Elizabeth
Vargas: What do you guys remember about how it felt the
first time you smoked a cigarette?
Bobby:
It was really strange because I remember my first cigarette, I
didn't really cough. Or get sick. I didn't really like it that
much.
Vargas:
How many of you guys are starting to already feel the physical
effects from smoking?
Amber:
I know I am. In the morning — boy — whew! I try to
tell you I will cough and cough. But then every, as soon as I
wake up, as soon as I wake up, the first thing I do is grab a
cigarette.
Vargas:
You have asthma?
Jordan:
Yeah.
Vargas:
And you're smoking how many cigarettes a day?
Jordan:
More than a pack a day.
Vargas:
Did it ever occur to you that maybe the asthma would be better
if you didn't smoke?
Jordan:
That occurs to me all the time and you don't, you have no idea
how like stupid I feel. I definitely notice what you're talking
about. When you wake up in the morning and you just can't breathe.
Like your lungs are just shut.
Vargas:
Why do kids continue to do it?
Bobby:
Everything out there tells you not to do it. There's always a
danger to it, but everyone says it's not gonna happen to me. And
I'm in charge of my own life.
Vargas:
Let me see a show of hands. How many of you guys really truly
think you're addicted to nicotine, to smoking? [Five raise their
hands.]
Alyssa:
Yeah, I know I'm addicted. Everyday I say I want to quit and I
can't. I can't because I get headaches from not smoking now.
Vargas:
A lot of girls smoke to stay thin. Do you smoke to keep the weight
off?
Teenage
Girl: Um … during the summer, this past summer,
I lost a lot of weight and it was through going to the gym, eating
right and smoking. It kept me from going to get McDonald's, going,
you know, all those fast food places.
Vargas:
Statistics show if your parents smoke, kids are more likely to
smoke. Does that ring true to you?
Jordan:
Well for me it clearly has. There was a really long period of
my life when I was completely against my mom smoking. I looked
down at her for it. I was so disgusted by it. I'd throw my mom's
cigarettes away.
Jacki:
Yeah, I used to break my dad's cigarettes and hide his cigarettes
from him. Then a few years later I ended up stealing them from
him.
Vargas:
How many of you here have somebody in your family who's been sick
from smoking?
Samantha:
Yeah, my great aunt smoked for like 60 years. And towards,
you know, the end of her life when I went to visit her, you know
she was on about five breathing machines and the sound was just
something that was like a wake-up call for me. I was like, 'don't
want to end up like this.'
Vargas:
Amber, your mom has lung cancer doesn't she?
Amber:
On one side of her lung she has like emphysema and then, like,
on the other she has tumors and stuff. I don't know. I don't like
to know a lot about it. I don't ask her about it.
Vargas:
And she still smokes?
Amber:
Yeah. She does.
Vargas:
Doesn't that scare you ?
Amber:
Yeah, it scares me.
Amber:
I don't smoke a lot. I used to smoke a pack a day. I don't smoke
near as much as I used to smoke. I've cut down like the pack that
I have now, I've had for like three days.
Amber:
It's not that easy.
Vargas:
Why isn't it? Why can't you just say, "You know what, starting
Monday that's it. No more cigarettes."
Amber:
It's just not. You're just, you're like one more, one more, just
one more.
Vargas:
But was it seeing your Mom get sick from smoking that made you
want to quit?
Amber: Yeah I losing my Mom over that you know
just that wouldn't be good.
Vargas:
Statistics show that if you guys all keep on smoking, none of
you quit, three of you here will eventually die of some sort of
smoking-related disorder.
Teenage
Girl: I hope that's not me.
Vargas:
I mean that's what, that's the statistics show. Does that scare
you? [Silence] I mean there's only seven of you sitting here.
Well that shut you guys up.
Samantha:
There's a lot to think about.
Vargas:
What would it take, what would it take to get you guys to quit
right now?
Amber:
Explain to me, like, how much damage it's done so far. And if
I'm capable of getting cancer within …
Alyssa:
Next two months, next two years.
Vargas:
So only if somebody said, "You might get sick and die from
this pretty soon."
Alyssa:
Yeah.
Vargas:
Like next year.
Alyssa:
I think that would scare me enough to make me stop.
Vargas:
But nothing short of that?
Alyssa:
Uh uh.
Jordan:
There's a big separation between reality. Like we are all living
like a slight delusion about how terrible it is for us. Because
if we were really smart and seeing reality the way it really is,
we should have stopped yesterday. Because it was easier to stop
yesterday than it will be today.