I'd been planning an epic post about my lifelong love affair with cigarettes for a long time when unforeseen circumstances rendered the whole idea painfully absurd. What follows is a little taste of that blog-post-that-never-was-to-be (aw, TEARZ!), as well as a little scenesetting for tomorrow's post, wherein I will discuss those unforeseen circumstances. The idea was to begin with a brief history of my cigarette addiction--how I started smoking as a way to wean myself off the Doritos and full-flavor Coca-Cola habit, which by age twelve had turned me into, in my mother's overheard words, "a fucking whale;" how cigarettes and my intense brand loyalty to Marlboro Reds formed a crucial part of my social identity through my teens and twenties; how through some high-powered self-help intervention I managed to kick the habit with almost no suffering or feelings of deprivation at age 29; and how, in the wake of a big move and some interpersonal and romantic upheavals, I took the habit up again during the first half of this year--and to filter this history through my then-contemporary dabbling in smoking Blu brand electronic cigarettes.
I was also planning to write some very foolish stuff about the specific relationship of gay men and cigarettes, how without the looming responsibilities of parenthood the temptation for even thirty- and fortysomething feys to keep flirting with Thanatos by cheerfully puffing away can be uniquely difficult to resist; and how, as the impact of AIDS has waned a bit since the height of the epidemic, a (perhaps wholly imagined-by-me/anecdotal) tendency for gay men to persist smoking into later life has helped to keep a creepy, unspoken Death's Head-Peter Pan image of gay men alive in our (homophobic) collective consciousness.
It was also to be a humorous and very personal product review of Blus, which I smoked, and more or less enjoyed smoking, for a couple weeks as a cig substitute. I was going to start with a detailed blow-by-blow on their pricing model, how they work, and how you use them--which I'm so glad I don't have to do anymore because it's actually really complicated and would've been totally ZZZZs to try to explain--and then go into the finer social nuances of smoking the stupid things.
As semi-satisfying a smoking substitute as Blus actually turned out to--briefly--be, I was going to conclude that they'd never fully catch on...because what's the point in being HALF a smoker? Smoking electronic cigarettes is probably the least cool thing ever. Out and about in LA, if I lit up a real ciggo I could still reasonably expect that maybe 1 person out of every 20 was not actively pegging me as a pitiable, run-down wreck of a weak-willed human for smoking. The other 19 were, yes, but maybe one person was sympathetic, or sweetly indulgent, or--even better!--a smoker themselves! But when I smoked an electronic cigarette in public, that was 20 out of 20 people full-on thinking I'm a douchebag. That's like 100%!
But even though I was going to finish my review with a big old thumbs-down--I mean, besides the shallow reasons mentioned above my e-cig actually SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUSTED in my pocket on the dancefloor at Akbar, such that I had to pull it out of my totally charred jeans pocket and toss its smoldering remains posthaste into an unattended martini glass--smoking Blus was kinda fun, especially when I would videochat my helplessly regular-cig-addicted friends like Bmad and taunt them by blowing (fake) smoke in their faces.
Don't I look happy? Carefree? And--completely incidentally and not at all as a set-up for what I'm about to reveal next--HEALTHY? I was, all of those things! Smoking Blus, like smoking cigarettes, was totally fun!At least, it was fun until MY RIGHT FUCKING LUNG FUCKING EXPLODED!
How the hell can you end that story and not follow up? Damn, that shit sounds intense. Get well.
hi, ive JUST been through this. I just turned 20, and one week later, my lung collapsed. i had the chest drain and suction applied for 3 days. My lung was refusing to reinflate because i had actually put up with my pain for 7 days before admitting myself to hospital. so it had been down a while. i was in denile, up until the point that i couldnt breathe or move anymore. i immediately quit smoking cigarettes, something i had been meaning to do for ages. i was wondering, are you saying that post-pneumothorax, the ecig was helpful to you in not smoking cigarettes again? or are you saying the ecig contributed to your lung collapse? as I am worried that using this is also damaging to my lungs?? anyway I'm glad to hear you're ok. best wishes, lauren.
p.s how long did u feel pain in your chest after leaving the hospital? cause ive been out for over a week, and stil feel like its going to happen again, and have pain in my other lung too. i have a check up xray in a month, so if anythings still wrong it would show up. i just wondered how long your pain continued? thanks again.
Hey Lauren,
I wrote a followup to this post which included some more details. Re: whether the e-cig caused my lung to collapse...I don't know! I was smoking them in the weeks before the lung collapse so it might've? Or it could've been my long history of smoking? Or it could've just been the fact that I'm tall and kinda thin (and was particularly thin at the time of the incident). Honestly I would advise dropping the ecig habit. The manufacturers of those things are shady and there hasn't been much research into their safety...are we even sure they aren't WORSE for you than regular? (It's unlikey but doesn't seem outside the realm of possibility.) At one point my eCig's trigger mechanism got jammed while inside my jeans pocket, overheated, and more or less caught on fire, burning my leg and my finger. And though I haven't used the thing in over 7 months I just got an email from the company saying it's been recalled, and laying out an onerous 5 point "safe disposal" plan for the item itself...you'd think it were radioactive waste. I'd get off the ecigs altogether...go cold turkey or switch to non-inhaled nicotine replacements. After the tubes were removed--assuming you got laprascopic wedge resectioning followed by talc pleurodesis? If not, your recovery might be different than mine--I was in acute pain for about a week followed by a couple months of minor pain, discomfort from the surgical scars and the severed nerves in my chest...it was hard to tell what was "lung" pain and what was post-op normal pain. 6 months out and the only thing I feel is the occasional itchiness on my scars!
Hope your recovery continues apace...best wishes...