Thanks for the “wake-up slap”, FG. 
It’s gonna be tough, but I’m going to stick to my principles. She really is a pretty lady and always has a hug (with the promise of more) for me, but I don’t think she’s the type to be able to give up smoking to have a relationship with a respiratory therapist, and wouldn’t I be a bit of a hypocrite myself?
Now do I tell her to her face or should I relay the message through the friend who has told me of her interest?
Thanks for your contributions, y’all.
Q
Smoking was always a deal-breaker for me, no matter how attractive the guy. Killed my desire for him on the spot as soon as I saw him light up. Ewww.
I’m a light smoker who has dated non-smokers too, and I found that I smoke much less when with them. In fact, it was a good start to tapering off. However, the SECOND they give me grief about it, I tell them to kiss my ass. I eat healthy, exercise, eat right, am not overweight, and pay my bills on time. The last thing I need is some self-righteous non-smoker telling me what to do.
I now date a light smoker, and we are light-smokers together! We’ll quit when we’re good and ready, and we don’t hassle each other.
All of my relationships have been smoker / nonsmoker ones. All of the ones that have lasted longer than a month, that is. While I don’t smoke more than about ten cigarettes a year myself, for some reason I tend not to click very well with nonsmokers (or with health-conscious, risk-averse people in general).
The smoking thing is pretty much a non-issue with me since it doesn’t bother me at all; I don’t know what to tell you if it does bother you.
Could never happen. We’d make each other miserable. Smoke makes me sick–I have asthma.
It’s pretty much a dead issue, though, because I don’t know a single friend or co-worker who does it.
And it’s not like I get asked out that much, either. Ha.
I started my relationship with my honey as a smoker, sucking down 1 1/2 packs a day. He didn’t like it, and had previously sworn that he would never date a smoker. I must be really cute or something… 
Four months later we visited my father in Michigan. I had one last cig before getting on the plane at LAX ( I HATE flying).
I had known for years that my dad had emphysema, but the reality of the disease had never hit home. I hadn’t seen Dad for 10 years, and all of our communication, when there was any, was via letter/e-mail.
He can’t hold a conversation with anyone for more than 30 minutes without having severe breathing problems. He is on oxygen 24/7. He can no longer eat a full meal, because it puts too much pressure on his lungs. He cannot sit for long periods of time, again due to pressure on his lungs. He uses a walker (it’s a really nifty one though. Purple.).
This man that I missed so much in my life, who I am so much like ~good and bad~, who was such an influence on the Pagan community, is dying. He is only 58.
I saw that, and I haven’t picked up a cig since. My little girl will never see me like that.
Needless to say, my honey was (and still is) estatic.
One of my ex-girlfriends was a smoker. A pretty heavy one, too. If you want to know what kissing one is like, go lick an ashtray. And your clothes always smell horrendous if they smoke around you. I wouldn’t do it again, because of my allergies.
I’m happily married to another smoker. Until reading this thread I hadn’t even THOUGHT that somebody out there would want to date and then stop to think “Wow, I’d really like to date her, but she smokes.”
I don’t think I’d WANT to date a guy who actually thought that.
I mean, it’s different if we’ve been together for a while, and know we’ll be together for the rest of our lives to say “I would like you to quit smoking, because I want you to be around longer.” but as far as just dating goes … whoa…
Oh, and back before I smoked, I did date guys who smoked and it never bothered me.
AND, I do recall a college boyfriend who once took cigarettes away from me, because he didn’t want me to start the habit. That didn’t bother me, because I think he was just concerned that I’d get addicted (which I later did). He didn’t seem upity or rude about it. Just didn’t want me to start and get hooked.
Just my two cents.
Since I’m one of the people who said smoking is a deal-breaker, I’ll comment on this.
Both Mr. S and I (we’re both nonsmokers, natch) grew up with chain-smoking parents. We both spent our childhoods swathed in tobacco smoke. For Mr. S, the smoke exacerbated his allergies. My dad accidentally burned me once or twice when I wandered into his dangling hand with the cigarette in it. We lived in houses with overflowing ashtrays. We didn’t like it.
When we grew up and could make our own decisions, we decided that we didn’t want to live in a smoke-filled house anymore. Yes, that eliminated some otherwise wonderful people from our dating pool. But we both figured that were plenty of wonderful nonsmokers from whom we might choose to share our lives.
I find that a lot of my personal contentment comes from the little day-to-day things in my life. If I lived with a smoker, no matter how wonderful he might be, the constant presence of tobacco smoke and mess would be a daily irritant. Being married to a nonsmoker, for me, is a way of having one less annoyance in my life, and to me, an important one.
We all have different levels of tolerance. I’m happy for those who can make a smoker/nonsmoker relationship work. (Heck, these days, it’s good to see ANY relationship work . . .) But I’m not one of them. Not while there are plenty of nonsmokers available (though I’ve caught my limit ).
Let me address this too. Here’s the deal. If I am around cigarette smoke for five minutes or so, my throat starts itching and burning. If I go longer, I start coughing. Major smoke-filled events like concerts keep me coughing for three days afterward and some of the worst ones have left me in bed for a few days, violently ill. And it wasn’t because I was drinking or anything, cause I hadn’t been. It was all the smoke. Maybe it’s all psychological, but whatever the cause, I’m miserable.
Now I’ll hang around smokers and I’m not going to evangelize. But I’m not going to spend the rest of my days coughing my lungs out so my potential SO can get her nicotine fix.
Ladies if its the cigarette breath thats bothering you, I’d hate to see what happens when the guy blows his jism in your mouths.
I simply could not put up with the smell of smoke hanging around a guy, or kissing him (ewww, I hate that), or staying over at a smoke-filled house or apartment. Also, if I really cared about him, I’d be constantly worrying about what he was doing to his health, and I’m quite the worrier.
So, no smokers. Want to be friends? Great. Want to date me? I’m sorry, you’ll have to quit first. I’d be 100% behind you in that effort.
If I’m a bit militant about this, so be it. I grew up in a blessedly smoke-free house and don’t feel like changing that.
With the exception of one, all my relationships have been smoker/nonsmoker (including the relationship I’m in now). I’m the smoker. All of them (including my present boyfriend) knew going in that I smoked. While certainly they would have liked it if I would have quit, none of them harped on me about it.
I respect nonsmokers’ rights to have non-smoke-filled homes and cars (meaning, at their homes if I want to smoke I go outside, and I don’t smoke inside their cars either). And I don’t throw the cig butts on their property either. For instance, at my boyfriend’s I dump the butts in this old empty milk bottle out on the back porch (which is where I go to smoke when I’m there), and I empty that periodically in the woodstove (this was his idea actually when I asked him where I could empty my “ashtray”). Of course, in MY apartment and car, I smoke as I please. But those are my places and I see it as my right to do as I please in that case.
I also expect non-smokers not to get on my case about it. While I wouldn’t go around trying to get non-smokers to start smoking, those “holier than thou” non-smokers (and ex-smokers, for that matter) who preach can, IMO, take a hike, and I tell them to mind their own business, plain and simple. I mean, it’s not like I’m polluting THEIR property with my cig smoke! If a man doesn’t want to date me because I smoke (or if he started dating me anyway but proceeded to get on my case about smoking), (a) fine with me, and (b) I’d tell him if my smoking bothered him that much, he should go find someone else.
My present boyfriend would certainly be supportive if I wanted to quit (over the years I’ve tried and failed a few times, and decided I don’t really WANT to quit strongly enough to deal with the difficulties), but he accepts it that I’m not quitting and is more than tolerant. I’ve never smoked in his house or car because he insisted “no smoking in my house or car,” but rather because they’re his, he doesn’t smoke, and as such I’m sure he prefers not to have to smell smoke in those places. When we go out to eat at a place that has a smoking section, if the person seating us asks if we want the smoking or non-smoking section, he says the smoking section is OK with him. And, he doesn’t mind when he’s at my apt or in my car and I smoke (and I open the windows too, to “ventilate” it for him somewhat – I know that doesn’t get rid of ALL the smoke, but I estimate it has to be better than being in a closed room or car with it).
If my boyfriend (who has never smoked, BTW) doesn’t like the way I taste with regards to kissing, there is no evidence of it whatsoever. He’s just as likely as I am to start the kissing, and we kiss often (and I think he’s a terrific kisser too!).
So that’s my experience with these kinds of relationships. However, I’d mention that anyone who does find smoking unconscionable (for any reason: hatred of smell, allergies, fear that being around a smoker will endanger your health, etc.), I think it would be much better that you refuse to date smokers at all than date one anyway and then start bugging him or her to quit. Quitting smoking is something a person can only do because he or she WANTS to do it badly enough, for him or herself, not because a SO wants him/her to stop.
Relay the message through the friend.
The message came to you that way to avoid a ‘burn’ so send it back without a burn to it: “I just cannot reconcile the dichotomy between what I do as a respiratory therapist and what a smoker does to their lungs. She’s a nice looking and friendly person, someone I could be very attracted to, but I can’t get past the smoking. Sorry if that seems judgemental, but it is a part not only of what I do, but of who I am.”
If the mutual friend’s a smoker, the message will be shortened to “He’s a no-smoking tightass.”
Stick to your principles. Better to have a disappointed co-worked than an angry ex-GF when you can’t commit to a relationship with her and her smoking. Now, if she quits…REALLY quits…go for it.
:wiping tears of laughter from my cheeks: 
Oh, God! Funny but only partly true. I’m a bit overweight, so to consider me a tightass would be a misnomer, but point taken, DD. I’m not out to hurt anyone, that’s for sure.
Thank you!
Quasi
I’ve turned down some nice men because of smoking. It is a dealbreaker. I watched my father suffer and die horribly because of smoking-related illnesses. I NEVER want to go through that heartbreak again, so I see dating smokers as asking for trouble.
Plus, now that I’ve been away from cigarette smoke for a few years (unfortunately because of my dad’s decline and death), I find cigarette smoke rather irritating.
I have nothing against smokers as people. I know it must be very hard to quit. But I could never live with a smoker again. Since I date people with the hope that someday we will have a future together, why waste time for both of us?
Quasi,
I think i’ve seen pictures of you. Not bad, my dear.
Not bad at all, but your Dallas is a little far from my Houston. (And why is it all MY respiratory therapists have always been tiny women with shrill voices that make me wanna whack 'em??)
Dee Dee