What sort of risks would you think of when you thought about health risks?

I mean, I mean how the health risks is associated with smoking is as long as your arm aren’t you? I mean you’ve got lung cancer, coronary heart disease are obviously the two biggest things, but emphysema and all kinds of things. But I mean it’s not just is that. It’s cosmetic things as well. It ages the skin and it’s just

And other things as well. I mean just social things. It makes, it colours your teeth. And it makes your breath smell bad. It makes, you know, it makes things, you know, your general fitness levels fall through the floor. But for me, I mean, always, always the biggest things I associated with smoking were always old people, I think. Old people in bed wheezing away, coughing up their lungs or whatever.

I mean it was, because I used to be quite young, sporty and you know, athletic. I stopped doing stuff like this, I got lazy, but I suddenly, things were, things were more difficult to do, like going out playing a long game of football. Things like that. You know, or getting a cold. That was always the worst one. You get a cold and you always end up with a, every single, it doesn’t matter what kind of cold it was, you’d end up, I’d end up with a cough. A horrible, chesty cough, where you’re hacking up horrible gunk. And after the cold had cleared, even for a few, you know, even for probably a week, two weeks, sometimes longer than that, the cough would be there still. And it wasn’t sort like a proper smoker’s cough. I never had that sort of wheezing at 6 o’clock in the morning every single morning. It was only ever sort of just after I’d a cold. But it made colds more difficult to shift, because they lasted longer than I think they normally would, because they hang around because my lungs were clapped out, [laughs] effectively. And I think it was, that was one of the things that really annoyed me.

And I think I realised that probably within sort of a year or so, a year prior to me giving up, I suddenly realised, wait a minute. I always get, I just thought, initially I put it down to bad luck, initially I thought I’m just having, you know, I’m just getting a lot of chesty colds at the moment. But I don’t think it was that realistically. It was because my, you know, I’d been smoking for such a long time. And I think that was a crucial aspect of it. But I think it was a matter of, all of those things put into one, you know, the, the health aspects, the cost aspects and that with the catalyst of, of me suddenly realising that I found myself completely and utterly enslaved to it. I think all of those things conspired together all in one go, came together and that was the moment that I just thought to myself, do you know what, that’s it. That’s time. I’m going to pack this in. Which I eventually did.

Now obviously the condition of my teeth, that’s another thing. I mean because I’ve smoked for, well off and on for so long, the condition of my teeth are pretty bad. I think there may be other factors that contribute to that, like diabetes or you know, whatever. But I do suffer periodontal. I have periodontal disease which means now that all my teeth have to come out and a totally new set put in. I’ve been putting that off for a while, but I know it needs to happen soon, you know, because I’m concerned about the infections and you know, because if your mouth isn’t right then you’ve got bad blood [laughs]. You know, it circulates. It goes everywhere. And that’s something I’m actually about to take action on now. I’ve already seen the dentist, but that was several months ago. And the reason I didn’t sort of do it immediately was because, because most of my teeth are still okay. But the condition is there, so that’s going to have And smoking has certainly contributed to all of that. So I was thinking, well I’ve stopped smoking now. I’m going to have my teeth done. Once that’s done, that’s going to help me prevent myself from smoking if I’ve got a new set of dentures [laughs].

I was sitting, I wasn’t sitting with chest infections all the time. Sorry [laughs] I wasn’t sitting with chest infections all the time. Because I was, I, you know, I would, if there was flu going around, I was the one getting it. If there was a cold in the area, I was the one that was in bed because it was so debilitating because I couldn’t breathe and you know, my lungs I was wheezing and coughing and, I haven’t had any of that in the last two years. Simply because I’m not smoking anymore. I don’t wheeze when I talk. I don’t have the irritating little [imitates a cough, cough, cough] all the time. And what a difference. What a difference it makes that I can walk up the road and feel happy and cheerful and, hell I can breathe [laughs]. And for me, that’s, you know, it’s a wonderful feeling to have.

The funniest thing is we go used to go jogging in the morning, me and my friend. We used to go jogging in the morning. There used to be a huge old ballast there. We used to go jogging along the ballast and after jogging from the nearby shop wed buy four cigarettes and smoke. Once this old guy came to us and said, If you guys are jogging, why on earth are you smoking after your jog. We said, Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever, yeah.

So funny, I mean, yes, by the time, all of our friends. We started, smoking was part of the enjoyment too, when we bought, make sure that we have cigarettes with us, we don’t want to run out of cigarettes.

You were saying quite into sport at the time.

Hm.

What sports were you into?

Oh it varied, mainly team games when I was younger, football, physical contact games like football, rugby and alongside that squash and badminton, and I trained as a PE teacher and I smoked through that time as well, which is just ridiculous. Mind you I wasn’t the only smoking on the PE course, but yes, trained as a PE teacher and so loved all sports really and then taught PE for 13 years and thoroughly enjoyed that as well.

So, I was fully aware of the health implications of smoking and not smoking, the implications of exercise and good diet and all of those things surrounding a healthy lifestyle. But I didn’t live up to it.

And the other things surrounding a healthy lifestyle that you would have done, so the good diet and so on that you were obviously be learning about as a PE teacher, did you sort of do other things like that as conscious sort of choices to be healthy or ?

I think I did. I think I tried to keep a healthy diet as much as, as much as I possibly could, and try and keep things in moderation I think, tried to keep things in moderation. I didn’t make it, it was nowhere near as sophisticated as it is now. I mean people, sports science is very intensive I think and very, very detailed, and it was nowhere near as intense and whether the knowledge was about or, or not I don’t know, but I certainly didn’t. I wasn’t as aware. I mean you know, the advantages of a good balanced diet, and yes, I did try, try to live to those years.

Yeah, the relief, and when I look at, even now, twelve years later, and I’ll notice someone in the street who’s smoking and I just think, thank God I haven’t got to do that anymore. And I still feel it now. Oh. It’s amazing.

I probably didn’t do much exercise, however, because, when I was a smoker, because I just thought, what’s the point. I’m a smoker, you know, that’s the worse thing I can do to my body, or one of the worst things I can do to my body. Why try and be healthier and eat healthy and do exercise when I’m a smoker. What’s the point? So it made me, it had I don’t know, it had this ripple effect, it made me make bad choices in other areas of my life, kind of. You know, yeah.

Was it just about exercise or, how did it feel?

It’s just a mindset that you’re in. An unhealthy mindset in a way. Not a very nice place to be. So I’m glad not to be there anymore. Yeah.

So you said I’m going to start running and take back control in these other ways?

Yes, it never works does it? I mean I think I can sort of keep these things up for a very short period of time, you know, and you know, it’s like yo yo dieting and stuff, you’re just kind of like, okay I’m just going to put myself on this really impossible regime and it makes me feel good for about six weeks and then you just think oh this is just too much work, I can’t’, and also it’s something that’s very much about sort of, it’s not about trying to listen or find out what really makes you feel good, it’s actually above some abstract notion as to what’s good, and I think, I think it got, sort of started to change for a little bit when I actually started to think, okay I’m going to do these things. Not because, you know, they are good,’ in inverted commas, but because actually they make me feel good. So, I think it was sort of taking up some kind of exercise the first time and I really kind of persisted with that, when I started rowing. Because that was a) I just really enjoyed it, and b) I just liked the people, and it was all part of, you know, it wasn’t a solitary, I need to punish myself. It was more like, wow, I’m going to get down there. I’m going to see all these people and, you know, well, I mean I did go sort of rowing in the snow, but you know, it was all about having quite a lot of fun. So that, I think that’s where it just, you know, I realised that I needed to do something else. And then, also I guess, well that was more, still more about other people, and enjoying it, and then I think that started when I, because I slipped a disc and started doing some yoga, just to, that was specifically for people who had back pain. And I remember sort of getting into that, and actually having that weird sensation where I thought, wow I’m always come out of this class, and I feel really happy and, and, making the sort of connection and thinking right that’s, you know, that’s what they always go on about, people, you know, like running, but I never, I always assumed I could probably run a marathon and never get the endorphin fix. So this obviously doesn’t work for me, and maybe I need to be more alert to, you know, what makes me feel good or actually, you know, I ended up thinking that makes me feel. I find that more interesting as well. So, you know, even within yoga I would still actually think oh I find things, I find it more interesting you know, where you’re kind of really trying to feel minute differences in your body rather than making a beautiful shape sort of on the outside.

So I think that’s, yes, that’s also about that might have feed me to thinking about smoking somehow. [Laughs] I don’t know.

So I guess thinking may be not about having an abstract idea of this is good and so on, do you start, are you saying you starting to own it more in that sense, started, or how did it work for you? If you didn’t just say I’m going to, you know, eat apples all day and run..

Yes. I think it was more about I owning it more is one way of putting it. I think it was more about not sort of being obsessed with the end product, but actually thinking, okay, it’s actually about now. How it makes me feel now. And so I suppose that feeds into the thing I said about, the smoking bit. I figured out that actually when you really have that, you’re sitting round everyone smoking, you’re thinking oh I’d really like a cigarette and may be you haven’t smoked for three months, and you think, well actually that doesn’t work. I can’t do it. So sort of, I think it was more about thinking about okay it’s not about some abstract notion I’m going to be fitter. It’s about actually this makes me feel better now or within I think that sense of yes, what does it feel like now, rather than always I think that’s probably true of most people when they are younger always living in the future, rather than kind of thinking okay, you know, right now, does this make me feel good or bad or