Smoking dangerous to Coke Zero love life

Would you French kiss an “ash tray”?

It turns out that smoking is not only dangerous to your health, it can also kill your already“Coke Zero” love life. While listening to DZRH this morning I caught the entertainment portion where a gossip “columnist” recounted her eaves dropping on a fashion designer and Femme Fatale Izza Calzado.

As the story goes, the designer was allegedly trying his darnest best to convince Izza Calzado to go out on a friendly date, even just lunch, with the most powerful bachelor in the land, President Noynoy Aquino.

But no matter how hard he tried, the designer could not convince the beautiful Izza to agree because she was completely turned off by cigarette smoke or even just the scent of tobacco!

Unless President Aquino chooses to go cold turkey and stay tobacco free, I don’t see him following in the footsteps of French President Nicolas Sarkozy who married celebrity model Carla Bruni. Sadly even if he were smitten enough, it would take 2 years detox to clean out the scent of tobacco in his pores.

We often make fun of waiting at the port for your ship to dock, but imagine waiting for your boat and being denied passage because it’s a non-smoking vessel? Imagine losing a championship because you never even got to play?

They say that there is nothing worse than a reformed smoker and I must admit that I am one. But I needed to share the story for a couple of reasons. First of all, the pre-emptive strike against the Presidential date is a strong reminder for people to consider what vices they want to carry through life and what they would be giving up.

Are you just losing a date with an Izza Calzado or are you denying passage to the best romance you’ll ever have or completely lose out marrying someone who would have been the perfect partner? All because you took a habit, an addiction you can live without?

Reformed smoker or not, many people I know will look at a stunning man or woman and would comment how attractive they are. But the minute the object of attention puffs on a cigarette, the usual reaction is: “I can’t imagine French kissing an ash tray.”

The second reason is because I am currently under going medication for COPD, which stands for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease.

To give you an idea, imagine yourself out of breath walking up just one flight of steps, then wheezing as you hear your lungs gurgle under your chest, because mucous and fluids have started to obstruct your air passages. You feel weak like someone having a bad case of asthma or mild pneumonia.

Whether you are 30 or 60, COPD is a curse that comes as the result of smoking. I quit smoking in July of 1991, but not early enough to avoid developing COPD. What makes COPD bad is the “chronic” part of it.

At age 55, I have had 2 episodes of COPD in the last year. The difficult part of it is figuring out if you just have a cold related cough, if you’re having allergy related asthma, if you have the beginnings of Pneumonia or if you have COPD.

Having to guess between all these sucks because you self medicate a mild cough or asthma but won’t realize COPD or Pneumonia until it’s really there. All these requires a hospital visit, sometimes a chest X-ray, and ultimately 1 to 2 weeks treatment of a very strong anti-bacterial medicine because bacteria builds up alongside the obstructions.

Add up the 500 for doctors fees with the 247.50 X seven days and do it twice a year and you’ve just spent 4,465.00 pesos. COPD is not cheap and as you grow older, it can only get worse.

Last night that bleak perspective struck as I weakly walked towards members of media celebrating one of several dozens of Christmas parties. Even as I took an afternoon nap, I could tell how very low my energy levels had gone. With inefficient lungs unable to process oxygen into your body and blood system, you can’t expect to have much energy.

Knowing how many of the young women in media have taken up smoking, I silently wondered if they knew they were compromising their reproductive capacities because their lungs are slowly becoming inefficient and directly contaminated with cigarette based chemicals?

Sadly, the ex-smoker in me knows that we don’t really think much of these. Between peer pressure, media induced habits and oxygen deprivation; our rational mind doesn’t really stand a chance in the argument.We only choose to change when the situation causes us real discomforts or brings about real threats.

Izza Calzado may not be enough motivation for some people to quit smoking, but consider the choice: If you don’t quit smoking, smoking will ultimately help you quit by killing you slowly, painfully and expensively. And then when they cremate you, your friends can even light up their cigarettes as you go up in smoke!

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