Personal Plea from Technopatra

[technopatra]

Hey everybody-

I know I haven't been involved with the Project for some time, but have been lurking on the Eplaya to passively keep in touch. Now I need to actively do so.

You may or may not now that I've been really sick for the past several weeks. What started out as a cold became a bronchitis which became a respiratory infection which culminated in full-blown acute asthma. I had a rough time breathing between massive coughing fits that have left me weak and dizzy, with a constant headache like I'd been at a speed metal concert. I haven't been able to work or socialize pretty much since Xmas. I couldn't sleep through the night for over a month, which made me even a little crazed than usual.

At the moment I'm on a massive drug regimen to get me back to a relatively normal state, and it's finally starting to work: prednisone to improve my strength and boost my immune system, a powder inhaler for maintenance that I may have to take twice a day forever, a spray inhaler for "emergencies", codeine cough syrup so I can sleep through the night. I had to sleep with a humidifier and I can now carry on a conversation for more than five minutes without setting off another coughing jag if I'm careful. I'm just damn lucky I have health insurance now, so that I only had to pay $60 worth of over $300 in prescriptions and about $500 worth of doctor's office visits & chest X-rays, and lucky that my company has been really cool about me telecommuting part time from home, so I've only missed 2 full weeks of work.

I have to make sure I have my inhalers with me if I leave the house for even a minute. A blast of exhaust or waft of strong perfume on the street will still have me doubled over in the middle of the sidewalk. A few days ago I had a coughing fit so severe that I when I was done I found myself lying on the floor, not knowing exactly how I got there...thankfully I was at home in my room when it happened. I'm down to only about a half-dozen coughing fits a day now, and they are less intense.

I was very relieved to find out this week that my X-rays showed no other, more serious problems, but the fact remains that I now have a permanent health condition from smoking cigarettes. Whether we are in personal touch or not, I care about you as a human, and I don't want you to suffer anything like what I've been dealing with. Ever.

I've felt isolated and scared, worried about working, worried about my now ongoing health care costs and needs, worried about my dwindling social life, worried that I have a whole new sensitivity to cleaning products and fuel and incense and any kind of smoke...and any cloud of dust. I'm *33 freaking years old*, and probably have done irreversible damage to my lungs.

I'm not telling you my sob story for sympathy. I don't need any help. I'm on my way to getting this acute episode under control, and get to the point where I only have to keep taking one inhaler daily. I will be able to hang out and talk your ear off and get back to my life soon.

But I am going to ask all of you, smokers and non-smokers alike, for something very, very hard: I want you all to stop pretending that smoking is OK.

I tried quitting smoking several times in my life. I was successful for a year one time, ten months the next, etc. etc., but I always came back to smoking. It's an addiction, we all know. It's bad for us, we all know. We do it anyway, because we live in an intense denial that it won't seriously affect us, that we won't be the ones to get sick, that nothing can happen until we get old. And we do it anyway, because our friends do it. We secretly feel annoyed when our friends quit, then we secretly feel better when they come back to the fold, so we don't have to feel as guilty about not quitting.

I know that every one of you smokers have thought about quitting. Maybe it was some hungover morning when you felt like death. Maybe it was some time where you were the only smoker in the group having to duck outside in the cold, windy rain. Maybe it was that time you saw your grandpa with emphysema, or heard about your coworker getting lung cancer. Maybe it was, it is, all the moments you think about becoming a parent. Maybe it's every time you pick up someone else's moop-y butt from the playa. Maybe it's just right now.

I'm begging you, on my knees, steroids in hand, to do it now. Do it together. Make a pact. No last smoke, no complicated ritual, no saying goodbye, no hypnosis, no master cleanse...just stop telling yourself and each other it's OK. Do anything, be it positive or negative reinforcement, to saturate your consciousness with the realities of smoking on you, and of your effect on those around you.

Happily gain that dreaded ten pounds - you can lose it later.
Get really agro and snappy with everyone and don't worry about it - you can apologize later.
Stock up on chewing gum, cinnamon toothpix, and altoids for your oral fixation.
Keep rubber bands, yo-yo's, those annoying Chinatown clicking-frog things in your pockets to keep your hands busy.
Make a deal with your partner that you can make out whenever you have the urge.
Turn every nicotine fit into "oral sex tuesday".

Remind yourself that every time a child sees you smoking on the street,
she is receiving a message that smoking is a cool, grown-up thing to do.
Remember that even though you don't smoke in front of your own child,
she will grow up knowing that you do, and thinking it's ok
...and have a 50% higher likelihood of becoming a smoker herself.

Remind yourself that all tobacco companies are ALL OWNED BY RIGHT-WING REPUBLICANS, EVEN AMERICAN SPIRIT http://www.reynoldsamerican.com/Who/corp_factbook.asp .
You roll-your-own types, too...Bali Shag may be Canadian, but it's still right-wing.

Stop hiding behind the fact that no one in your family had health problems from smoking so you probably won't either -- it's not just about you. It's about you setting an example for everyone else who wasn't blessed with your hearty genes.

Think of me, the once-glorious Technopatra...picture me doubled over, choking, red of face, trying not to panic while pulling on breaths like a rope, hawking up mucus like Neo getting out of the pod in the first Matrix, then fainting...actually blacking out for a minute before waking up on the floor with no memory of landing there and a chance of having peed my pants.

Yeah that's right. I wet my goddamn pants. More than once. Smoking-induced asthma isn't that cute little wheezing you see on TV, and it isn't immediately helped by sucking on that cute little inhaler. It's ugly, painful, embarrassing, dangerous, and gross. And it really could be you.

Denial has put my health at serious risk, and I am *lucky* that it's *only* asthma I've got right now. I'm considering it a blessing that my body gave me something terrifying but manageable to get me to deal with the reality of what I've been doing to myself. I'm asking you all to face the truth, stop denying what you are doing to yourselves, and love yourselves enough to give up the immediate gratification of smoking for a longer, healthier existence.

And you non-smokers and social smokers - stop enabling your friends and lovers to do this to themselves:
Be the bitch, be the dick that steps on your buddies' good time when they want to smoke.
Throw away their cigarettes when they are not looking.
Let them know when their clothes stink, their breath stinks, their cars stink, their bodies stink, their hair stinks.
Don't politely suggest breath mints or a change of shirts.
Be annoyed when they need to duck out of a conversation to go smoke.
Tell them you *do* notice their smoker's wrinkles, their ashy pallor, their enlarged pores.
Give 'em the stink eye *without* makin' it funny.
Don't let them off the hook spending $5 on a pack of cigarettes when they owe you $10 or they haven't bought you flowers or beer this week.
Don't "respect" their needs and personal time.
Don't have that occasional social smoke with them over a drink.
Withhold sex, pancakes, child visitation...whatever will get their attention.
Don't let them think it's ok for even a second. You have every right to be irritated, so start exercising those rights.

Everyone - you can do it. I know you can. I will do anything I can to help you.
Call me so I can cough into your ear.
Let me know you've stopped and I'll make you a badge.
Let me be the voice at the back of your mind nagging you, pleading with you, strengthening your resolve.

I will be that voice in person just as soon as I am able. It is my goal to make smoking cigarettes the single most socially retarded thing you can do. It is the television of social interaction - you are buying into advertising, corporate malfeasance, image-making, and your own subjugation as an intelligent, expressionistic individual...no matter how cool and happy you feel doing it.

Every time you smoke, you may as well be chomping a Big Mac and wearing sweat-shop Nike's while buying a gun from a homophobe at Wal-Mart to go be a Minuteman on the Mexico border during a Pro-Patriot Act rally, because it's the same damn thing...you are helping to keep in economic, governmental, and societal power the very anti-individuality forces Burning Man was collectively created to repudiate and transcend.

Plus, you are (sometimes not so) slowly killing yourself.
All of you.
Even you.
Yeah, you.

Campaign and art project ideas brewing. Collaborators welcome. Thanks for making it to the end of this message.

Please feel free to forward this far and wide.

[nogganoodle]

I think you might just have swung it for me technopatra, I have been a hardcore smoker for about 18 years now and am always saying to myself, partner and friends that I will give up next year etc etc but have never had the balls to do it.

I read your posting just the once and I do believe that today may be the day to GIVE UP. I've been getting worried about being ill and all i want is to live to see my 3 year old son go off to university and make something of himself.

You can safely say that you have affected at least one person in this big wide world for the better.

I wish you all the love in the world with your recovery. You are in my thoughts

Much Love

[hageymon]

Another reason to QUIT smoking, especially for the guys: LYMP DYCK! That's right, fellas; LYMP DYCK! Sooner or later, you're gonna get it, and no amount of Cialis or Viagra will give you that Youthful Woodie you so desire! That's why, finally, I have decided to quit the nasty habit, too! I'm much too young for LYMP DYCK! Gotta cure that LYMP DYCK! LYMP DYCK is frustrating and embarrassing! LYMP DYCK sucks! Hats off to Technopatra!

[Apollonaris Zeus]

Technopatra I am totally sorry about your condition, smoking anything is harmful and cigs are one of the worst especially if your addicted and being addicted to anything is bad. Everyone should get all their addictions under order and find out what they are really missing in life before life itself fades before them.

I started smoking around 13 and demanded that my parents allow me to smoke. They did not, so I continued to smoke regularly until I was sixteen when I asked again and they granted it. I told them this was great and said now I can quit since it was never really about smoking, but having the right to make my own decisions about me.

You and I always knew the damage that smoking does, but somewhere along the way, I quit and you continued still being a rebel and then the addict. Once in a blue moon, I'll smoke a cit or cigar and enjoy it more now then before. But smoking anything is or should be a right since you are the master of your body and the decisions you make for it. I'm not for stopping the production of tobacco nor opium because someone has become addicted- that was the choice they made for themselve. I am for non-smoke public places not just because I was a smoke-free atmosphere, but because in the long run there will be less people becoming addicted just because everyone around them is smoking.

Again, I'm very sad that you have asthma and hope that you will once again be on the playa with us as close to being fully recovered! I support you on your fight against all addicted forms of smoking and to let all BMers that "the dust is enough!"

So what are you doing next Tuesday?

Love

AIIZ

[Bambi of Finland]

I've smoked on and off since I was 16 yrs old, I am 45. I've always used the once a year excuse "Burningman" as reason to smoke. I've rituallistically raided campmates ciggy supplies and placed myself in situations where I would be gifted a smoke or two or three. I'd swear it was what got me through that 15 hr. drive to Blackrock. I'd like to believe it is what made me tolerable, in camp and more socially acceptable. The truth is that it took months afterward to feel like my lungs were back to non-smoking normal. I needed to work on my attitude and not worry about being socially accepted. My campmates love me anyway. I've had one cigarrette since last Sept. and it made me sick.
I spent some time taking care of my Dad last April when He was in the hospital one more time because of his heart and lung problems. I believe he won't survive one more hospital stay. He is now chronically tired and short of breath, though 75 years old , he is suffering. I am most like my father out of all nine of my brothers and sisters. I must stop the chain of behavior now, and hope its not to late. No more excuses.
I think this is a perfect art project for Hope and Fear. Maybe someplace where butts or even a portion of a persons pack of cigarrettes is donated and deposited into a plexiglass tube, so we can all see the nasty accumulation. It's a start.
Thank you Technopatra, your message is certainly resonating with me. Not sure I can help you , but please let us know your progress. I can certainly give you some labor/assistance, at the event.
Love Bambi

[robotland]

Finally quitting smoking FOR GOOD is one of the things in my life that I am the most proud of having accomplished. It's very, very hard, and I've relapsed several times even after having been smokeless for several years- Currently I'm at about eight years clean. Six of the past eight years were spent working at the West Michigan Cancer Center, where I witnessed many ended or dramatically shortened lives due to tobacco use. To my astonishment, many of the nurses at the Center still smoked- Testament to tobacco's wicked power. When I still smoked, I had no idea of how much my hair and clothes and breath stank. Of how much it was stealing my breath away. And how much it freakin' COST. I could have taken four friends to Burning Man, full-price tickets, for what I spent on smokes in a year. And I quit when they cost almost HALF what they do now.
Quit. You'll just bust, you'll be so fucking proud of yourself.

[LeChatNoir]

good job robot... really.

And Techonpatra... my thoughts are with you. Everyone in my family smokes cigerettes but me, and I worry about them... we are in Kentucky... where tobacco is a vegitable. They aren’t going to quite unless they want to and I refuse to endlessly preach. We've all been through that before and we all know the deal. So I just worry silently and will be there if they need me I reckon. Ugh...

I really don’t have big issues with anybody smoking. But I worry when someone lets it progress past a luxury to become a habit. I’m for most anything in moderation... but it can slip easily out of control if not watched.

[Bob]

I quit (again) in December. Snuff helps w/ tapering off, and gives you nice chunky playa-like boogers.

[diane o'thirst]

((((((((Technopatria))))))))))))

You know what? I'm a proud non-smoker and tonight, coloured me inspired. I've been playing with the idea of doing a Smoke-in-the-Box installation for this year, I WANT to do it now!

Yikes...I'm projecting again. See what a bad influence you guys are?

Off to the drawing board...I have an installation to design...

[technopatra]

Wow, everybody, thanks for sharing your stories, too. A couple more things...

I was down to 3-5 cigarettes a day, max...and would go for days at a time without smoking. I'm beginning to think there is no such thing as moderation...the damage can still creep up on you.

I started smoking at 14, and I did it for one reason..I wanted to look tough. I was a skinny, big-boobed blonde girl, I was starting to get a lot of attention I wasn't really ready for. Smoking was immediately part of an identity I cultivated...and I wonder how much that figured into my inability to permanently quit. I wonder how many other girls felt this?

[DVD Burner]

Wow!

This hit me in the stomach just now really hard.


Sorry to hear that technopatra. I hope you can get better.

[Chai Guy]

Technopatra, thanks for sharing your story with us and I hope that it inspires people to quit.

My mom smoked all her life, it took a heart attack, and a quadruple bypass surgery, along with an above the knee amputation of both legs to get her to quit. (All health problems that her doctors feel could have been prevented had she quit smoking when originally advised).

[gyre]

My cardiologists clinic has a class to teach you all the stuff the doctor doesn't have time for- blood chemistry, diet and exercise. Tobacco can cancel out the benefits of diet and exercise almost instantly in the blood. Someone asked about lung cancer and they virtually dismissed it.
They said that heart failure usually gets smokers before they can get lung problems. So worry about your heart first.
The body reacts to nicotine faster than heroin. That is supposed to be why it is so addictive. If I do something so destructive, I want a much better return on the costs.

Good wishes, Technopatra and everyone else who's quitting.
It is thought that the part of the brain that changes with addiction will reset eventually. This can be measured on MRI now. It's not a delusion.

[Niacin]

Technopatra, I'm geniunely sorry that such a horrible thing has beset you. I had a very rough time quitting cigarettes two years ago, but your story, reinforced by what happened to Chai's mom, will stick in my mind every time a craving hits from here in. I'm rooting for you.

[sparkletarte]

Thanks TP, I just forwarded your post to a friend for whom I'm the bitch.

I'm glad to hear you are on the mend.

[Rob the Wop]

I smoked from when I was 13 until I was 25. During that time I also became addicted tp meth. Guess which one was harder to quit? People sometimes don't realize that cigarettes are an addiction, and the toughest one I personally ever faced.

Smoking is a real bitch to stop and I'm glad you did it. The longer you go without smoking, the more your body will rebuild itself. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

You tend to develope smoke allergies as time passes. Now, after 13 years of not smoking, I can't go into bars for long periods of time. If I drink as little as two beers in a smokey room, I will end up throwing up the next morning and being sick the entire day. The sooner they make bars non smoking in Oregon, the better. It is truely some useless, nasty, noxious weeds.

Someday I'll have to meet up with you there TP, and buy you a drink BTW. I don't tend to post or come around much anymore, but you've put up with my obnoxious furry ass for years on the board.

[robotland]

You tend to develope smoke allergies as time passes. Now, after 13 years of not smoking, I can't go into bars for long periods of time. If I drink as little as two beers in a smokey room, I will end up throwing up the next morning and being sick the entire day. .

I think of this as penance...It never bothered me at all while I smoked, but now it's like getting maced. The wife likes to go to the casino in Michigan City now and then, and while it's GREAT peoplewatching I can only stand a little of it before my eyes get to watering.

[Zhust]

I was talking with a friend of mine the other week about addiction and such. While I have had but 5 cigarettes my whole life, he said he smoked for 20 or 30 years or something. He had tried to quit and failed dozens of times but here's what finally worked:

He just told himself, "I'll have a cigarette tomorrow if I need one," every day.

After a few years of saying that, he got over it. The key is there's never any failure. When you look back you see successes and when you look forward, well, what's the big deal if you don't make it to tomorrow?

Good luck. I'm all for kissing but I hate that yucky mouth taste -- while my plea is completely self-motivated, I also encourage you all to quit.

[AntiM]

I can't believe how many states still allow smoking in restaurants. Larry and I stopped at a truckstop in Ohio and when we asked for a table in the no-smoking area we were told, "It's all smoking. If you don't like it, you can leave." There wasn't another truckstop for miles and miles; we ended up over the border in West Virginia for a smoke-free meal.

As a resident of a clean indoor air state, I was convinced that every public restaurant had to have a no smoking section. I was very wrong.

http://www.no-smoke.org/goingsmokefree.php?id=114#maps

Healing wishes for TP and warm fuzzy thoughts to all those trying to quit.

[Kinetic IV]

"It's all smoking. If you don't like it, you can leave."

I can't believe they had that kind of attitude especially in this day and age. It's a piss poor way to run a business too...alienating your customers is a great way to meet a bankruptcy attorney if you do too much of it.

It may have been a hassle but it made me smile when you said you walked out. They didn't deserve your business.

[theCryptofishist]

Hard stuff. First off, Techno-way to go! Brava! Get better soon! And sorry about that wierd attention you got as a kid, it does wierd things to our heads and we take decades to heal.

My stuff. One of the last things I said to Scott on the night before he was killed was "When are you going to give up smoking?" I'm tearing up right now, because, of course you want to remember your last moments with your husband as being golden. On the other hand, taking him to the hospital for another asthsma attack was always such a strain. I guess I'm glad I didn't have to watch him die a slow death from his lungs. Don't ask it of your loved ones--if you are hesitating in this matter.

[AntiM]

It may have been a hassle but it made me smile when you said you walked out. They didn't deserve your business.

It was more of a hassle than you'd think. Larry had to scale his load and it was the only place available in that neck of the woods, not at all close to the manufacturing plant where we'd been all day. When we went in to eat and found no no smoking, we gave the manager hell, and she flat refused to let us call the owner. Had every single customer staring at us; I can get, um, shrill. Larry was damn near out of drive time; he sat and went over his logs to be sure we could get to a truckstop which was along the assigned route and not run over legal hours. When you're in a 75' vehicle, you can't stop just anywhere. It wasn't just food, we were going down for ten hours rest too. The highway to WV was a twisty two-laner along a river in the dark, very nerve-wracking, but we got there.

[theCryptofishist]

You have an address? Cause you can always right the owner. It may even give you "gravitas" cause it's something that took more effort.

[mojo]

If you can get the address, pass it on - we'll help write the owner too.

[AntiM]

I did call the Attorney General's office to ask about Ohio's smoking laws. Called the tourism board too and let them know we moved on to another state for dinner.

I have the addy, but hesitate to post because I wouldn't want a flood of angry letters, I'd have to know the correspondence would be courteous, professional and polite. The owner has every right to run his business without a smoking section even if it does suck for the non-smokers. We did choose to go elsewhere.

[PrincessCharming]

Sounds familiar, TechnoPatra, regarding your reasons for starting to smoke.. I started at 14 also. I'm 33 too, and wound myself down from the addiction in my late 20s, because I just knew without a shadow of a doubt that I would become very ill if I didn't. Till recently, I was still the "ex" smoker who just had to have one or two with a beer. Feeling like hell the next few days is just not worth it. Sorry to hear about your health problems now. But, glad that it was the swift kick in the ass you've taken it to be. Thanks for taking a stand and passing on that kick in the pants.. I'll be forwarding this to a few friends. It would be fantastic to see an art installation about this on the playa. Thanks!

[tisha2]

hi techno -

i saw this on the staff list a few days ago and have been thinking about it ever since. i've quit so many times. i *know* i need to...it's been time for a long time. i, too, have been down to 3 or so a day for years and have been telling myself that that's okay. i haven't had one yet today. this is when it starts getting hard, and it will suck for weeks. it's usually too much for me after a few days... i'll try the tomorrow trick.

*help!*

[diane o'thirst]

You might want to try thinking this:

"Who's the stronger one here, me or the damn chemical?"

[SED]

Okay, so now everytime I see someone smoking, I want to give them a copy of your letter. I only wish I had the social skill to do that effectively. For me, Burning Man has been a way to circumvent social norms that restrain us from pleading with strangers not to smoke. I live in too small a town to take big risks, but I also live in Black Rock City, and I will risk creating moop (and a punch in the nose) to distribute your story, Techno.

I started smoking at 14, and I did it for one reason..I wanted to look tough. I was a skinny, big-boobed blonde girl, I was starting to get a lot of attention I wasn't really ready for. Smoking was immediately part of an identity I cultivated...and I wonder how much that figured into my inability to permanently quit. I wonder how many other girls felt this?

The important thing to remember about girls and boys is that they are children, no matter how adult they want to be or are forced to act.

[cowboyangel]

you are a real sweety Tech. Will do agnihotra (holy Vedic smoke, not inhaled) for your health.
Love
CBA