Sorry about your co-worker. I used to smoke so I know how hard it is to kick. I was diagnosed with UC shortly after I quit smoking so I'm positive that was my trigger. (UC is in my family big time).

Cold turkey is the only way to do it in my opinion. Take them and toss them out and don't look back. As an extra motivation, think of all the money you will save. What is it now $8 a pack?

Denis, Sorry about your co-worker, but think smart about quiting yourself. There is now a lot of literature and research showing the positive and negative effects of nicotene on the intestine. You may want ditch the smoke which is hazardous to your lungs and keep the nicotene which can be injested in many different ways these days. i'm just sayin'- Do some research, dude.

That's really tough. 38 is way too young to be getting throat cancer. In your case, I would say try a nicotine patch.

My mother was an intense smoker for 25 years. At least 2 packs a day. I doubted she had the willpower to give it up. Then a funny thing happened. She had the habit of smoking while reading a book by a lamp while seated on the sofa in our living room. Anyway she fell asleep while reading, somehow the cigarette butt fell onto the sofa, and it caught fire. I was playing out in the yard at the time. Somehow the flames woke my mother just in time and next thing I knew I heard yelling and screaming and she was throwing the burning sofa pillows out the front door and onto the front lawn. Anyway the sofa was burned and destroyed but nothing else caught fire. My mother was devastated as it was her favorite sofa, and my mother is a woman who has had a furniture fetish her whole life. Anyway the whole episode shook her up so much she never smoked a cigarette again. Not one!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am guessing this happened in about 1977 when my mother was 42 years old. She is now 78 and has not smoked since.

Last weekend I took care of two 39 year olds affected by smoking. One had a similar dx as your friend, with an ENT/throat cancer who had to get trach'd and a PEG tube since he can no longer swallow. One had a vascular issue likely exacerbated by heavy smoking. She threw a clot to her mesenteric artery and lost most of her large bowel and some of her small bowel due to ischemia and dead gut.

People always think of the cancer issues with smoking, but it's a killer on your vascular system, too. Good to try to quit if you can! Younger and younger people being affected all the time.

I quit cold turkey when I was having a breast reduction back in 06. I knew the risk was wounds opening due to oxygen issues, etc. So quit a month prior. I smokes a pack a week or pack and a half a week, so wasn't much to begin with.

My dad smoked since a teen and quit about 5 years ago in his 50's. He smoked a carton a week or some ridiculous amount. He went on Chantix and hasn't smoked since.

It is hard. There are days I miss it just like I smoked yesterday.

As for the cost. I think they are 12 bucks for a pack of cowboy killers.

Denis,
So sorry for the co worker, that is way too young to be sick like that and worse when it is self-inflicted...I am a smoker, have been since the age of 14 or 15...I used to say that it calmed my guts when I was a kid but nobody believed me, but it did...I don't smoke in the winter; from October to April every year I smoke maybe a pack in all...then once the nice weather comes and I can sit outside I smoke more...(I smoke about 2 cartons a year)...when under extreme stress, or after lunch...it is my little pleasure, I don't abuse and I enjoy it...no apology...it may be self justification but I figure that at the rate I smoke, in my lifetime, I will have smoked what a 'real' smoker does in one year...My GP only limits it to avoiding it pre and post op for 1 month on either end...so does my surgeon...other than that they 'allow' it as long as I do not increase my consumption...funny but no one in my family smokes...I was considered worse than a junkie for smoking.
Sharon

Good morning (or evening depending on where you are)...the funny thing is that there has always been some weird thinking on the smoking subject that it "helps" people with Crohns or UC by slowing the gut down. I actually had an ER doctor tell me one time to not quit because I had UC (long story on that one). I am like Sharon. I eat really healthy and stay away from the bad foods. I had an uncle who smoked and drank like a fish...he passed away last year from dementia due to the alcohol as did his 40 year old son a few months later...unfortunately alcoholism runs in my family. If for no other reason to steer clear of the stuff, the fact that it makes me dehydrated is enough in itself. Sharon, consider me virtually sitting with you on the porch enjoying the spring morning (I'm inviting myself ). My hope is to someday just quit the darn things for good. Denis, am so sad for your friend. I think sometimes it just takes something like that to shake some sense in to all of us at times. Grab the patches, gum, whatever you can and keep trying...you will be successful. Sending prayers and thoughts your way.

My dad passed away from Emphysema it is hard watching someone you love not being able to breath. I actually quit smoking through hypnosis over 20 yrs ago and haven't touched a cig. since. It teaches you to be a non smoker instead of an ex smoker so you don't miss the sensations of smoking. I went to one of those group sessions so it wasn't very expensive at the time.

Holly, I've been wondering about hypnosis...how many sessions did you have to have? What was it like? By chance did your insurance cover any of it? Did you just do hypnosis or did you do patches or gum along with it?

There is something to smoking and its connection to Inflammatory Bowel Disease. It goes like this:

Smoking makes Ulcerative Colitis better
Smoking makes Crohns Disease worse.

I smoked for 15 years, quit November 2006, diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis 3 weeks later in December 2006 with nary a symptom prior to that.

Stayed quit for a long while then started up again. Quit again in January of this year, now I'm severely flared up with pouchitis. I even put on a nicotine patch last week to see if it would help. (it didn't)

I often wonder if I started again if it would stop the pouchitis I've been struggling with, but my Mom was just diagnosed with Stage 3b lung cancer in January, and my paternal Grandfather died of lung cancer 15 years ago (both heavy smokers) so my genetics tell me if I start again I'll end up down that path too. So I'll chose the lesser of the two evils for now.

You are welcome anytime Val...but I suggest that you wait til the sun comes out here...For now we are in a perpetual state of grey and rain...makes for soggy cigarettes!
I do still feel as if the cigs 'calm' my guts....probaby psycosomatic but there may be something to it...
Can't wait for the sun to come out...I feel like my armpits are growing mushrooms from all of the humidity here!
Sharon

Smoking helps with inflammation so I have read. Reason I hear people's GIs mention don't quit if you have pouchitis/UC.

My friend with Chron's claims her guts do better when she smoked. Or so she thinks.

If you still want to smoke and have that urge but without the chemicals you can always try the elctronic cig...I use the tubed version I still get the same relief, however i dont wake up feeling like I have a pound of bricks on my chest. I can also go days without using it. I quit the real smokes cold turkey day 1 back from my 9th deployment. I would reccomend cold turkey because all the othr stuff is owned by the cigarette companies and you become do-dependent on them (or so i felt). Maintenance on the electroic ones are pretty cheap and last a hell of a lot longer, variable voltage kit 60 bucks (bought it 2 years ago still works) liquids 5-10 bucks a month...2-3 cartons a month is what 120ish? Good luck etiher way brotha, I wish you the best of and I am sorry for your loss.