Almost five years ago, on January 29, 2013, I posted a blog about a really difficult, emotionally-draining flight I’d just had. A woman, whose daughter had just been killed the day before in a skiing accident, was on my flight from Orlando to Denver. She was connecting to a flight to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to claim her daughter’s body and to find some way to comfort her other two children who had watched their sister be killed when thrown against a tree in a freak snow slide. There was nothing to say. I just held her in the galley as she sobbed in a way I will never, ever forget. She told me about her bright, beautiful 28 year-old daughter. She felt helpless in her own grief about how to comfort her other two children who had SEEN their sister die. I still choke up just typing about it. If you want to read that old blog, search for “An Emotional Flight”.
I took away something incredibly important from that experience. And now, whenever I see online, or see on tv, or hear about any person who dies unexpectedly in acts of violence, or a random accident on the road, or even a medical mistake...I think about how innocent people with great futures ahead, or with wonderful histories behind them, die every single day in senseless, meaningless ways, leaving their wife, their husband, their parents, their children, their friends to mourn them, miss them, want them back. And these deaths were beyond the control of the person who died.
In contrast, here we are, all of us here on EX, who once smoked or are in the process of quitting...who CHOSE to do this. We CHOSE to put poison into our bodies. We CHOSE to kill ourselves slowly. And, all the while, thinking that we were ENJOYING it.
There are innocent people, young or old, worthy or not, going about the business of their daily life...and boom...something out of their control happens and they are gone. GONE. Their loved ones will never see them again. And they had no warning.
But smokers DO have warnings. Lots of them.
Ask us for help when you don’t think you can go another minute.
Because you CAN. And we will help you do it.
xxxooo, Sky
