QUITTING SMOKING

For years now, there has been a regular barrage of documents, studies, and publications telling you not to smoke, especially if you have diabetes. You know you should stop—but do you know why?

One of the complications of diabetes, especially type 2, non-insulin-dependent diabetes, is circulatory damage: stiffening, constricting, and blockage of small blood vessels. This can lead to all manner of problems, in the feet, the eyes, the heart and elsewhere. But nicotine, the addictive narcotic active ingredient in tobacco, also causes circulatory damage: stiffening, constricting, even blockage of small blood vessels. The diabetic who smokes is more than doubling his odds of trouble, just as the non-diabetic smoker is more than doubling the odds of developing diabetes.

Most smokers have already heard these statistics. Some respond with "It'll never happen to me" (but it can and probably will) and others declare, even believe, that the trauma of quitting would be worse for them than the damage from continuing to smoke.

Smoking has been described as the number one cause of preventable illness and death in the United States. If you have diabetes, it is perhaps the number one bad lifestyle choice, with obesity and inactivity following close behind.

The choice to "follow a healthy lifestyle" cannot come from your doctor. No medication can take its place. The decision has to be yours. If you smoke, the decision to stop is one of the most important steps you can take. It can be very hard, very stressful, to "kick the habit," but the stresses of quitting do less harm than the stresses of continuing to smoke. Talk to your doctor about quitting tobacco; there are many strategies, and a number of pharmaceutical products, to help you quit.