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For most of my life I never saw anyone chew tobacco.
I had heard of it but had never seen it in action or even saw a commercial for it. Then I took a job as a Nurse Practitioner for the USAF. Within a month while doing an exam and reviewing lab results a patient told me that he dipped. I had no idea what he meant. After some conversation I caught on. So then when discussing smoking with patients I would bring up stop chewing tobacco and found it to be quite pervasive. And these were 20–30-year-olds. I expected it was an older man’s habit.
So, then I wanted to know why they all chewed. But I could not find a common theme. They were from all over the country, had been all over the world and none smoked cigarettes. It took a few years, but I finally found a commonality. They chewed because they could *NOT* smoke. The thing they all had in common was they had some type of military job where smoking was forbidden. Maybe they serviced aircraft, fueled equipment or were even flight crew themselves. So, no smoking allowed, but they could chew tobacco and spit it out without having an open flame. And they still got their nicotine fix.
The moral of the story is, of course, the incredible addiction of nicotine. They went through such an amazing amount of trouble just to get their nicotine. In ten years, the only person I ever met that stopped dipping was a young man who had half his tongue removed from cancer due to chewing tobacco. Smokeless tobacco contains 28 chemicals that can cause cancer. Our program Self Hypnosis to Stop Chewing Tobacco can help you stop dipping. Furthermore, read a great article on the health issues of chewing/dipping Mayo Clinic article on smokeless tobacco.
