How Can We Teach Our Children to Quit Smoking?

How in the world can we teach our children to not start smoking and to stay away from all tobacco products? All over the country, cities and towns are banning smoking in bars restaurants, and other public places. Who would have thought five years ago that you would not be able to have a cup of coffee with your dinner and light up a cigarette in your favorite restaurant? Or even smoke a cigarette at a sporting event? That goes for pipes and cigars, as well.

But the message is clear and many folks are getting the word. Already, millions of die-hard smokers have seen the dangers and lethal effects of smoking cigarettes and ingesting nicotine into their lungs. However, there is one segment of the population that seems oblivious to reality.

About 90 percent of the people who are considered to be regular smokers began smoking before their 21st birthday, and it is estimated that on any day of the week there are about 4,000,000 to 5,000,000 adolescent smokers. At a time when everyone is telling us to stop smoking because it is bad for our health, teenagers, in their infinite wisdom know better than everyone else. Their decisions ignore the power and the collective wisdom of indisputable medical facts and research that have been collected and studied since the early 1950's. This medical knowledge and wisdom gained through experience tells us to reject cigarettes and the smoking of any kind of tobacco as agents that cause cancer and kill people. But the teenage mindset believes in their power of invincibility. They mistakenly believe that smoking will have no adverse or debilitating effect on them.

Despite all of the available information, they make completely arbitrary and incorrect decisions to begin smoking. It is really stupid when you think about it. Parents spend tens of thousands of dollars, in taxes and in private funds, to educate their children before they even enter college and they are rewarded with a contrarian nincompoop who decides that it is OK to smoke.

They ignore the good advice that is evident to them every day. They truly believe that they can quit at any time. Whenever they wish. They truly believe in their own invincibility and merrily choose the path of destruction.

What can we do to help our children to see the light. I know that parents have been stuck in this dilemma for forever, trying to convince their children not to smoke, not to drink, not to do x, y, or z.

Take heart. There is help and there are solutions. Probably more help and ideas than you can read in a lifetime. What you need is a starting point and a roadmap. And there is plenty of encouragement along the way

Jack Igan writes and moderates a helpful blog on How to Quit Smoking and hosts a companion website at http://www.Yes-Quit-Smoking.com