I find that smoking is a dirty thing.
It really hurts you, in the long run, and can affect your relationships with friends and family.
I didn't realise exactly how bad smoking was until i started my first year of high school.
You see, my mother smoked all my life. it was normal for me.
almost every time i saw her she would have a cigarette in her hand, so i didn't know it was an extremely bad thing to do.
She always told me 'Don't smoke princess. It ruins your life', but i didn't understand. My mother was telling me not to smoke, but she was smoking!
I just couldn't understand it.
i realised, though, as i got into high school, that smoking was a very big issue for my area.
Almost everybody that I knew smoked, or did drugs, and i was horrified!
I had never tried smoking, but I knew that as soon as i got to this school, i made the right choice not to smoke.
People were getting caught left right and centre for smoking on school grounds, and I ended up getting caught in with the wrong crowd.
I thought they were my friends.
i thought they would have my back.
But a smoker thinks the same as everybody else in their little group.
We formed a group that literally ran the school called the 'coterie' and unfortunately I took up smoking.
Teachers called us the rat-pack and other students were afraid of us.
I never once did drugs but i quickly got addicted. Just as addicted as everyone else in the coterie.
we would ditch classes, constantly get suspended, at least one of got arrested each day and a few of us spent up to two weeks in a juvenile detention centre.
It wasn't until one of the coterie girls had to face court that i realised how bad the group i belonged to was.
i tried to quit, but it was so hard.
i couldn't bring myself to put down the cigarette and i didn't know what i was going to do.
Smoking is a horrible thing, and it took me so long to realise how much it affected my family, as well as me.
I didn't know this until about two days ago, but one time when i got arrested, my mother was out on the highway trying to jump infront of log trucks,
You lose yourself.
It becomes so hard to go a day without smoking and no matter how cool people think it is, it really does ruin your life.
My mother was just as lost as me.
i wasn't even her little princess any more. she was ashamed to even call me her daughter.
i was part of the coterie, and that was a bad thing to most people.
but they were my friends.
well, that's what i thought.
the coterie found out that i was trying to quit smoking, and i was threatened that i would be kicked out.
the boy i was dating (Who was part of the coterie, as we all stuck with each other) threatened to break up with me and i was told that nobody would ever be my friend again.
That's when i couldn't take it anymore.
i burnt everything to do with them.
i brooke up with my boyfriend and i gave all my cigarettes to my mother.
i started staying full days at school and i did everything i was supposed to do.
but i was still terrible.
this was around the middle of year 9 when i had extreme anger management issues, and i constantly got into fights with coterie members.
around this time one of them put me in hospital and blamed everything on me.
she blamed me for why she was so horrible, for why she got arrested, and for everything in between.
All i was was a scapegoat.
that's what they started using me for.
i didn't smoke anymore, and it was terrifying.
i had nothing to pull me out of this hole i was in and i fell into a depression. i constantly cut myself open and i snuck out every night to try and jump off the local bridge.
i didn't want to be alive any more.
One day my mother called me princess though. princess was the nickname i had since i was a baby, and as soon as my mother found out about everything she immediately stopped calling me 'princess' and started using my name.
when she called me princess I cried.
she knew i was trying, aside from the problems.
at least i wasn't getting arrested any more, she would tell me.
i didn't think she knew about what the coterie was doing to me, but she did.
i was sitting in my room with a blade to my wrist when the police came through my door telling me that i had to go with them.
it terrified me, i thought i had done something wrong.
but when i got to the station the rest of the coterie was there and anger fuelled me.
the police had to hold me back, because there was so much anger, and rage that i needed to let go of.
i was pulled into a little interview room and asked questions about what had been happening with me and the coterie.
i told them everything, and couldn't stop myself from crying the whole way through.
then the coterie was interviewed and i went home.
after a week i had to go back for court and the coterie all went to a juvenile detention centre for the summer, or until they quit smoking and doing drugs.
i couldn't understand what had went wrong with me.
was it the smoking?
my mum was there for me through the whole thing and i finally understood how bad smoking was. it ruined my life. if i hadn't of started smoking i wouldn't of had to look at the scars on my arms and wrists everyday.
it killed relationships with people that actually cared about me, and i lost myself for a very long time.
sitting here in this class room, having finished my work early and deciding that it's time to speak up about my experience, i can honestly say that i wish i had never taken up smoking, but i am glad i gave it up and glad that it has made me a stronger, better person today.
and i finally understand.