25-year-old mom showcases horrific effects 2 years of vaping did to her lungs
A young mom was informed that two years of vaping had left her with a severe health problem she mistook for a heart attack.
Mom-of-five Cloey Eyes was left in intensive care after waking up in the middle of the night struggling to catch her breath - at the time, she believed she was suffering from a heart attack, but just hours later discovered the grim truth.
The 25-year-old, of Ocala in Florida - a city just over an hour's drive northwest from Orlando - puffed cigarettes for three years before giving them up due to her hatred of the smell of smoke.
Like many who ditch smoking, Cloey began vaping, picking up the habit in August 2023. From then until July this year, she would go through a 5,000-puff disposable vape every fortnight.
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If we crunch the numbers, in the 23 months she was vaping, she went through roughly 50 vapes with 5,000 puffs inside, equating to her inhaling vapor from the sticks 250,000 times.
But it all came to a head on July 12.
'I felt like I was going to die'
Speaking about the horrific moment in which her lungs gave up on her and she suspected she was having a heart attack, she said: "I couldn't catch my breath and I had to hit myself in the chest multiple times to be able to catch my breath.
"I was terrified at the pain, and I felt like I was going to die as I was scared I was going to not be able to breathe at all. It was a sharp pain in my chest, but it also was a suffocating feeling.
"The ambulance came and got me and I was taken to hospital, and they said my left lung had an oil pocket in it."
Cloey added: "Around both my lungs was oil. It was scary to hear this. It's the oil from the vape, and this is thickening up as you hit it [the vape] and attaching itself to your lungs.
"I technically at that point had popcorn lung. That's what they call it here."
She was hospitalized for the night but was discharged the following day after having been prescribed an inhaler and cough suppressant medication, and antibiotics, but the damage vaping has caused to her lungs will take at least a year to heal.
'You don't think it's going to happen to you'
Cloey became addicted to the habit of vaping, conceding that she would use it 'every day non-stop' - using it much more than she would with cigarettes due to it being 'handy'.
She continued: "I would never pick up a vape again, especially because I'm a mum. I went cold turkey and quit vaping.
"I feel 10 times better now as I have stopped completely. My lungs feel better, and I don't feel out of breath all the time.
"As a person I would tell people to put the vape down, especially if you're a parent. You don't think it's going to happen to you. I didn't think it would."
Cloey is now trying to raise awareness of the dangers of vaping by stressing how she 'could have lost my life from vaping'.
Joe Yates