Do You Know Anyone Who Smoked During Their Pregnancy? (faint, weeks, early)
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obviously op has not been a smoker is not aware of the hold it can have on your hold life. I got that monkey off my back almost 40 years ago but I still am considered a pervious smoker on all my medical records.
I knew a young woman who got pregnant and wanted me to help her find adoptive home for her child. She was still smoking and probably drank too as far as I know. She had no prenatal care either. Just a very irresponsible 30 year old woman. Even as hard as it is to adopt a newborn domestically, several couples refused to even consider her child because of the smoking and drinking issues. The baby was finally placed in a good home and I hope she turned out to be a healthy child. Birthmom went right on with her unhealthy life style after the baby was born.
Indeed, I've never had a cigarette or any tobacco product and plan never to for the rest of my life. I don't think anyone is denying smoking is difficult to quit, but doesn't it seem a little bizarre that someone who wants a child and knows they are pregnant would not only continue smoking but actively avoid efforts to quit?
I was an on again, off again smoker for years - I tried to quit many times but just kept going back to it. I was terribly addicted. And I've known women who have smoked throughout their own pregnancies, try as they might they just could not kick the habit.
But when I found out that I was expecting, I quit and did not smoke at all during my pregnancy. I relapsed a little bit after my son was born. But when I got pregnant again, I did not smoke at all during that pregnancy, either.
I think that it helped a lot that I had quit many times before and I knew that I could go without cigarettes. I also knew that if anything went wrong with my pregnancies or if my babies had any health issues - I would blame myself if I had smoked or done anything else potentially harmful during my pregnancies. So I was very careful about everything I put into my body.
Now I haven't had a cigarette in years and I don't want one.
I smoked while pregnant, but limited myself to 3 a day.
At 'no kudzu'... after 10 years, you are not considered a previous smoker medically, or by insurance companies.
Smoking is bad for you... we all know this. But the anti-smoking propaganda just gives addicts fuel... like my young BIL who believed the TV ads showing smoke filling the womb while the baby breathed it in... ridiculous. Or those that believe that asthma is caused solely by smoking... what about children (like my cousin's kids) with asthma, but whose mother DIDN'T smoke? There are a lot of factors at play.
Years ago, I went out drinking with friends. When we hit the bar, we ordered shots. While throwing back my first drink (a shot) of the evening, I was overcome with a REALLY bad headache - I had to go home right away. The following night, a friend took me to the ER. I couldn't convince the doctor I hadn't fallen and hit my head... because he stopped listening after I said I took a shot. Fast forward a week later, diagnosed with a tumor or possible aneurysm, with an exploratory brain surgery scheduled by my own primary care doctor... I sought a FOURTH opinion and went outside my insurance to another doctor. I had impacted sinuses.
Tobacco (or alcohol, in the above case) isn't always the culprit. It's just easy to blame. 30 years ago, more 75% of the adult population of America smoked. And yet there are billions of people living now that do NOT have asthma, and are still alive... as are their children. Mind boggling.
I smoked while pregnant, but limited myself to 3 a day.
At 'no kudzu'... after 10 years, you are not considered a previous smoker medically, or by insurance companies.
Smoking is bad for you... we all know this. But the anti-smoking propaganda just gives addicts fuel... like my young BIL who believed the TV ads showing smoke filling the womb while the baby breathed it in... ridiculous. Or those that believe that asthma is caused solely by smoking... what about children (like my cousin's kids) with asthma, but whose mother DIDN'T smoke? There are a lot of factors at play.
Years ago, I went out drinking with friends. When we hit the bar, we ordered shots. While throwing back my first drink (a shot) of the evening, I was overcome with a REALLY bad headache - I had to go home right away. The following night, a friend took me to the ER. I couldn't convince the doctor I hadn't fallen and hit my head... because he stopped listening after I said I took a shot. Fast forward a week later, diagnosed with a tumor or possible aneurysm, with an exploratory brain surgery scheduled by my own primary care doctor... I sought a FOURTH opinion and went outside my insurance to another doctor. I had impacted sinuses.
Tobacco (or alcohol, in the above case) isn't always the culprit. It's just easy to blame. 30 years ago, more 75% of the adult population of America smoked. And yet there are billions of people living now that do NOT have asthma, and are still alive... as are their children. Mind boggling.
Hahaha, at the highlighted. I remember that, too. How utterly stupid. I remember a similar ad or article about how "your unborn baby is in a smoke-filled environment." Oh really. Exactly how does that work?
One can give facts about the negative effects of smoking on a fetus without the drama or outright stupidity.
I smoked while pregnant, but limited myself to 3 a day.
At 'no kudzu'... after 10 years, you are not considered a previous smoker medically, or by insurance companies.
Smoking is bad for you... we all know this. But the anti-smoking propaganda just gives addicts fuel... like my young BIL who believed the TV ads showing smoke filling the womb while the baby breathed it in... ridiculous. Or those that believe that asthma is caused solely by smoking... what about children (like my cousin's kids) with asthma, but whose mother DIDN'T smoke? There are a lot of factors at play.
Years ago, I went out drinking with friends. When we hit the bar, we ordered shots. While throwing back my first drink (a shot) of the evening, I was overcome with a REALLY bad headache - I had to go home right away. The following night, a friend took me to the ER. I couldn't convince the doctor I hadn't fallen and hit my head... because he stopped listening after I said I took a shot. Fast forward a week later, diagnosed with a tumor or possible aneurysm, with an exploratory brain surgery scheduled by my own primary care doctor... I sought a FOURTH opinion and went outside my insurance to another doctor. I had impacted sinuses.
Tobacco (or alcohol, in the above case) isn't always the culprit. It's just easy to blame. 30 years ago, more 75% of the adult population of America smoked. And yet there are billions of people living now that do NOT have asthma, and are still alive... as are their children. Mind boggling.
I have never heard anyone claim that. There is no denying that smoking is bad for you. Don't try to make light of it.
Smoking has been related to premature birth and low birth weight.
My cousin smoked through both of her pregnancies because she felt it would be too stressful on the fetus to stop.
Child #1 - born EXTREMELY premature with a severely low birth weight. When she was born, her lungs were very underdeveloped as well. Once out of the nursery ICU, she had to continue breathing treatments for several years and did grow up with asthma. In this case, the asthma was related to being born premature and underdeveloped, but both of those could have been impacted by the smoking.
Child #2 - born full term with no issues.
I personally don't agree with smoking while pregnant, but I'm not going to throw stones, either.
I smoked while pregnant, but limited myself to 3 a day.
At 'no kudzu'... after 10 years, you are not considered a previous smoker medically, or by insurance companies.
Smoking is bad for you... we all know this. But the anti-smoking propaganda just gives addicts fuel... like my young BIL who believed the TV ads showing smoke filling the womb while the baby breathed it in... ridiculous. Or those that believe that asthma is caused solely by smoking... what about children (like my cousin's kids) with asthma, but whose mother DIDN'T smoke? There are a lot of factors at play.
Years ago, I went out drinking with friends. When we hit the bar, we ordered shots. While throwing back my first drink (a shot) of the evening, I was overcome with a REALLY bad headache - I had to go home right away. The following night, a friend took me to the ER. I couldn't convince the doctor I hadn't fallen and hit my head... because he stopped listening after I said I took a shot. Fast forward a week later, diagnosed with a tumor or possible aneurysm, with an exploratory brain surgery scheduled by my own primary care doctor... I sought a FOURTH opinion and went outside my insurance to another doctor. I had impacted sinuses.
Tobacco (or alcohol, in the above case) isn't always the culprit. It's just easy to blame. 30 years ago, more 75% of the adult population of America smoked. And yet there are billions of people living now that do NOT have asthma, and are still alive... as are their children. Mind boggling.
By thirty years ago, the number of smokers had dropped considerably. The first Surgeon General's Report on Smoking came out in 1964 and the number of smokers started to decrease.
See table 4. In 1982, between 30 and 33 per cent of adults smoked.
Saying that many people who are exposed to smoke do not get cancer, or they smoke during pregnancy and their children are not apparently damaged, is simply an effort to rationalize your own smoking.
How did you determine that three cigarettes a day was safe for your baby, but more were not?
What you have to understand is the concept of risk. If you look at a group of smokers, what problems are more likely to happen to their babies? It isn't just asthma.
Women who smoke during pregnancy are more likely to have miscarriages and stillbirths. Their babies are more likely to be born too soon, be underweight at birth and to die of SIDS. Their children are at higher risk to have ADHD and trouble with school performance.
Just because a baby falls in the normal weight range does not mean it was unaffected by its mother's smoking. A baby that would have weighed 7 pounds if its mother had not smoked might weigh 6 pounds and be considered normal.
Tobacco is not blamed without evidence to back it up. It is indeed the culprit. It does do what it is blamed for.
Hahaha, at the highlighted. I remember that, too. How utterly stupid. I remember a similar ad or article about how "your unborn baby is in a smoke-filled environment." Oh really. Exactly how does that work?
One can give facts about the negative effects of smoking on a fetus without the drama or outright stupidity.
Perhaps you might want to think of those ads as metaphors? They were not meant to be taken literally, you know.
The fact that you remember them does mean they were effective, doesn't it? Perhaps that is the point of the ads, to make you think?
The fact is that nicotine does cross the placenta and is probably one of the major causes of the adverse effects of smoking on the fetus.
Women who smoke also have larger amounts of carbon monoxide in their blood, which reduces the amount of oxygen available to the baby.
The levels of nicotine and its breakdown product cotinine are actually higher in the fetus than in its smoking mother, reflecting the fact that the baby cannot get rid of it very easily:
Maybe those ads were more literal after all. The fetus is swimming in amniotic fluid contaminated with nicotine. It inhales and swallows amniotic fluid, so it is being exposed to the toxins in cigarette smoke through its stomach, skin, and lungs. Kind of like living in a toxic waste dump.
How about if mom is only exposed to second hand smoke:
"The fact that, in involuntary smokers, fetal serum and amniotic fluid cotinine levels reached 30 and 44% of the corresponding levels in active smokers, respectively, supports the evidence that passive smoking could have a substantial deleterious effect on the fetus." (Cotinine is a metabolite of nicotine ~ Suzy Q.)
There is no safe level of cigarette smoke. Even if you do not mind that half of smokers will die from diseases caused by smoking and that smokers will die on average about 14 years sooner than non-smokers, please do not smoke during pregnancy, do not expose yourself to second hand smoke during pregnancy, and do not smoke around your children.
Perhaps you might want to think of those ads as metaphors? They were not meant to be taken literally, you know.
The fact that you remember them does mean they were effective, doesn't it? Perhaps that is the point of the ads, to make you think?
<Snip>
I certainly hope they were metaphors! I still thought they were dumb, but that's just me.
Of course, when you are pregnant and smoking, you are going to notice anything smoking-related like that. You don't even need the ads. The guilt weighs heavily on you. It did on me, anyway.
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