced at least several thousand of ordinary cigars.  That means that e-cigs are progressively winning over the tobacco cigarettes and cigars in the smoking products marketplace. Even the most entrenched critics of electronic smoking must admit that, if not helping the committed smokers to quit, electronic cigarettes are at least helping enormously to reduce the adverse effects produced by the most harmful type of smoking. That definitely means that hesitant questions about electronic cigarettes, like “but do they work” are simply past tense and that consumer belief in the product definitely set up a steady trend. Electronic cigarettes, like Gamucci Micro electronic or Gamuci NicoVap, are here to stay and providing that some government legislation doesn’t abruptly change the situation, they are here to stay. Without any doubt it is interesting to look into what market survey will reveal. NJOY of Arizona comissioned electronic cigarettes market survey, so lets see what does it reveal.

 This survey throws some new light on the trends in the electronic cigarettes market. Confidence levels that survey produces are very high, which is generally accepted standard in a statistical surveys of this kind. Well, this is our average smoker: he is 45 years of age, he smokes 24.7 ordinary cigarettes per day, which is really hot, nearly 80% higher than more general smoking average of about 14 cigarettes per day or .72 packs per day. Conclusively, the average smoker who had chosen electronic cigarettes as a complement to regular smoking, is enjoying his habit and he just wants to avoid some of the side effects connected with classic tobacco smoking. Probably he didn’t quit real tobacco cigarettes either, but he combines the two, possibly using electronic cigarettes when he is in the public spaces and only smoking real tobacco when he is in his private home. Surprisingly this shows that average smoker is ‘tech-savvy’ middle-aged person, rather than ‘tech-savvy’ younger generation consumer. This might mean that in a long term, smoking is going to become abandoned whim, we’ll only watch in the one time black & white movies.

 One thing that review is telling us is that smoking technology is here to continue, in a tobacco or in a electronic cigarette form. Hard core smokers are aware of the negative impact of classic smoking products on well-being and they are pro-actively experimenting with electronic cigarettes as a less harmful supplement to their habit. Immediate friends of the electronic cigarette smokers are tolerant of their habit, but not necessarily encouraging. Simply put, lovers of tobacco are not failing to appreciate the benefits of the alternative electronic smoking. Once charged e-cig is usually equivalent to a whole pack of tobacco cigarettes. Electronic cigarettes offer flavors, like mint, vanilla, strawberry, chocolate, cherry etc., that are only rarely available in the tobacco equivalents. And nowadays, the consumers know that electronic cigarettes are accepted in a majority of public places.

If you would like to find more about any particular models, try Gamucci Micro cigarette.

The Positive Effects of the Smoking Ban in England

<!– @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } –>

Researchers from Bath University have concluded that the smoking ban has resulted in 1,200 fewer heart attack hospital admission in the year following the introduction of the legislation. The study analysed data from the period between July 2002 – September 2008. By studying the five year period prior to the ban, researchers were able to determine annual trends in terms of heart attack hospital admissions, and then apply these past trends to a hypothetical scenario in which the smoking ban had not been introduced. These figures were then compared to actual data compiled throughout the 12 months after the commencement of the ban.

The outcome was that the ban has potentially decreased the number of heart attack patients by 2.4%. The predicted figures can be translated as an £8 million saving for the NHS, and the prevention of circa 180 deaths. Every year approximately 141,000 people in the UK suffer a heart attack, about a third of die before arriving at a hospital. Within the hospital though, the survival rate is 85%, in which case, of a group of 1,200, 180 would not recover.

Although demonstrating obvious association between the smoking ban and the lower number of heart attack admissions in England, the study fails to investigate on a more comprehensive level. It remains impossible to say with any degree of certainty to what extent the ban has had on the overall numbers of heart attack patients, with other factors such as an unhealthy diet, excessive alcohol consumption and a lack of exercise all major causes of cardiac problems. Furthermore, the research does not investigate the smoking status of patients or their experience of passive smoking prior to the ban.

Since 2002 there has been a steady decrease in the number of heart attack hospital admissions, a fact cited by anti-non-smoking campaigners who suggest that the latest figures simply conform to the yearly fall in emergency heart attack admissions. However, this is not an accurate interpretation of the study. As aforementioned, the data was arrived at through a comparison of two scenarios; one in which the ban had not been created, and the other the reality in which we live.

This piece of legislation has clearly gone some way to addressing the health issues associated with smoking. There is however, much more that can be done by individuals. The benefits of not smoking can be felt in one’s health, lifestyle, and finances. By giving up the habit, one is far less likely to suffer from cancer and heart problems, and will find that they save a small fortune not only on the purchase of cigarettes or cigars, but also on financial products such as life insurance, which can be three or four times more expensive for a smoker.

Find More Smoking Ban Legislation Articles

by tosaytheleast

Getting Help To Stop Smoking Cannabis – How To Quit Cannabis For Good

Getting Help To Stop Smoking Cannabis could be the smartest thing you could do if you have a cannabis addiction. Marijuana can be a very serious and threatening way to live your life and trying to quit cannabis can be a very difficult task. People that suffer from cannabis addiction will often find it hard to hold down a job or even get a job in the first place. Weed addiction can also effect your social life, bank account and health. If you are suffering from weed addiction then it is time to do something about it.

Getting Help To Stop Smoking Cannabis

Weed is a very expensive habit, fact. The heavier your addiction then the more money you will throw away. It is illegal in most countries, damages your health and has long term effects on your memory.

Just have a think for a moment about how much better life would be without having to rely on cannabis?

Think about how much more potential you would have.

Think about the time and money you would save.

Imagine not having to worry about your health deteriorating

There are obviously so many other plus’ to giving up marijuana. And I know it’s not a simple task but with the right method it can be made a whole lot easier.

How To Quit Cannabis

There are so many methods to giving up cannabis. Most of them are expensive, take a long time and are a slow and painful process. There are however cheaper and quicker methods online that really do work great.

If you have looked online then a program you will be familiar with is Cannabis Coach. Cannabis Coach is an audio and worksheet based program that can be downloaded from the web. It was originally designed by a cannabis addict and is the methods he used to free himself from his addiction. It has a very high success rate among its users and often gets rave reviews. The aim of Cannabis Coach is not to control your addiction, but to completely free you of it in just a matter of weeks.

Fed up of using cannabis on a daily basis? Visit: Getting Help To Stop Smoking Cannabis

Want to know more about getting help to stop smoking cannabis? Cannabis Coach can help you quit cannabis for good in a matter of weeks.

Really want to give up smoking marijuana? Visit: Quit Cannabis

This video features the famous Eagle Bill and a yet-to-be-famous Paris Hilton at the Hash Marijuana Hemp Museum in Amsterdam. During her visit (apparently filmed just before her leaked video propelled her to stardom), Eagle Bill shows Paris how to use his original vaporizer to ingest cannabis in a healthy, efficient and effective way.

Video Rating: 4 / 5

Find More Smoking Cannabis Articles

by dafrog418

Quit Smoking for Good – 3 Critical Keys to Breaking the Habit!

 

When looking to quit smoking for good, there is one important factor which is often overlooked and the reason why so many people fail to quit smoking year after year. This is so critical, that quitting smoking is literally impossible unless you nail this one factor down. The most frequently overlooked aspect in quitting smoking is getting your mental game straight.

If you seriously want to quit smoking for good, you need to come to the battlegrounds with the right mindset, a mindset for success, if you do not, you will subconsciously self-sabotage your efforts. Without further ado, here are the 3 quit smoking tips:

 

Quit Smoking For Good Key No.1 – You Must Believe it is Possible for You.

Often times people engage in negative self talk and have negative chatter going on in their heads along the lines of “It’s too hard to quit”, “I don’t have the willpower!”, “I’ve tried ‘X’ times and it just doesn’t work for me” etc, etc. The truth is the more you tell yourself lines such as this, the more you will program your mind into believing it will fail. Your mind is a computer and it WILL be programmed. Catch ALL your negative programming as it happens and shut it off. Replace it with positive thoughts such as “Quitting smoking is easier and easier with each new day!”, “I feel healthier and stronger each day”, “My mental strength increases with each passing day, it becomes easier and easier for me to live a smoke-free life”. Take an inventory of your self-talk on a DAILY basis, become critically aware of it, it is THAT important.

 

Quit Smoking For Good Key No.2 – Visualize Success.

It is equally important to not only believe quitting smoking for good is possible, but for you to see it in your minds eye as having actually HAPPENED. Take a moment to close your eyes, and visualize yourself in the present moment, living a smoke free lifestyle. Notice how much healthier you appear, your eyes are clear and bright, you walk with a bounce in your step, you’re enjoying life, able to breathe the surrounding air freely and fully into your lungs, notice the subtle aromas in the surrounding environment you otherwise wouldn’t. See how much more positive and happy you are in your interactions with others, notice how others perceive you differently, in a more positive light as they notice your sense of pride and accomplishment emanating from within you.

Take the time to really see in your minds eye, you, living a smoke free life. Allow yourself to feel all the associated positive emotions, keep your eyes closed and perform this long enough to the point that you’ve forgotten you’re visualizing it and you’re done for the day! Now repeat this DAILY! It will feed into your subconscious and in a weeks time you will feel MUCH more positive about your ability to quit smoking.

 

Quit Smoking For Good Key No.3 – Persevere and be Relentless

It is vitally important that at each and every instance of a setback to your progress towards a smoke free life, that you do not allow it to throw you completely off target. If you have a lapse and veer off your course, smoking a cigarette you didn’t plan for, do not dwell on it, and more importantly do not let it de-motivate you to the point of giving up completely! If you believe you have tried everything and you just can’t seem to stick to a plan, ask yourself this “What were the last 100 things I tried to quit smoking for good?”. That’s right, 100, list them off. Can’t think of 100? Ok then, 50…20? Do you see what I’m getting at? It took Thomas Edison over 1000 tries to develop the light bulb, what would have happened if he stopped at his 999th try? Failure. Be relentless, it is possible, no matter WHO you are, regardless of whether you realize it now or not, I am telling you it is absolutely 100% within your ability to quit smoking for good right now! Believe it and never give up no many how many times you fall down, get right back up at it. Develop it and take pride in this winning mentality!

 

What I have just shared with you is so critical you must not just read over this and say to yourself “Ya, ya, I know all about that”. It is one thing to know about it, it is another thing to register it on an emotional level and really FEEL it inside of you. To not only know it intellectually, but to live it emotionally. These steps are not for you to know, they are for you to take in, breathe in, to feel, and most importantly, implement in your life. Once you have the mental game down and develop a deep and true understanding for each of these points, you are well on your way to a new, healthier you.

 

by sashafatcat

Hypnosis to Quit Smoking and Drinking – is it Effective?

Hypnotherapy as long been used to help people overcome theirs addictions or personal problems. A lot of people have tried to stop smoking or drinking many times before they turned to hypnosis, for a lot of them it is the final answer to overcome their addiction. Fortunately for them, there a many resources like hypnosis eBooks and CD’s available on the market. Some will try those products others will go the more traditional way and hire a professional hypnotherapsit for their hypnosis to help them quit smoking and drinking.

The difference between the two is obvious…For the EBooks and other products you are all alone to achieve the task of getting rid of your addiction while with the hypnotherapist you work with a professional. On the other hand eBooks and cd’s often comes with a much lower price!

For some, hypnosis to quit smoking and drinking is their last chance to finally overcome their addiction and vice.

Get Free From Alcohol

Wendy Freisen is a clinical hypnotherapist, she is well known for her Hypnosis therapy to help people quit smoking and drinking. On of her best program is called “Alcohol Freedom with hypnosis” and comes in the form of audio CD’s. The program is very well created and guarantees to help you get rid of your addiction, by helping you stop thinking about alcohol. She even states that she will help you stop the pain that you feel that might be responsible for your drinking problem.

Wendy Freisen believes that your addiction and behaviour toward alcohol is affected by your subconscious mind. One of her best hypnosis program “Alcohol Freedom with Hypnosis” is based around that concept. The principle behind this hypnosis course is that it will make your subconscious mind adapt to new belief, that you no longer need alcohol. Her Hypnosis course to quit drinking has a very high success rate.

Stop Smoking with hypnosis

Some of the hypnosis course to help you quit smoking and drinking are very good other are very bad, here are a few good recommendation about good hypnosis programs to stop smoking.

Teresa Jeffcot is a well known hypnotherapist that has developed a self-help hypnosis program to help people quit smoking called “Got Twenty Minutes – Stop Smoking”. Since the release of this course it as been said that this program is truly a breakthrough because it combines Hypnotic suggestion and a minimal work of body massage and enhanced technology.

“Whole Body Breathing” by Anna Coy is another known hypnosis course to help people stop smoking. She also believes in using hypnosis to quit smoking and drinking. Her training program helps stimulate:

– The awareness

– Release of tension

– Control of your emotions

On top of that you will learn breathing techniques that help:

– Reduce Stress

– Overcome illness and depression

– Increase your energy

– Rejuvenate your Body and mind.

www.sonypictures.com

Video Rating: 4 / 5

by Stefan Zabunov

Online Dating Can Add Spices to Your Life

Online dating is pretty useful in this age. I personally feel that in this age when people are hardly getting time to socialize, the online dating sites are working as great tools for everyone where they can meet with strangers and ultimately become friends. Since the advent of the online dating websites many techno-friendly people have added spices to their lives by connecting to other people across the world. Many people have found their love and soul mates through online dating.

The online dating websites offer many practical features for the convenience of the users. You can find different levels of options for conversation such as online chatting, voice chatting and video chatting. Many online dating websites offer blogging options; you can share your experience or new ideas with other people out there on the websites through your blogs. You can participate in the forum discussions which are not confined to only dating, rather, people like to discuss important global issues.

There are many people who are using online dating for the sake of fun. Well, the websites for online dating are mainly created for fun. But people have to be careful while using those sites. Basically, it is the instructions on those sites that are important and must be followed to avoid future hassles. When I created my profiles on the online dating websites I didn’t bother to attach my photographs. Though I was making friends and chatting with other people no one was interested to make long-term relationship with me. Earlier, it made no difference to me. But, when I found all my friends having dates with their girl-friends they meet on online dating sites, I became a bit serious about my profile. I couldn’t realize this fact until one of my friends brought it into my notice that photographs on the profile add credibility.

After that I edited my profile by adding my latest photographs and other necessary information. The other day I found many messages from my online friends. Some of them complemented me; others congratulated me for taking right decision. Anyways, I must say, this single step changed my life. There was a smoking girl on one of the online dating sites. I started liking her for the first time I saw her profile. I sent some messages but she didn’t reciprocate. After adding my picture to my profile, it was the same girl who sent messages from her side. That was a wonderful moment for me when I saw her message for the first time and we became friends.

Those days were golden days of my life. Every evening, I would wait for her on the online dating sites and we would chat for long. Then we decided to meet personally and fixed a date. Oh… I still remember that day when I saw her for the first time. She was looking gorgeous. No doubt, I was in love with her since the beginning and I found her interested in me on our first date. I would not have expected more than that.

These days we are in different cities because of our jobs, but we still use online dating sites to meet and chat with each other.

More Smoking Girls Articles

by Laurie Pink

My Baby Smokes

Despite all the warnings to the contrary, the statistics regarding teenage smoking continues to rise.

Feeling invincible, a common misconception of the age group, smoking seems like an excellent means of achieving popularity, feeling grown up, and rebelling

against adults.

Like Superman, the same rules do not seem to apply to high school and junior high age individuals. Kids think, unlike everyone else on the planet, they can quit any time. By the time teenagers understand the addictive nature of cigarettes, the damage has been done, and ceasation is extremely difficult.

Although smokers agree the long-term effects of inhaling up to 1000 different chemical toxins is responsible for deadly diseases like heart attacks, emphysema, and cancer- the addiction rules. Sadly, when smokers choose to have a baby, the unborn child has no choice but to become a smoker as well.

Smoking before pregnancy can affect fertility. After conception, the baby is essential a smoker, increasing the odds of stillbirths and miscarriages. A smoker’s baby is likely to be a low birth-weight, ahd have significant health problems long after birth. Yet, smoking mothers have the option to quit, before the chemicals can do irrepairable damage.

Future mothers and fathers may have greater difficulty starting a family in the first place. For male smokers, sperm count is lower, the sperm may be misshapen, and motility is restricted by reduced semen.

For females, smoking affects the release of an egg through the fallopian tubes to the womb. Also, IVF is less likely to succeed. Although the egg is successfully fertilized in a test tube, the embryo will have difficulty attaching to the womb.

Even if the mother manages to conceive, she is still endangering the life of her unborn child, because the baby has no option but to smoke as well. Why? Anything the mother ingest is transferred to her baby via the placenta, including the 1000 toxic chemicals found in cigarettes.

In addition, the carbon monoxide, the same toxic emissions from a car’s tailpipe, forms in the bloodstream, reducing the flow of oxygen to both mother and baby. Therefore, the baby is deprived of the appropriate amount of oxygen and nutrients to promote proper growth and development.

The mother’s choice to smoke increases the odds of stillbirths and miscarriages. According to Dr. Krisa Van Meurs of Stanford University School of Medicine, there is a 33% increase in the chances of miscarriage before the 28th week. Also, because of restricted blood flow, doctors have found a greater incidence of spontaneous abortions among smokers.

If a baby manages to survive until birth, the health problems associated with cigarette smoking are only beginning. Because the carcinogens of cigarettes have replaced the appropriate levels of oxygen and nutrients, smoking is comparable to skipping feedings after birth. Thus, the low birth weight.

Think about it. No loving parent will allow an infant to go hungry. Nevertheless, smoking during pregancy essentially starves a growing fetus. Unfortunately, low birth weight babies cannot simply be fattened up after birth. Subjected to the same poisons a mother inhales during pregnancy, a smoker’s baby’s weight can also be an outward sing of grave inward health problems.

For example, studies have shown babies of smokers are much more likely to succumb to sudden infant death syndrome. Thus, the mortality of an infant, before age one, increases due toexposure from the harmful affects of cigarette smoke.

Also, because lung development has been compromised during pregnancy, a smoker’s child is likely to suffer more colds and inner ear infections. Additionally, a baby is prone to illnesses such as pneumonia and bronchitis, requiring hospitalization.

Even as a baby growns into toddlerhood and beyond, the affects of being a smoking fetus can continue plaguing the child. Sadly, children exposed to smoking during pregancy have increased chances of suffering from asthma and even cancer.

Asthma alone can be pretty scary. More than a simple cough or cold, asthma inflames the airways. As the bronchila tubes swell, a baby has greater difficulty breathing. Without immediate medical attention, a baby with asthma can perish.

As if asthma is not bad enough, babies exposed to cancer-causing polutants in the womb have and increased probability of sufferinglife-threatening cancers in childhood: Numerous studies have investigated the incidence of childhood cancer in the children of women who smoked during pregnancy. An increased risk for all cancers is found as well as an association of acute lymphocytic leukemia and lymphoma with maternal smoking has been confirmed in several studies.

Thankfully, smoking mothers can drastically reduce the odds of a precious baby suffering from severe health problems and dastardly diseases. Quit smoking now! Give a baby the best chance at a healthy life, and a healthy mother.

Often, the willpower to quit is aided by pregnancy. If morning sickness does not make cigarettes taste disgusting, the love for a baby is a great motivator. Whether a mother quits smoking before conception or during the pregnancy, there is no time like the present.

Find More Baby Smoking Articles