Priscilla Ewing of Louisville started smoking as a teenager. Influenced by her parents, who both smoked, Ewing was used to having cigarettes around, and smoking became a part of her daily life well into adulthood. She developed a chronic cough, but that wasn’t enough to deter her from increasing her habit to two packs a day.

“As I continued to smoke, the cough got terrible,” she says. “For me to speak a full sentence, it was almost impossible.”

One day, Ewing’s cough got so bad that her husband had a heart-to-heart talk with her and convinced her that it was time for both of them to quit smoking – together.

Ewing decided she was willing to try, but the early attempts were not successful. Finally, she and her husband attended a smoking cessation course at the Family Health Center in Louisville’s Portland neighborhood. The Cooper-Clayton Method presented by two doctors at the center helped to educate Ewing and her husband about smoking’s pervasive health effects, and motivated them to give up tobacco for good.

Now, Ewing’s daily routine does not begin with a cigarette but instead with Bible reading and making “blasts” – fruit and vegetable smoothies – for herself and her husband.

“I quit smoking 14 years ago,” she says. “That was the turning point in my adult life. I began to live instead of die. I began to embrace instead of push away. When smoke clears away, clarity follows.”