Diagnosis

We can't escape our pasts, we can only survive them.

I survived twenty-odd years heavy drinking. Just barely, but I did.

Now I have to survive the smoking. Mine and that of others.

I have never smoked cigarettes, but I used to work in some of the smokiest bars on the planet. As a child, I used to get sick when the adults would fill the car with smoke. This was attributed to "road -sickness", but I knew better.
And of course there's the weed. Apparently, it's not quite as harmless as I'd fooled myself into believing.

My X-rays show that I have Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, or COPD. Until further tests are done, I won't know the severity of my disease, but I do know it's incurable and irreversible.
With luck, I'm in the early stages (0 0r 1 ) and with the help of medicines, I can lead a fairly normal life. No oxygen tanks or surgery needed, just a bit of lifestyle change. There are yoga-based breathing techniques that can help as well. Or so I am told.

I was told that even twenty years of pot smoking alone was unlikely to have been enough to cause this, nor would have the years of second-hand smoke- but together it was almost inevitable.
Then again, some people never smoke at all, second -hand or not- and get COPD anyway. This is 10-20% of the cases. It may be hereditary.
That is not reassuring.

I had to leave work when I found out. I called my Grandmother. We talked for a long time. I told her how scared I was, how I just cannot get the images of my mother's slow death from lung cancer out of my mind.
Even at the age of 40, I still need my Granny to tell me everything is going to be OK.

But she needed something from me too.

She was tip-toeing around it, so I answered her unasked question for her:

No, I am not going to start drinking. There is a good chance that I will live for another twenty years or even longer, but if I drink, I won't last a month.

And, by Godzilla, if I only have a short time, I don't want to waste it drinking.

I don't know what to do , but I need to be sober, I know that much. No more pot, of course.

So I'm trying to get a plan together. I need to clean my mental house and decide what is most important - what needs doing and what doesn't. What I can and can't do.

I have been told to just relax and take it easy until a full battery of tests can be done this weekend.
This is good advice, but I'm finding it impossible to follow.