Smoking Causes Death: Here's the Play By Play

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You smoked to rebel, or to look cool, and now you just can't quite quit. It might not be too late to save your life, but by the time you know you have cancer of the lung, throat or mouth, it probably will be. But, since a cure is possible, rather than dwelling on the possibility of your untimely death, let’s briefly consider your treatment options.

First, your flesh will be cut by a surgeon, and maybe more than once. The first cut will be a biopsy to confirm you really have cancer and not some other less deadly problem. The major cutting will come after the biopsy confirms what you already knew in your gut. The surgeon cutting away your lung or esophagus hopes your cancer hasn’t spread before he removes the part that is visible. Surgery is the best hope for long-term survival, and it is also quite a good business for surgeons who have many more clients than they would if no one smoked tobacco.

After you bleed and your muscles and other tissues begin to heal, you will slowly find out whether or not critical nerves were damaged by the surgery and whether or not you are likely to be left with long-term pain or paralysis.

You survived the surgery? Ok, now it’s time for radiation and maybe chemotherapy. Radiation, in theory, will kill remaining cancer cells that are undetectable with current technology but that are lethal if left alive. You will go to the clinic or hospital for many days of radiation therapy, and the rays you hope will keep you alive will also burn your skin and possibly produce other cancer that won’t show up for several years.

You may also be given chemotherapy. Why? Cancer cells not only invade your body from the original tumor the surgeon could see and cut out, they also swim around in your blood and spread to entirely new locations. This is called metastasis. New locations can include your bones, your liver, the surface of your skin and your brain. Once cancer cells take up residence in these new locations, they begin the invasion and destruction of the normal tissues around them. If you are going to live, they must be destroyed. It is not easy, and is sometimes impossible.

Chemotherapy involves injecting you with poison that will make you vomit, make your hair fall out, and leave you tired, sick and looking like you are older than you really are. Chemotherapy was originally discovered during an accident with chemical warfare agents. Of course, there have been some improvements since those bad old days, and now nausea can be better controlled, the quality of wigs is better, and sometimes the chemotherapy even works.

Are you ready to light up another cigarette, or do want to go on to the part about exactly how you will die if the surgery and radiation and chemotherapy fail? If you’d rather stop now, try a new approach: Quit Smoking Today! It's Easier Than You Think!