Smoking and still in remission for 16 days and counting

New to the site, my wife has been a lurcker here since my teenage son has been diagnosed Moderate/Severe UC a few months past. I must say, this site has given us more support, information, and insite into the disease than you ould beleive. Our son, just a teen is the first in our family to suffer from UC. Nobody on my wife side has ever had it and I being adopted have no idea of family history. That said, I quit smoking Memorial weekend and have been having IB issues ever since. I am REALLY reluctant to test your theories but am willing to listen as things develop...I've been Dodging the scope Dr. since the summer but think I wil get a look first before jumping back in bed with Phillip Morris.
Thanks for the help, and keep posting my wife loves this site!
Frank

PLEASE said...
jm, how old were you when you got uc? were you alrady a smoker? what does your dr say doesn't he think it's an important finding if it really worked? i would thhink there needs to be more investigation. after all many people don't smoke get lung cancer and many people with uc can get colon cancer or drug induced cancers. i find it interesting. certainly if it worked with just a couple of cigarettes a day

I am 61 and was Dx in December 2007. I had been having symptoms since September, but waited for my normal physical before telling my regular Doctor about them. After testing I was told 20% of my colon was affected. I took 3 colazal 3 times a day for 10 days and the bleeding stopped but the other symptoms were still present. He cut me back to 2 colazal 2 times a day. After a few days the bleeding came back and I began to take 2 colazal 3 times a day. On Jan 1 I made a resolution that if I was still bleeding on the 2nd of Jan. I would take my health in my own hands. Jan 2 after agonizing over starting back to smoke I purchased a pack. I had stopped smoking on Jan 10, 2005. Almost 3 years. I am now normal again and will continue to smoke until my toes turn up. What piqued my curiosity that the info I read that said this stikes ex-smokers and non-smokers. I then realized that if it normally doesn't strike smokers then I reasoned I probably would have never gotten this if I hadn't quit 3 years ago. It is now 18 days and not a sign of a symptom. I failed to mention, in order to determine whether or not this would clear up by smoking, I took my last dose of colazal on the 1st of January and started smoking on the 2nd. I still had all the symptoms on the 2nd so the last dose of colazal on the 1st did not clear me up. No doubt the smoking stopped it in my case.

It is good news to hear that there is something some of us can do to relieve this miserable affliction. I have the same basic story - quit, get hit with UC, find out that smoking gets rid of the UC, and then sit faced with the decision to smoke and be well, or not smoke and be saddled with the hideous burden of UC. For those who instantly throw out the lung cancer threat, well, smoking does not necessarily lead to that, a minority of smokers will get ill from their habit. And the later in life you take up smoking, the less likely you are to get lung cancer, it takes decades to happen. Look at it this way: smoke and be UC-free and run the relatively small risk of lung cancer, don't smoke and live on a cocktail of drugs which provide partial symptom relief at best. Are the drugs harmless over a long time? Hmmm...

I noticed the topic of this post and as I was reading an article from a website I remembered it.

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/library/DS/00598.html

this is a great article!

"Nicotine patches
These skin patches — the same kind smokers use — seem to provide short-term relief from flare-ups of ulcerative colitis for some people, especially people who formerly smoked. How nicotine patches work isn't exactly clear, and no one should take up smoking as a treatment for ulcerative colitis. The risks from smoking far outweigh any potential benefit."

I thought that particular passage would interest the readers of this topic.

Most of the immune modulating drugs are probably worse long term than smoking. If I had a choice of the 2, I'd take up smoking in a heartbeat.

JM said...

quincy said...
Let's not bring the Lord into excuses....sheesh. You've made the decision to smoke...plain and simple.

q

Excuses about what; being totally free from all symptoms for going on 3 weeks. No excuses needed. I sorry smoking didn't help you since I see you are on a real regiment of meds. I hope every thing works out for you also.

I don't smoke, and my meds are doing a bang-up job. Oh, my mom died of lung cancer..nasty way to go suffocating to death.  Very undignifed.

q

But we're not allowed to discuss marijuana even for medisinal purposes, it's against forum rules so I'm sure it won't be long before your post is deleted.

:)

ah, it happens :)

quicy: I understand your feeling toward smoking. If smoking related illnesses were in my bloodlines, I don't know if I would have selected the choice I made. At 61, I can take risk that I would not recommend to others as I have said in other posts. One thing is certain, and that is that we will leave this world in some matter, either by disease or accident. We each have to make our own decisions and we will never know if we made the right decision until it all plays out. On the other hand we also will never know if an alternative would have been better or worst than the one we took. My mother passed away at 82, my father at 80 and my a Grandmother that died of colon cancer at 85 on her birthday. Congestive heart failure and colon cancer does run in my bloodlines. With the possibility of colon cancer in 8 to 10 years once UC has been diagnosed (20% greater possibility (if I remember the numbers correctly), I did not want that risk. I don't know if that risk factor is accurate if it stays in remission or not. I do not like to take man made chemicals with all of the potential side effects for any length of time and the doctor said I would be on meds the rest of my life. Of course smoking is taking chemicals, but at least I can remember to take them. In any case do not condemn someone because they selected a different path than you did. It appears that there is something in nature (tobacco) that works and I only hope it that what ever it is, it can be isolated so that others can benefit from it.

Pb and Quincy - I know you two will never agree on certain things so can we please not bring your arguments into these threads? This is a support forum, not a forum for bickering.

Exsmoker, started again a little at the beginning of 2007..since being diagnosed in 1999 w/ pancolitis, this past year has been the BEST since being diagnosed. Most all symptoms are gone. Once in awhile I have a little rough spot that might last for a day. I do just sit and wonder sometimes about it all. DO I want to be a smoker? or do I want lung cancer? NO. Do I MISS the nasty symptoms of U.C pancolitis and being a prisoner to the disease and confined to me house? Hell no!! Don't know what the future holds for me, but I do like living while I am here.
may God bless each of us,
Deacon

Sir's, Ma'ams, ladies and Gentlemen allow me to jump in here and remind you all that the purpose of this thread is not to have a bickering match between yourselfs but JM sharing his/her story having started smoking, any disagreements should be taken elesewhere, you are all sensible enough people please don't give me reason to have to start quoting the forum rules.

Take care.

Dave