Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Every time you have an attempt to give up smoking
and you are giving up for a short time,
it makes you stronger, it makes you know that you can give up.
It's not something that you can't do.
Every little achievement is important,
and it's important to celebrate those achievements
and to keep on going.
You know, no-one wants to die.
You've got to make some sacrifices,
even for yourself, your own life.
I changed within myself.
I really put it out there for myself.
If I can do it,
someone else can see me
and they can do the same change.
Yeah, I just sort of do it myself, you know?
Enough is enough.
But this time I decided with my family.
I waited till my husband went away to work,
and I done it by myself,
because I didn't want the pressure of them harping,
because I was not in a very good mood for giving up smoking.
When they went away and he came home, I was smoke-free,
which was really good.
People will start their journey in a whole bunch of different ways,
whether that's because they've had a serious health incident,
where they've gone to hospital for some reason
and doctors have told them to quit
or they've seen a poster of ours, or multiple posters,
that start to trigger messaging.
One of the really strong things that we started to do
was talking about smoke-free homes and cars.
If you're going to do it, think about your family first.
Think about your kids.
Don't smoke in your house, do it outside.
Don't do it in your car
while your kids are strapped into their seats.
They don't really have a choice to escape that.
Well, I'm 58, and I'm a diabetic.
The doctor was always harping on me to give up smoking
because of my diabetes and everything.
Then I just decided, 'Yep, I'm going to stop smoking.'
I went to the case workers with Maari Ma Health,
and they supported me through my journey of quitting smoking.
- How have you been? - Oh, not bad. Just take a seat.
OK, thanks.
So Uncle Colly told me that you wanted to give up smoking.
- Well, I want to try, Chris. - You want to try?
I've had stacks of attempts of giving up smoking -
you know, lasts a week.
Used all the excuses of getting angry, annoyed with people.
Why do you think you didn't quit last time?
Because all of my friends were still smoking.
- So it's a social thing? - Social thing.
Got to be in with the crowd.
First thing in the morning, as soon as I got out of bed,
I would have a cigarette in my hand.
I would smoke and then I'll have breakfast
and then I'll have a couple of smokes.
At work, everyone smoked. They all went outside.
I used to think, 'I'll go out and join them and have a smoke.'
But now, it doesn't worry me.
What worries me is the smell of the smoke
when they come back and walk past me.
That really...
I used to say to people, 'Did I smell like that?'
Because the smell was just something shocking.
Did you notice anything about your urges,
like, when you really wanted a smoke when you woke up?
Was it in the car, or just out with friends?
When I woke up in the morning, I had to have a cigarette.
It didn't matter what time I woke up.
But now, what I do is I get up and I think,
'I could tidy up the bathroom or something like that.'
Then I have my breakfast.
Now I don't even think about it.
But at first, it was the temptation
of looking for a cigarette as soon as I woke up.
No, I don't do that anymore.
I just do things around the house.
We'll also give you the inhaler,
so when people are smoking, you can have it there
so you don't feel way out.
When I quit smoking, with my family away, that was good,
but I had the support of the workers at Maari Ma Health.
They were really good.
I could pop in and see them or I'd ring them up.
There was no hassles.
They just keep encouraging you all the time,
and it was just the positive feedback I got from them
that you thought, 'I don't want to go back to smoking anymore.'
When I became pregnant with my first child,
the doctor gave me the big talk about smoking
and the harm to the baby, and it really sunk in.
The morning sickness helped a lot, to give up the smoking.
It was just set in my mind to give up smoking.
It was easier when I kept thinking about
why I was doing it.
VOICE-OVER: When you light up...
..you drag over 4,000 chemicals into your lungs
and then into your bloodstream.
If you're pregnant, those chemicals are fed to your baby
through the placenta.
Yeah, I felt my head was clearer
all the time
and that my body just started to feel good again.
It only took, like, a couple of weeks
and I was feeling better after.
It didn't take long for the smoke to get out of my system
and make me feel a lot better.
Baby gets less oxygen,
which affects lung and brain development.
(Coughs)
- When you quit... (Baby coughs)
..you quit together.
I smoke outside, of course,
like everyone does now these days.
But when I do have a smoke, it's when my daughter is asleep
or she's with someone else.
Because I go out for a smoke and I come in and I scrub my hands.
I'm big on those antibacterial hand sanitisers.
My teeth, I'm forever brushing my teeth, and I hate it.
It's something that I shouldn't...
I know that I shouldn't be doing anyways.
It's a waste of time, when you think about it.
Instead of going through all that hassle
of getting rid of the smell and everything,
I should work on giving up smoking again.
Because I've done it twice before.
It's just a matter of getting my head back into it,
thinking about it again.
Talk to friends and relations
about the issues that affect them in your smoking.
And think about what you're denying yourself.
But I think it's also important for people who don't smoke
to don't take it up and to know, now that the information is out,
that it's not good, it's not good fun to smoke.
I know from young friends of my children
who have got hooked on smoking because they tried it early
and they're now struggling into their early 20s.
They're trying to buy a car, they're trying to go on holiday,
and they find that all their money is going on cigarettes.
But when they do give up, they can celebrate.
They can go on their holiday.
And I think they're the important issues that we have to think about
in the whole process of giving up smoking.
I estimated and sat down only a week or so ago
and worked out how many cigarettes I'd smoked.
I added it up again and added it up again,
and went, 'No, that can't be right! 200,000 cigarettes?'
And that's what it is - 200,000 cigarettes.
So all those things hit you home,
and you think, 'What's that costing now?
What's it going to cost in the future as well, that much money?'
They were cheaper when we were younger,
but now they're not as much and all that.
There's a lot of factors now that make me want to be a non-smoker.
More work has to be done around the social structures
in communities and within individuals
to try and help them develop their own strategies
to cope with whatever they need to.
Stress is a big issue.
The social aspect of smoking
is quite difficult for people to try and shed,
because when they're trying to quit,
they have to stay away from some people
they would normally smoke with,
which in some instances might be their partner,
which makes it difficult and challenging
for that person to go through.
So I think a lot of work can be done in the next few years
about helping people come up with their own coping strategies.
And then hopefully doing programs to help families -
a number of people who are smoking,
trying to help them to try and quit at the same time,
or a particular social group.
It might be another interesting way of trying to tackle that issue.
Because if they're all coming at that problem
with the same coping strategies, they can all help each other.
So you're kind of setting up your own support structure
for that person and that group.
It will be interesting to see
if anyone tries to tackle that kind of stuff soon.
Anecdotally, you hear
so many people are smoking and not many people are quitting,
but there are people quitting.
There are people who were available locally
who could tell their story about giving away the smokes
and how they quit smoking
and the improvements they received in their health.
We wanted to present those good-news stories
so that people could see the messages are positively framed.
They're helping people build up their confidence -
'Well, maybe I can do it too.'
Hi, I'm Alec Doomadgee.
If you're watching this film,
I'm guessing you're thinking about quitting smoking, right?
Good for you, because smoking is the number-one killer of our mob.
I've been working with the Aboriginal community locally
since 2005.
Before that, I was involved with a division of general practice
in Coffs Harbour,
developing and running quit-smoking programs,
mostly group programs.
In 2005, we were approached by a local Aboriginal medical service
called Galambila.
They really said, 'Can you do something for our people?
Smoking prevalence is very high in Indigenous communities.'
At that point, I got involved with developing, with Galambila,
a culturally appropriate smoking-cessation program.
Bust your lungs up, you got busted lungs, you got no woman.
You got no woman, you got no car. You got no job.
You're busted up, brother. Don't smoke.
I had this vision that I wanted to be able to provide
a more comprehensive program.
A couple of opportunities came up for funding.
The first grant we applied for wasn't successful.
But then the Indigenous Tobacco Control Initiative started,
and we did put in an application for that, and we were successful.
So right from the beginning, one of my ideas was
for that program to have a DVD.
Let's go and talk to some people about smoking.
I've smoked since I was young. I still smoke.
I've tried to give up smoking, but it's hard.
- What do you think of cigarettes? - No good.
Can you tell me about your experience with cigarettes?
Hate them! I really hate them.
It's not good for you.
Never have, never will.
- Good stuff. - I take it you're a smoker?
I'm a smoker, yeah.
You can't make something like that
without involving the community every step of the way.
For our broader program, which was called No Smokes North Coast,
we had a steering committee,
and that involved representatives from lots of different sectors.
That included representatives
of Aboriginal community-controlled organisations in the area
and the health services, the Aboriginal Health at the hospital,
educational services and social services.
So that was our overarching committee.
Then under that, we had a specific arts and media subcommittee.
We had a lot of committees, I have to say!
Then underneath that, we had a DVD working party,
of people who were particularly...
A smaller group that were going to be really more hands-on
with working on the DVD.
VOICE-OVER: OK, here's a short history lesson.
A long time ago,
some of our ancestors dried out the leaves of certain plants
to make pituri and bush tobacco, which was chewed with ash.
Then those Indonesian fellas came down
and started trading tobacco.
After that, whitefellas turned up
and traded tobacco for all kinds of stuff.
And when we worked on stations,
we often got paid in tobacco there too.
These days, cigarettes have become some kind of currency
for us mob.
We'll trade it for just about anything,
like getting a lift into town.
GILLIAN GOULD: One of the things that was going to be important
with the DVD
was to have the right balance of messages.
So there obviously had to be some medical,
health promotional-type messages in there,
and we didn't want those to be confusing.
So, what if you're pregnant? Can you still smoke?
Can you still take NRT
and medications like Champix and Zyban?
Let's find out.
In terms of medications like Zyban or Champix,
we don't recommend its use in pregnancy.
The safest form would be to use the NRT as a lozenge.
The next line would be to use patches, NRT patches.
It's really important to try and stop smoking
as early as possible in the pregnancy,
preferably before you fall pregnant, but if not,
as early as possible in the pregnancy
and preferably before 16 weeks.
It's got some not-so-good health effects
on both you and the baby.
Basically, once we'd selected the production company
that we were going to work with,
the script was really a collaborative development
between the producer and director and myself.
But then we kept feeding the script back to the committee
for them to give their input.
The parts that were scripted were really more the parts where
we were perhaps going to interview a doctor or health professional
and we wanted them to talk about tobacco.
It was a loose sort of script.
We didn't want people to suddenly come up with a random message
that wasn't evidence-based, so those parts were scripted.
But then we also had more general sections
where people in the community were going to be interviewed,
say, on the street or sportspeople or role models.
None of that was scripted, as such.
VOICE-OVER: These fellas have just won the local grand final.
I wonder if any of them are smokers.
I don't smoke.
That's why you're man of the match.
- Yeah. - Non-smoker.
I felt a hundred percent, myself, when I wasn't smoking.
I gave up probably in 2003.
- Have you tried to quit? - Yeah. It's just too hard.
I've tried a couple of times.
Brother, you still haven't quit yet. You tried?
I tried twice.
INTERVIEWER: What's dragging you back into smoking?
I'd say myself. Just holding myself back.
What are some of the other benefits you've faced
since giving up smoking?
Motivation. Like, I wasn't really motivated.
INTERVIEWER: Are you going to keep trying?
Yeah, I'll keep trying.
Another way to make quitting a little bit easier
is to join a support group like this one, the Quit Cafe.
- Hi, guys. EVERYONE: Hello.
- Can I join in? - Yeah.
Hi, Alec. Welcome to the Quit Cafe.
We're just talking about why people want to quit
and what some of the challenges are.
When you go out, you have a beer,
and it's just automatically that you have the cigarette as well.
I have friends who come over,
and most of my friends are smokers, so it's really hard.
I've tried - this is about the sixth or seventh time - to give up.
I'm not really ready to quit,
but I thought I'd come along and have a look.
I know it's good to have support.
I've tried it before, and it was a bit hard,
trying to give up on my own.
I've had ten years off it before,
but I've been smoking again for another ten.
It's really important that you felt you could come here today,
because even though some of you feel like it's huge
and you might not be ready to quit at the moment,
you'll find, with the support in the group
and with everybody working together,
you will feel more supported
and more motivated to make that decision.
I just love working with people, helping them quit smoking.
I believe it's the single most important thing you can do
as a doctor.
If somebody smokes, their health is not going to improve, really,
until they stop smoking.
So although it's very simple, it's a very powerful thing to do.
And because of my interest in the arts -
apart from being a doctor,
I've probably got more qualifications in the arts area
than I have in medicine -
in drama and in arts therapy.
I have this feeling of just loving working with art
and visual things and movement and drama.
I found that with my work with Aboriginal people,
I've been able to bring this more in.
Like, we ran an arts and health program
for Indigenous schoolchildren,
getting them to make their own quit-smoking messages,
and some of those are incredibly powerful.
You can see from that how worried the kids are
that their parents are smoking.
They're worried they're going to lose their parents.
TOM CALMA: People have asked me, have I ever smoked? Yes, I did.
But I gave up in 1977, but I had tried many times.
I was successful when I was in my mid to late 20s.
I was at university, and as a psychology assignment
was a behaviour modification.
And so I chose to stop smoking, and to stop myself from smoking.
And so I went through a process
and haven't had a cigarette since 1977,
20th September 1977, in fact.
So it's a long time, but I know the struggle.
I know the struggle that my family goes through, my sisters,
and other friends and my daughter.
She's had this trouble,
but it's over 430 days since she's given up smoking,
which is fantastic.
She keeps a record, as does one of my sisters,
who's now into 35 days since she's given up.
Like everybody, very few people are really successful
on the first attempt.
BOB: At first, when you're trying to make that change,
you change for yourself, to better yourself, your life,
your health and your wellbeing.
At the same time, you're hanging around people
who are still doing the same thing.
So, yeah, it was a struggle.
I sort of tried it a week, two weeks
and then went for a month.
But there was times that I'd go around
and hang around with all my brothers, my sisters
and families, friends.
There would be a time where they would come around and say,
'Ah, come and have a cigarette with us.
Don't try and act like you're a better person,' and that.
You try and avoid it, but after a couple of drinks and that,
you find yourself going back and having a cigarette again.
But I always practised.
I would say, 'I'm better than this. I can do it.'
So I sort of put myself on trial -
if I can overcome this for a week and then for a month
and then for a year, as I go, as I success,
and then I can overcome it.
So, yeah, it took me awhile. It took me a week, a month.
Now I'd say it's about seven to eight months
that I've completely stayed out of cigarettes
and reduced all my alcohol intake.
I'm trying to eat healthy and do a lot of exercise
and focus more on my artwork and my music.
And, yeah, life is much more better.
This is just... If I have a rough time
in my personal life, if I have a rough time,
I come in here and just lay on the floor.
Chuck a beanbag down there
and just lay there and look up at the ceiling.
This will remind me of who I am and what I can do.
I can create stuff out of nothing, so it sort of reminds me.
If I lay down there and then I look up at the ceiling,
I say, 'I've got a beautiful talent. I'm a beautiful person.
I can do stuff.'
It's going to remind me of, 'Get up and move forward again.'
Captions by CSI Australia