On my morning drive to Cordy’s preschool, I was stopped at a obscenely long traffic light. I glanced over to the car beside me. There was a boy in the passenger seat – couldn’t have been older than seven or eight – and a woman I will assume is his mom was driving the car. In her hand was a cigarette, and the only ventilation was the two inch crack in the mom’s window needed to flick her ashes into the street. I saw the boy coughing, but the mom continued to talk on her Bluetooth, seemingly unconcerned.
I understand that smoking is a tough habit to break, and that some don’t want to break their habit. I also know that many smokers are smart people who comprehend the dangers of smoking, not only to themselves but to others around them. Secondhand smoke is no longer a theoretical risk – it’s been proven to cause real health problems.
But forcing your kid to sit in a smoke-filled car? Not cool. In some places, it’s considered child abuse and against the law. I don’t care how cold it is outside. Two inches from one window is not remotely close to enough ventilation. The kid was coughing – sure, he could have had a cold, but even if it was a cold, do you think the smoke was helping his lungs recover from that cold? If she’s smoking, then by default he’s smoking, too. Does he get to drink if she has a cocktail?
This is a touchy subject for me because I was that kid when I was younger. My mom didn’t smoke, but my aunts did, and they would routinely smoke in the car when we traveled. If it was warm out, they’d have the windows down, but in the winter? Two inches. And I coughed. A lot.
Turns out, I have a bit of a reaction to cigarette smoke. After being in an enclosed space with smokers for even an hour, I spend the next week in misery with all of the symptoms of the worst cold you can imagine. It’s why I always wanted to sit on the patio at the local bars in college, and why I generally avoided clubs. I don’t like feeling sick for days all because someone else wanted their nicotine fix.
There are plenty of considerate smokers out there. I have friends who smoke, and it doesn’t bother me. They are always polite, smoking outdoors and never if I’m in the car. I know other smokers who have kids, and they never smoke in the house or car because of their kids. They will go out of their way to keep their kids away from the smoke. Some quit before kids.
I couldn’t help but stare at this woman and her child as we stopped at the next light and were beside each other again. She made no effort to blow the smoke towards her two inch vent to the outside, and she didn’t seem to notice her child looked miserable. Was her desire for a cigarette so strong that she’d rather put her child’s health at risk rather than waiting the 15 minutes (at most) it would take to drop the kid off at school?
I’ll admit I’m completely and utterly biased. If you want to smoke, that is completely OK with me. Cigarettes are legal, and smoking them is legal. I don’t have a problem with it until you start affecting someone else’s health, especially a child’s. The lungs of a child are especially sensitive to the effects of secondhand smoke, and they are more vulnerable because they often have no ability to escape the smoke. And while I can simply avoid a person who is an inconsiderate smoker, a child can’t choose to go somewhere else because their parents are smoking around them.
At least give your kids the choice to smoke when they’re eighteen. Don’t decide for them before they’re even out of diapers.
That totally irks me off as well. I always want to ask them who the adult is. And to tell them that adults are supposed to be able to control themselves and make better decisions. But then again that would require them caring.
YES. I agree 10000%. It Kills me almost as much as it’s killing their children…
As someone who gets migraines after just standing in line NEXT to someone who’s just been smoking (and reeks of it) I completely understand.
And no, its NOT fair to that child.
I think you’ve been reading my mind – I was JUST going to write about his next time I blogged… or perhaps the problem is just so widespread that it is easy to see this sort of thing.
I think this is one of my absolute biggest peeves ever. I saw two women get in their car with 2 kids at the playground just yesterday and I was so disgusted. You just don’t get to make that choice for your kids. To quote my son, “It’s not fair!”
Oh, I am SO WITH YOU on this one. I feel awful for those kids in cars with smokers. Don’t you just want to scream at the top of your lungs?!?! Infuriating. I’m glad that we are like-minded. I think Mass was proposing a law that would make it illegal to smoke in a car with children. Think the lawmakers will listen? Kids can’t vote afterall… (@myjezi)
As a former smoker, I understand the nicotine addiction, but NEVER would I subject my child to such a health risk. That is infuriating.
Thankfully, I was lucky enough to quit for good this time. My health has improved greatly!
I knew a guy who was allergic to cigerette smoke. Until I met my friend, I didn’t even know that type of allergy exsisted. I wonder if being constantly around a non-ventilated second hand smoke situation is how my friend may have developed his allergy?
On my way to an OB appt at the hospital where I later gave birth, I came across an extraordinarily pregnant woman… smoking. I will never get that image out of my mind. Perhaps she was trying to “relax” during labor, but seeing her engulfed in her own cloud of smoke while carrying a child repulsed me.
My dear grandparents smoked. I loved spending time with them, but I have the lung capacity of a gnat and a very thick voice that makes people wonder if I am a smoker. I’m not, but my throat and lungs have been affected by smoke.
My MIL is a smoker I point blank asked her NOT TO smoke in the car or the HOUSE with her EVER!!!
My mom is a closet smoker and I have told her too!
I hate to see that!!! Hate it!
Since I’ve been sick for, like, the last month, I keep thinking, “Oh my god I am so glad I never started smoking” because the idea of having emphysema and hacking up a lung for the last years of my life sounds like worse torture than being on Fear Factor.
Unfortunately, there’s no law against boneheaded parenting skills.
I so totally agree with you! I am a smoker, but I absolutely go outside (even in below 0 weather!) and never smoke in the car with my kids! That’s just awful! I know I hated it when I was a kid and my mom smoked in the car (actually I still hate it! I hate smoking inside).
My Dad is a smoker so I grew up w/ second hand smoke up the wazoo. After college I spent a few years bartending and towards the end I was hopelessly allergic to cigarette smoke. I feel for that kid.
I don’t even like to be walking near someone that’s smoking.
I was the child of 2 smokers and suffered no ill effects from it. Other than probably the inclination to smoke myself. I remember enjoying how it smelled – even as a child. I don’t ever remember wishing they were not smoking in the car or the house. And yes, I have smoked all my adult life, except while pregnant. But we know more about it now and my husband and I, at my insistence, never smoke in the house or the car. It’s inconvenient and sometimes uncomfortable, but I will not endanger her health for my addiction. And I have to admit, I love having a cleaner house for it.
I work at a children’s hospital, and I have a very difficult time believing that these parents only smoke outside. The smoke clings to clothes and hair, so unless people are changing clothes and showering after every cigarette, it’s not enough. I also have a difficult time believing that people only smoke outside when it’s -15 degrees outside.
My Dad smoked when I was younger. I had lots of bronchial ailments (though not asthma), and I have never had any desire to smoke.
There was a picture in my local paper not too long ago of a woman holding her baby and venting about the garbage dump near her home. She was all concerned about her baby’s safety. And in her other hand? A cigarette.
Irony can be so ironic sometimes.
I, too, was that kid. Everyone in my family smoked: parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents. I have asthma now and so do my kids. I do not allow my kids to ride in cars or visit the home of those who smoke inside: friend, foe, relative, ANYONE.
I feel just what you are expressing: it is horrible to be that kid.
AMEN, sister.
I agree with you 100%! I grew up in a family of smokers and our house was always full of smoke. It made me very anit-smoking. When my husband and I got engaged, I told him I would not marry him if he did not quit smoking, I did not want to live with a smoker and expose myself and any possible children to that. He quit, wasn’t easy for him but he wanted to do it. I hate when smokers come in my office, they don’t realize how terrible they smell!
I also hate when smokers flick their cigarettes out the window. Thats littering. Use your freaking ashtray and only leave a mess for yourself and not pollute MY space.
I have had major breathing issues since birth until I moved out of my mother’s house. My senior year in high school I had pneumia twice in a 2 month period. The dr told my mother it was due to her and my step-father smoking. She said it was not possible and continue to smoke around me all the time
i think i would have yelled at her, or thrown things at her window. i’m hyper sensitive to things people do to kids. that poor kid probably had nicotine breast milk too. but, i’m such an asshole i’m totally against giving kids soda. in fact, i honestly can’t figure out what age i think it is okay…maybe 30 hmmm. we had a dentist come to out baby class, who said that if your child came in with a cavity once, and he talked you about it, and you came in with more cavities, he would call social services for child neglect. and while i do think that is extreme, i do agree, giving kids soda is setting them up for a plethora of health problems and issues, and teeth problems.
sometimes parents really don’t realize the damage they cause their kids (she says as her two year old eats cheetos…sigh, i suck)
Oh I agree. I smoked until I found out I was pregnant and I’ve never touched one again. They now gross me out. Since Squeaks has had RSV I’m especially watchful of keeping her away from smoke.
Definitely agree with you. My province is very close to passing a law to make it illegal to smoke if you have kids in the car. I know it’s hard to enforce but at least people may think twice before they do it, if they think they might get caught and have to pay a fine.
This drives me crazy – it’s all I can do to not yell at these people.
Sometimes I really support the idea to live and let live, but in cases like these I say you should have to go through screening to become a parent or caregiver – it’s ridiculous.
Those poor lungs don’t have a prayer.