To think that DP should smoke outside when we bring our baby home?

[whinegums]

DP went off on a rant the other night about how he wouldn't be going outside to smoke when we have our baby (due in about 4-5 weeks). He currently goes into another room when he smokes, but doesn't shut the door, and the window isn't open wide enough for the smoke to escape, so it comes through our (smallish) flat. He, like most smokers, gets really angry at being told that he can't smoke.

According to him, he has read research that says that passive smoking isn't dangerous!!!

We live in a third floor flat, so yes, it will be a PITA for him to go downstairs and outside, but hard lines. And yes, it's ok to have all the windows open at the moment, but I won't be able to do that when we have the baby (noise, cold, etc etc). We are planning to move, and I'm pretty sure if we were in a house with a garden, it wouldn't be an issue.

I have had a look online, to try and find as much research as possible to contradict this. I know that FSIDs say smoking around babies is dangerous, but I need the original research papers to back this up.

TBH, I'm more concerned about ENT problems than SID - my parents both smoked, and I had 'glue ear' when I was a kid - which meant I ended up being practically deaf for the best part of a year, it was only picked up when I started slipping behind at school, my brother had to have his tonsils removed, and in fact one of DP's other kids had to have grommets when she was younger. I'm sure this has something to do with being exposed to smoke.

You don't have to tell me how selfish and what a shit he's being btw! I know he is! But please help me to pull together as much concrete evidence as possible to try and shame him into behaving himself. He is being an ostrich - the stupid sod even has asthma himself, and reckons that he's 'fine' even though his parents smoked in the house. Gah!

TBH I couldn't even be bothered to read all your post.

He needs to stop smoking full stop for the health of his new baby.

Passive smoking killed my nana. It IS dangerous.

I strongly suspect he has asthma because his parents smoked.

I never had it until I went to live with my Gran who smoked like a chimney. (Not the one mentioned above.)

This is what I showed DH, it's a bit dull but it has stuff about indirect smoking as well, so even if you smoke outside you will still bring it back in.
He had a smoking coat (I know!) that he had to put on when he went for a cig or I wouldn't allow him near DD1, and he ahd to wash his hands.
After a few months of that he gave up!

Every single answer you get will say 'he must go outside to smoke' or better still 'he must give up'.

These days there simply is no way to avoid the truth about smoking.

oh christ, you poor thing

he needs not to smoke around his baby, end of, but you know this.

he might well feel very diffrerntly when the baby is born. Could your midwife, gp or health visitor make a difference (I am sure any of them would talk to him, btw, passive smoke/babies is a big thing atm)

I think it does come down to "be a man, don't smoke, but your kid above your revolting selfish habit"

(ex smoker alert)

He can smoke if he wants but if he was the father of my child he wouldn't be coming anywhere near the baby.

Your DP is talking bollox, even the residual smoke on his breath can increase the babies risk of cot death if it is cosleeping - to smoke inside the house is jsut outrageous. quite apart from the increased risk of cot death which is unthinkable enough he will increase the babies risk of asthma and other respiratory infections and cancer in later life

for me this would be a case of give up smoking or you cannot live in the same house as the baby. i would be prepared to end the relationship over it. its that serious and that simple - if he doesn't believe you go the your nearest doctors surgery and ask them for as many give up smoking leaflets as possible. frankly a quick search of the web will show him what utter bollox he's talking

has he been smoking round you while you've been pregnant ??

(that should be "PUT your kid above your revolting, selfish habit". obv.

Ok, I KNOW he needs not to smoke inside - but I need some help to back this up with some concrete research - lots of papers saying infants' bloodstream/urine contaminated with by products of smoking from parents, but NOT what the effects are.

ChirpyGirl, thank you, there are some more links on that link that might help too.

Fleming et al, 2000: Smoking and the sudden infant death syndrome: results from 1993-5 case-control study for confidential inquiry into stillbirths and deaths in infancy This is linked to from the FSIDs website.

Not a whole lot of point in getting into a research slanging match. I certainly find the evidence pretty convincing but then I probaby want to be convinced. Have his parents since given up? Would they help so that you don't have to be the bad guy? Is your health visitor any good?

The link between cot death and parent smoking near or being near soon after a baby are irrefutable. I find it really puzzling that anyone smokes near a baby... I went to a christening before the smoking ban but we couldn't stay for the party becasue too many people were smoking, with children on laps and in the room. It is so grotesque.

You could also try saying he could smoke at work if he really has to.
DH rides in on his bike so he has workclothes that never came into the house apart from straight into the machine. After the first few weeks of smoking in the garden he only did it at work, was a compromise until he gave up.

Whinegums the place to get that info is a biomedical database called PubMed. Its the major database of pretty much all published biomedical research from around the world

Heres the web address

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed

I just ran a search "passive smoking infant death" and pulled up 224 reports

other searches you could run:

passive smoking respiratory
passive smoking asthma
passive smoking death/mortality

Pheebe, thank you for that. A lot of the research papers I've found so far then require a subscription to the sites to access them.

Choosyfloosy - his parents are both dead - not smoking-related though. I haven't even met my HV yet, but DP did get a talking to from the MW when I went for my booking-in appointment. As any ex-smoker will remember (myself included) being told what you have to do is like a red rag to a bull....

my ds was hospitalised twice in his first year with breathing problems, and my exdh smoked. After that ALL visitors had to smoke outside.

I don't smoke and dp doesn't, no-body has ever minded having to go outside to smoke.

I also appreciate how hard it is to give up, my mother has tried a few times and is currently smoke free.

If your DP will not even consider giving up for the health of his baby, for your health, for his own health and for the sake of your finances too then he has a lot of growing up to do!

Yes, it is hard, that is why there are loads of support programmes and gadgets to help. I'm sure that you would be supportive and give him praise for each day he succeeds. It's up to him!

I think too that its quite hard to imagine how precious your child is til after they are born

anne diamond has written very movingly of the experience of her son dying of SIDS, especially finding him there in his cot. Oh it is so fkn , just make him go outside

reality of cot death

oh dear, this is a subject a bit too close to me, I think. I don't want to make things harder, am sorry if I am. but SIDS is awful.

he should't go outside to have a smoke

he should give up

My BIL goes outside to smoke - and his children follow him

but I think it says in the OP that he already has a daughter from a previous relationship who he exposed to smoke? They're not THAT precious to him, clearly

OK get all the research you can if you feel you must but personally I wouldn't get into this as an argument, it is non-negotiable; he does not expose your baby to smoke, end of story.

good luck - he sounds very entrenched in his position which is so sad, many smokers are totally able to bend their habits in order not to expose children and it's such a shame he can't

not original research but some clear, nasty statistics about risks for children of smokers here

Message withdrawn

I will say too

I smoked for several years, pre kids

I never every smoked around kids. not once

BUT - how do I stop him? I cannot physically eject him from our flat. Do I get a water pistol and aim it at his evil fags every time he tries to light up??

F&Z - thanks for posting the link, but this is his point - so much stuff that quotes statistics, but doesn't back them up - there is nothing that says where those conclusions came from, and how robust the research is.

It makes me really angry and sad too that he is being like this.

Looking at research papers, some actually say there hasn't been any/enough research carried out about the effect of fathers smoking.

His argument is there is a lot of dodgy research - don't want to start another barney, but look at what has happened recently with the doctor who said MMR vaccine caused autism - and resulting fallout. I know it's a different thing entirely, but as HG says, smokers are very good at bending the rules to suit themselves.

My own father smoked like a chimney, despite having many health problems himself (and is also now dead). I remember crying at him when I was a kid because I hated being in a smoky atmosphere, and he refused to stop. And I don't doubt for a moment that his kids were very precious to him.

Whinegums-I think one thing that convinced my dh to give up was the fact that after you have had a cigarette it takes over an hour before you stop breathing smoke out. So he would have to wait an hour or more after smoking to hold his child when new-born.
I don't think that it is fair for anyone to say that because he smokes he doesn't care about his children; it is an addiction and a terribly hard one to break.

Sadly if he doesn't want to stop he won't and there's nothing you can do about it. It boils down to where you draw the line. For me it would be a straight choice between him and my baby - no choice really. If he wouldn't leave, I'd be packing my bags sorry this is so hard for you