I've been friends with April since middle school. She was my first real friend.
Sometimes we talk often, sometimes not for a month or two. But I've always considered her family.
A few years ago she developed Lymphoma, a cancer that went throughout her whole body.
Although I live an hour away, I visited her in the hospital every 3 days, even taking off work.
I was so worried for her, her father had died of lung cancer only a few years earlier.
She survived the cancer because of her strong will and I was never so impressed with her.
This week she mentioned that she started smoking cigarettes.
"are you retarded?" I asked, "didnt your father die of lung cancer?"
She said "yeah, well I'm gonna get cancer again anyway so what difference does it make"
April has 2 young boys, one in in Pre-K and one in elementary school.
She had to watch her father suffer and die from lung cancer, why would she do that to her kids?
I'm at a loss for words, I truly dont know if I can watch her do this to herself, it makes me so upset.
What do I do? What do I say? "If you get lung cancer, I'm not coming to visit you in the hospital."
![](https://dz3ixmv6nok8z.cloudfront.net/static/img/ph-508.604ed20cffa9.gif)
Sometimes we talk often, sometimes not for a month or two. But I've always considered her family.
A few years ago she developed Lymphoma, a cancer that went throughout her whole body.
Although I live an hour away, I visited her in the hospital every 3 days, even taking off work.
I was so worried for her, her father had died of lung cancer only a few years earlier.
She survived the cancer because of her strong will and I was never so impressed with her.
This week she mentioned that she started smoking cigarettes.
"are you retarded?" I asked, "didnt your father die of lung cancer?"
She said "yeah, well I'm gonna get cancer again anyway so what difference does it make"
April has 2 young boys, one in in Pre-K and one in elementary school.
She had to watch her father suffer and die from lung cancer, why would she do that to her kids?
I'm at a loss for words, I truly dont know if I can watch her do this to herself, it makes me so upset.
What do I do? What do I say? "If you get lung cancer, I'm not coming to visit you in the hospital."
![](https://dz3ixmv6nok8z.cloudfront.net/static/img/ph-508.604ed20cffa9.gif)
VIEW 13 of 13 COMMENTS
Another friend in the UK recently had a double masectomy and endured months of pain from the cancer and the stresses that came with it.
Both of them got through the dark days.
Fucked thing in both cases is that they are the nicest most genuine sorts you could hope to meet, yet they get cancer while others of us in the crew were using and abusing with minimal consequences. Felt kind of unbalanced in a way.
I loved smoking but it got in the way and stopped me from doing other things in life that i loved.
Maybe your friend needs a distraction from smoking or something new to do that she loves. Maybe then she'll realise she doesnt need it as much as she may think?