Smokers or ex-smokers - what could someone have said to you when you were first experimenting with cigarettes, to make you stop?

[FrannyandZooey]

I have a friend who is 17 and just starting to have the odd cigarette when out with friends. She feels bad about it, and doesn't want to become addicted, but enjoys trying them and wants to "live life to the full" - experimenting being part of that.

She confessed this to me and I think she partly wants me to have a go at her and make her promise me she won't do it again. What can I say to her? I don't feel that promising another person not to smoke will have any effect, but just worsen her self-esteem if she chooses to smoke again.

I told her I personally wished I had never smoked - told her she WILL get addicted if she keeps having the odd one - and talked about the thousands of pounds I have spent on cigarettes, the wrinkles she can plainly see I have from smoking, and the fact I seem to have some kind of asthma now and for all I know, I will get lung cancer one day.

I also told her it makes you stink and that men that smoke can't get it up so well

I don't see what a lecture will achieve here but I would dearly like to be able to say something that will strike home with her and dissuade her from years of addiction that I had.

I worked as her nanny for several years and now we often go out together as friends so I think she sees me in a sort of big sister type role. What could anyone have said to you, that would have made a difference? Is there anything that can put young people off from experimenting, if they have a mind to?

Yep, concentrate on yellow teeth, bad skin, smelly breath, stinky hair and wrinkles.

I think my answer would be no. I started at 15 and quit 17 years later, after many many attempts (half-hearted though - for other people including children) were not persisted with manly due the self imposed idea that i was addicted and therefore had to smoke and it was toooooo haaaaaaaard, cue 2 year old tantrum-fest.

Its been two years now since i smoked, and looking back, there was nothing that anyone could have said to me to make me either not try it or stop doing it once i started. I had to do that on my own in order for me to be able to live with my choices in a positive way. However, you mention that you talked honestly and candidly about the dangers with your friend without being pushy or disapproving. I think that whether or not she takes heed will not affect the trust and openess she will find in your friendship.

One of my favourite ever quotes was from Blaise Pascal of 'wager' fame...

"People are usually more convinced by reasons they discovered themselves than by those found by others."

Its a good thought to live by.

Yes have just realised that perhaps what I should have asked was:

NON-SMOKERS - what made you NOT experiment with cigarettes?

this would be more effective than asking the question I did, maybe

May start another thread with this title if no-one minds

all your comments have been very useful, thank you

lol Franny, you're absolutely right!
Most of us said 'nothing'

as mentioned, the thought that if I started I'd only have to give up later

and that only the cool girls smoked and, after the initial rejection/failures, I made a conscious decision not to try to be cool in any way whatsoever.

LOL WWW, at least you answered

I have started a thread asking the non-smokers but no replies so far

MrsB, you are the epitome of stylishness and chic

Honestly, I don't think anything anyone said would have stopped me. I was determined. I was 13 . Have only just started to consider myself a non-smoker . Gave up when pg with DD.

well yes I am now - I have found my own style and no longer either need to try or care what the cool girls think.

I was a deeply unconfident and geeky teenager.

Hi

I haven't read all of the responses, but for me, it was the fact that each fag took, on average, 5 minutes off my life, that got to me. I didn't care at first. I knew the risks and chose to live life to the full, like your friend. (I'd been a non-smoker for ages, and was fed up of being cast as the goodie-goodie who doesn't.) However, after a year or so (of 40 a day by the end - I have noooo will power) I added up the 5 minutes and got a shock!

HTH

i think i did it to fit in, so i'd push the 'it's a bit wanky to do something just to fit in' line a la MrsB. but the truth is that she can give up, and she probably will. it's disgusting but it's a rite of passage. plus, she'll probably 'need' to know how to handle tobacco cos she'll probably want to smoke dope if she doesn't already. have you spoken to her about that? seems to me it's a more insidious road to go down than plain smoking, iykwim?

they've banned smoking up here for the last year, it's been BRILLIANT! tell her it will be a PITA to be addicted to smoking when the ban comes into force, loads of people have given up here this winter, just cos it's freezing and grim standing outside. and there has been more fighting etc so it's actually more dangerous to be outside a pub nowadays.

watch 10 years younger!
smoking makes you uglier!

i loved loved smoking...and still really miss it, but when i was younger, nothing anybody said would put me off...though i do recall my dad saying that he wasn't going to lecture me because he had been a smoker etc etc...only gave up when ttc

sorry, have no advice...really wished i had never started smoking though

Nothing I suppose, Franny. I started when I was 17 and a half (and it was Italy, 1988, totally different awareness), when all my friends had been smoking for at least 2 years. I started in order to have something to do with my hands while we were chatting. How pathetic is that?

Yes, Aitch, I said "oh I know it seems cool" and she said no no it wasn't that.

I did tell her I knew people who had started smoking spliffs (IMO less addictive than nicotine) and got hooked on the tobacco

I just let her ask me about stuff at her own pace

today it was had I ever taken the pill and should she stop trying cigarettes

ohhh bless her I do love her

Nothing.

I started in my mid-20s.

Nothing you can say IMO. At 17 getting older, becoming addicted, being skint, getting uglier, becoming more addicted was not going to happen to ME. The only thing that would have stopped me smoking was if cigarettes were unavailable.

Same here, nothing. And I wasn't young when I started, not bowing into peer pressure.

You could tell her that by the time she's been smoking 10 or 15 years and realises she's addiced, that every time she lights up, or gets a little twinge in her chest or a pain when she breathes in, she will be panicking that she's done irreversible damage. In the end it was this constant fear that made me stop. Maybe if I'd been told it would turn me into a nervous wreck. But then again, I thought I was invinsible and didn't believe anything anyone said.

Frany - did she ask about going on the Pill? Because women who smoke and take the Pill are at very much higher risk of suffering a DVT apparently the risk is about 20 times higher in smokers than among non-smokers who take the Pill.

When I was a teenager, a 16 year old acqualintance tragically died of a pulmonary thrombosis that was initially misdiagnosed as an asthma attack - she was a smoker and on the Pill.

Have you read 'The tipping point'? It explains that nothing anyone says will stop teenagers trying cigs and that some people are more likely to become addicted than others for physiological reasons, sorry...

Bother -I've looked again at the source for that 20 times higher risk stat, and it doesn't say quite what I thought it did - that's the increase in risk for heart attack, not DVT.

But there is an increased risk of various cardiocvascular problems (including DVT) in women who smoke and tale the pill.

Nothing, not even my father dying of mouth cancer previously stopped me (and my brothers) starting smoking.

Firepile, yes, I did tell her and she said she would tell her friend who smokes and takes the pill

I starteed smoking at 14 and quit at 18 when my boyfriend (now dh) got a bad chest infection. Tbh I found it dead easy to give up although I still have the odd dream about it.

The health warnings made no difference to me, a big thing about the damage it does was made at school and it went over my head totally.

What might have made a difference is someone I looked up to telling me I was looking like a stupid teenage rebellious prat rather than a cool grown up.

But I don't think she is a stupid rebellious teenage prat

I think she is entirely normal for wanting to try things and I kind of admire her having the spirit not to just meekly accept everything her parents say

and yes I know smoking is crap and horrible but you see what I mean