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Wednesday, January 30, 2013

So much frustration


I am open to advice on how to view this, but I am really having a hard time with my husband’s choice to smoke cigarettes.  Obviously smoking is an addiction and an unhealthy one at that. I understand addictions are hard to stop, and Josh had made the decision to stop smoking before, but now he justifies his choices by claiming that it helps him.  I have gone over and over the risk factors and how that isn’t fair to me or our family if something should happen to him due to these (in my opinion) selfish choices.  I also fail to see how an addiction is helpful.  To those who know my background, I had a struggle getting off my pain medications after my car accident.  I very easily could have continued in taking the narcotics claiming they helped me deal with the pain, but in truth I was aware of the addiction and fought to lose its control on me.  I know I shouldn’t but I have a hard time not being judgmental as I know he could cut the addiction if he really wanted as he has done so before.  I feel that his dependence on the cigarettes is a weakness and he refuses my help in quitting his habit that I silently despise his choices and take them as a personal offence that he chooses the comfort of his addiction over the health of himself and his family.  I have been begging him for the last year to show me affection and when he finally does I have a hard time returning the intimate touches or kisses when I smell the smoke on his clothes and breath.  I feel like every day I have been betrayed because he is choosing himself over the greater good.  I especially feel it is not fair in this sense:  for the last three years I have been pregnant or breastfeeding meaning I am super conscious of what I am taking into my body as it affects the child I am carrying or nursing.  Just because Josh does not carry a child inside him, does not mean he should not have that same sort of caution.  He is teaching habits and if I can smell the smoke on him, so can our kids.  Even just breathing in the smell is considered dangerous, especially around newborns.  He is considerate in that he doesn’t come home just reeking of smoke, but there is no hiding such an icky habit.  I don’t know how to get over feeling it as a personal attack as obviously I feel it affects me and the children.  He has cut back, but at the moment seems to refuse quitting.  I feel it is especially unfair as before we were married I was very clear about making sure this would never be allowed in my home, and although he doesn’t smoke at home, it still comes home with him.  Any advice?

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