R.J. Reynolds, maker of some the U.S.'s best-selling brands like Camel, Kool, Winston and Salem, said the new requirements violate the First and Fifth Amendments. The company said,
"The anti-smoking message is not intended to provide information that smokers and potential smokers can consider rationally in weighing the risks and perceived benefits from smoking. Rather, it plainly conveys -- through graphic images and designs intended to elicit loathing, disgust, and repulsion -- the Government's viewpoint that the risks associated with smoking cigarettes outweigh the pleasure that smokers derive from them and, therefore, that no one should use these lawful products."
I really, really hate these people and what they did to my mother. She was one of so many that hung on to the previous words of 'can' and 'may' in the warnings that she refused to believe anyone that told her any different.
She didn't even believe the surgeons when they told her that she was going to lose her leg if she didn't quit smoking, even after they opened her leg up and cleaned out her arteries to restore the circulation to her decaying foot.
One minute she was complaining that it felt like she had 'a sponge in her lungs' when she tried to breathe, and the next she was telling me how she was 'dying for a cigarette'. She eventually did die...but not until she suffered necessary mutilation in order to save her life. Not until she lost her independence and quality of life. Not until she slowly suffocated to death before my very eyes...
She said something to me once that caused a realization that unnerves me to this very day. Mere weeks before she died, I found out that she had still been secretly smoking from time to time. "It relaxes me" she said. I suddenly had a clear picture of a killer holding a pillow over her face right in front of me, speaking in soothing tones to calm her, even stroking her hair in reassurance while slowly pressing the pillow ever tighter against her face to kill her, and she was welcoming it... The vision was so vivid, this entity stole a mocking glance at me and sneered with obscene glee...
I was so horrified by what I was picturing and the wave of utter helplessness that swept through me that I nearly passed out. I was in agony. I could see what was killing her, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do to stop it...
I fought for my mother's life. I busted my ass to make her well. Her right little toe was gangrenous. After her surgery in 2006, I diligently changed the bandages and followed the doctor's instructions. He was beyond amazed when the toe actually healed. He credited it to my uncompromising care of her. I was elated to see her healing so well, but she refused to quit smoking.
You can imagine my devastation when two short years later, the same problem reappeared. This time, we were not so lucky. The whole front part of her right foot had to be amputated. I threw her cigarettes away. We fought like cats and dogs. Every time I had to change the bandage on that gaping, horrific wound I took it as a sign of my personal failure. I kept my head together long enough to do what I had to do, then went out into the living room and sobbed with the image of what was left of her foot still fresh in my mind...
After two solid months of bandage changes two times a day and listening to Mom beg me for more pain medication that I couldn't give her, she lost her right leg below the knee. I was watching Big Tobacco take my mother away from me a piece at a time. Her independence took a huge hit, and with it, her self-esteem. Even after she was fitted with a prosthesis, her lung capacity was so compromised that she just didn't have the stamina to do the things she used to do. Depression started to creep in.
For the next nearly two years, we struggled through our daily routines of physical therapy, oxygen therapy, doctors appointments, and the like. Things were going well enough that I had been lulled into a false sense of security. Maybe her lungs were healing. Maybe we were going to get through this. Then one morning, near the end of March 2010, Mom tells me that she needs to go to the hospital because she can't breathe.
It was to be the beginning of the end for us...in so many ways.
When I think of all of the money that she wasted on cigarettes over the years it staggers the imagination. Little did she realize that the cost would be so dear...not only to her...but to me as well. I still have nightmares about it.
I will be haunted by the images of her suffering for the rest of my life.
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