By Donna Richardson, MSW, LCSW, LCADC, CTTS
People who use tobacco often say, “I wish I had never started!” They recall learning how to smoke or chew from friends or older siblings, reporting they felt sick to their stomachs, dizzy the first few times. They remember where they were the first time, who they were with, how old they were, how they felt. If they had it to do over again, they say, they would make a different choice. They tell us they feel guilty if their children followed the same path. They feel proud if their children have quit. They hope their grandchildren won’t make the same mistake. They want to protect the little ones in the family from second- and third-hand smoke.
Kick Butts Day (www.kickbuttsday.org) is a public health campaign held in mid-March each year aimed at tobacco prevention starting with young people. According to the American Lung Association, every day 4,000 people under the age of 18 smoke their first cigarette, accounting for nearly 1.5 million youth annually. At the Rutgers Tobacco Dependence Program (http://www.cinj.org/patient-care/tobacco-dependence-program), our aim is aligned with this important campaign. While most of our work is to provide science-backed help to quit, we advocate never starting or walking away early. The simple and powerful idea is that if younger people don’t get hooked on tobacco, they won’t become adults who struggle to quit. They won’t suffer from diseases that affect the quality of their lives as they grow older. They won’t spend hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime on tobacco products. They won’t die prematurely.
One successful quitter in his 50’s, good with numbers, calculated he could have paid cash for a top of the line Mercedes Benz in his favorite color with the money he had spent on cigarettes from the time he started in middle school. Another expressed deep regret about his exposure to toxins in tobacco over a 40-year period, linking that exposure to his disabling lung disease.
As people who use tobacco become more knowledgeable about the financial, social and health costs associated with its use, we hear stories about the damage done. We see the regret. At the Tobacco Dependence Program, we work with our clients to identify triggers to tobacco use, and we plot a plan to achieve cessation goals by using tailored quit tools—including nicotine replacements medications (patch, gum, lozenge, nasal spray, Nicotrol Inhaler) as well as Chantix and bupropion.
Just as the Great American Smokeout in November encourages tobacco users to quit for at least one day, use Kick Butts Day as another opportunity to put a plan in place toward a tobacco-free lifestyle. Remember, it’s never too early or too late to start.
Donna Richardson, MSW, LCSW, LCADC, CTTS, is the clinic coordinator for the Rutgers Tobacco Dependence Program supported by the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, School of Public Health, and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. As a tobacco treatment specialist, she has spent more than 30 years helping people examine ways to improve their health and lifestyle through behavioral changes in order to become tobacco-free.