Nathan might accidentally smoke a cigarette

A while back I was out with the kids and we saw someone smoking. Nathan (of course it would be Nathan) wanted to know what she was doing. I grabbed hold of this teaching moment and explained to the kids about how it was a habit that made you feel good at first but hurt your lungs, heart, mouth, etc., was hard to quit, smelled bad, wasn't something to ever try, blah, blah, blah, blah. I felt like the Charlie Brown mom who is only ever a garbled voice in the background. Still I left the situation with a deep feeling of satisfaction. Lesson imparted, children will never try cigarettes.

This is what Aubrey, my first born rule follower, took from the lecture: Cigarettes bad. Don't do them 'cause Mom said so.

Nathan heard something different.

A few weeks later after all the kids were tucked in for the night, we heard Nathan calling for us in a panicky, sobbing voice. We rushed in to soothe him and he wailed, "I AM SO SCARED FOR ALL THE SMOKING PEOPLE!!" Bewildered, we asked him what he meant. "What if they don't know they are hurting their lungs! What if they don't know they can't quit! WHAT IF SOMEONE FORCES ME TO SMOKE CIGARETTES AND IT HURTS MY LUNGS AND I DIE?!?!?!?"

After assuring Nathan that no one could ever force him to smoke we endured another barrage of questions. Why do people smoke if they know it's bad for them? Do they know they could die? Why was the man on Parent Trap smoking? (I didn't even think he was watching that movie!) Why do they make cigarettes if they are bad for you? Short of having a discussion on free agency, peer pressure, economics, and changing health care attitudes, we were rather at a loss.

I ended up back peddling on half my earlier lecture. Yes, smoking is bad but people who smoke are not bad people. Quitting smoking is hard but people do it all the time and if someone forces you to smoke Nathan, I'm sure you could quit. No, you do not drop dead instantly of a heart attack if you one day smoke one cigarette. I nearly offered to go buy him a pack and smoke it all together, just so he could stop thinking that the mere sight of one was going to give him lung disease and death.

He seems to have recovered from the initial cigarette horror but every single time we see a cigarette butt on the ground he says, "Look Mom, it's one of those sickness sticks."

I can't imagine what he'll do when he gets the birds and the bees talk.