But wait...they will come back...my kind of cancer always does. The pulmonary doc said I had three to four months to live without treatment. The oncologist said he might be able to buy me one or two years, but it's up to the medicine and me as to how well I do. I know he must be sick of seeing people who are dying because they chose to smoke. He's young and looks very weary for his age. I actually worry about him. The radiologist said if I kill these tumors, more will come eventually. He said he could maybe buy me a year, or even three. Limited small cell cancer is incurable and inoperable. I have a 50 percent chance of beating this round, he says with sympathy and amazement in his eyes. He sees so many patients like myself. What a sad job. His amazement is at why anyone...in this day and age...would smoke in the first place.

The base line for me is to stay well enough to endure the treatments. I must stay healthy, germ-free, and eat right, etc., for the rest of my life. Right now I can't shop. I can't be in crowds. I can't even kiss my grandbabies because of their sniffles. I have no immune system anymore, so I should wear a mask around people. It's sure funny/ironic that everything I did in life (my so called fun/bad habits) was to avoid this exact healthy lifestyle. Heck, it was no fun to be healthy and vice-free. Too dull for me. I knew I was going to live to be one hundred. Now that I am ill, I have to do all of those things I resisted or was too lazy to do in the past...if I want to stay alive and fight the cancers. Now, wouldn't life have been simpler for me to have done those things all along? DUH!

Let's see now...why was it that I preferred to smoke...as opposed to...say...live and not smoke?
It's very hard to forgive myself...

I am trying to let the shame and blame go. It's very hard to forgive myself for what I am doing to my loved ones. My life now depends on me having a healthy and positive attitude. I am going to give it my best, but it's difficult at times.

I want so much to make something positive out of this horrible state I have gotten myself into. I thought maybe a story from a person who has smoking-related cancer might help someone. But how could I get my story out? And would anyone care? I'm nobody in particular. Then Terry from About.com kindly invited me here, and we decided maybe a story on this site would be seen by others trying to quit. It might make a difference in their lives to see how much harder it is to have cancer than it is to stop smoking.

Even if it's only one person who might get scared enough and quit, that's a miracle in itself. I am sharing my story for all the folks who come here to get help in order to quit smoking. I want them to hear firsthand how devastating cancer is, not only for me, but for my innocent loved ones.
If you use nicotine, then nicotine will get you eventually...

...unless you are murdered or have a fatal accident. It will give you a heart attack, stroke, or cancer. It can happen; it happened to me. It happens every day. The real crime is that a drug which is that addictive is legal in the first place.

I am writing all about this cancer and how my life has completely changed in my personal journal. Actually, it's the same journal I used for my "stop smoking" journal. Now that's a wee bit ironic and morbid, don't you think? But so is death at 56.

The shrink says to tell my eight-year-old granddaughter I am ill, but not to use the word cancer. I don't have to tell her. She knows on her own. She saw me working with scarves for the day my hair will be gone (which it is now), and said, "Oh no you don't! That is not a cool look on you, grand-mom."

Remember when only the cool people smoked? I was terminally "cool."

Thanks for reading my story. I have to go take some of the 900 dollars a month's worth of medication now. It's the only way I can sleep with minimal pain.