A self-proclaimed “vaping addict” is looking for the devices to be banned after her right lung collapsed twice and she or he suffered everlasting scars.
“You never think this kind of thing will occur to you — but it surely happened to me. It felt like my lung was on fire,” Wisconsinite Karlee Ozkurt, 20, told SWNS.
“I fell into the trap of pondering vaping was cool,” Ozkurt confessed. “However it’s silly. I didn’t realize until it was too late.”
Ozkurt’s plea follows a recent study that found that 11.3% of American highschool students reported using e-cigarettes previously 30 days whilst health experts warn of the danger of lung injury, heart attack, respiratory distress, and other dangerous unwanted effects.
Ozkurt, an Eau Claire medical assistant, began vaping as a highschool sophomore after noticing older classmates do it.
She thought it looked cool and could be less harmful than cigarettes, but for the primary month, she needed to “force” herself to enjoy it when her lungs began to harm.
“My older friends bought me my first vape. It was extremely painful to try to inhale it,” Ozkurt admitted.
“I should’ve known from the beginning it wasn’t an excellent thing,” she added. “But I desired to seem to be a badass while doing it. I used to be 15, naïve and impressionable.”
Over time, Ozkurt became used to the sensation of inhaling and grew hooked on the “nicotine buzz,” particularly if she was anxious or stressed.
When the “buzz” faded, the Gen Zer leaned in harder — going through an Elf Bar disposable vape a day to chase the sensation.
Three years in, Ozkurt’s right lung collapsed in November 2021 while she was vaping in the toilet at work.
“I suddenly felt like I’d just pulled a muscle in my back. About an hour later, I began wheezing,” Ozkurt recalled, noting that she was sent home from work but didn’t think the pain was “serious enough” to go to the emergency room.
“But after a sleepless night, I still had the identical pain and I couldn’t breathe. I felt like I used to be dying,” she continued. “I went to the walk-in clinic and told them my symptoms — chest pain, shortness of breath, and back pain. They sent me to the emergency room immediately.”
A chest X-ray revealed that Ozkurt’s right lung had collapsed by 50%.
Doctors manually re-inflated it with a syringe, but they warned her to quit vaping if she didn’t want it to occur again.
After three months of attempting to kick the habit, Ozkurt began vaping repeatedly again.
In November 2022, her lung collapsed again after she endured a severe chest cold for months.
She had surgery to fuse her lung to her chest wall.
“After a CT scan and operating on my lung, my doctor noticed some real scarring on the underside of it and all along it,” Ozkurt shared. “Once I was conscious, I asked him what may need caused it — and he said undoubtedly it was from vaping.”
After a yr and 4 months of an “on-again, off-again habit,” Ozkurt put down the vape for good on Feb. 28 and hopes to never pick it up again.
She wants more people to acknowledge vaping is an addiction with real withdrawal symptoms, including uncontrollable, full-body shakes and extreme irritability.
She’s on 1 milligram of Chantix, a pill that gets in the best way of nicotine within the brain to stop smokers from having fun with it a lot — and now she is “finally” heading in the right direction to complete her first full month vape-free.
But Ozkurt is frightened of the long-term health effects of years of vaping.
“I still don’t know whether I’ve done irreparable damage because we’re unaware of the long-term effects,” she lamented. “I could die at 40 or 50 — and all due to a five-year habit I used to be peer-pressured into.”
Now, Ozkurt is attempting to peer pressure others to not vape.
“I’ve got friends a yr or two younger than me. I need to say to them, don’t even start,” she said. “It’s not cool — just plain silly.”
A self-proclaimed “vaping addict” is looking for the devices to be banned after her right lung collapsed twice and she or he suffered everlasting scars.
“You never think this kind of thing will occur to you — but it surely happened to me. It felt like my lung was on fire,” Wisconsinite Karlee Ozkurt, 20, told SWNS.
“I fell into the trap of pondering vaping was cool,” Ozkurt confessed. “However it’s silly. I didn’t realize until it was too late.”
Ozkurt’s plea follows a recent study that found that 11.3% of American highschool students reported using e-cigarettes previously 30 days whilst health experts warn of the danger of lung injury, heart attack, respiratory distress, and other dangerous unwanted effects.
Ozkurt, an Eau Claire medical assistant, began vaping as a highschool sophomore after noticing older classmates do it.
She thought it looked cool and could be less harmful than cigarettes, but for the primary month, she needed to “force” herself to enjoy it when her lungs began to harm.
“My older friends bought me my first vape. It was extremely painful to try to inhale it,” Ozkurt admitted.
“I should’ve known from the beginning it wasn’t an excellent thing,” she added. “But I desired to seem to be a badass while doing it. I used to be 15, naïve and impressionable.”
Over time, Ozkurt became used to the sensation of inhaling and grew hooked on the “nicotine buzz,” particularly if she was anxious or stressed.
When the “buzz” faded, the Gen Zer leaned in harder — going through an Elf Bar disposable vape a day to chase the sensation.
Three years in, Ozkurt’s right lung collapsed in November 2021 while she was vaping in the toilet at work.
“I suddenly felt like I’d just pulled a muscle in my back. About an hour later, I began wheezing,” Ozkurt recalled, noting that she was sent home from work but didn’t think the pain was “serious enough” to go to the emergency room.
“But after a sleepless night, I still had the identical pain and I couldn’t breathe. I felt like I used to be dying,” she continued. “I went to the walk-in clinic and told them my symptoms — chest pain, shortness of breath, and back pain. They sent me to the emergency room immediately.”
A chest X-ray revealed that Ozkurt’s right lung had collapsed by 50%.
Doctors manually re-inflated it with a syringe, but they warned her to quit vaping if she didn’t want it to occur again.
After three months of attempting to kick the habit, Ozkurt began vaping repeatedly again.
In November 2022, her lung collapsed again after she endured a severe chest cold for months.
She had surgery to fuse her lung to her chest wall.
“After a CT scan and operating on my lung, my doctor noticed some real scarring on the underside of it and all along it,” Ozkurt shared. “Once I was conscious, I asked him what may need caused it — and he said undoubtedly it was from vaping.”
After a yr and 4 months of an “on-again, off-again habit,” Ozkurt put down the vape for good on Feb. 28 and hopes to never pick it up again.
She wants more people to acknowledge vaping is an addiction with real withdrawal symptoms, including uncontrollable, full-body shakes and extreme irritability.
She’s on 1 milligram of Chantix, a pill that gets in the best way of nicotine within the brain to stop smokers from having fun with it a lot — and now she is “finally” heading in the right direction to complete her first full month vape-free.
But Ozkurt is frightened of the long-term health effects of years of vaping.
“I still don’t know whether I’ve done irreparable damage because we’re unaware of the long-term effects,” she lamented. “I could die at 40 or 50 — and all due to a five-year habit I used to be peer-pressured into.”
Now, Ozkurt is attempting to peer pressure others to not vape.
“I’ve got friends a yr or two younger than me. I need to say to them, don’t even start,” she said. “It’s not cool — just plain silly.”
