Published July 2004

Group gives kids eyeful about smoking, drinking

Snohomish County Business Journal/ KIMBERLY HILDEN Registered nurse Kathy Ketchum held up the diseased lungs of a smoker during a recent presentation of “The Real Inside Story” at Canyon Park Junior High School in Bothell.

By Kimberly Hilden
SCBJ Assistant Editor

On one Friday morning in May, ninth-graders sitting in an auditorium at Canyon Park Junior High School in Bothell weren’t chatting about upcoming weekend plans, summer vacation or campus gossip.

They were sitting silently in their chairs, their attention fixed on the stage, where a woman with a soft voice and a white lab coat was doling out a dose of reality about tobacco, marijuana and alcohol; bullying and school violence; choices and consequences.

“Life is a gift and can be taken away in a heartbeat,” said Kathy Ketchum, a presenter of “The Real Inside Story,” a health education program run by the Arlington-based nonprofit group Choice & Consequence.

Ketchum, a registered nurse at Providence Everett Medical Center, shared numbers: one cigarette contains 4,000 different chemicals; one marijuana joint contains 5,000 chemicals; one can of chewing tobacco equals 60 cigarettes’ worth of nicotine. Oh, and “one drop of pure nicotine will kill you.”

She also shared personal — and painful — stories of her own. Such as the night when her best friend, Brandon, died of alcohol poisoning following an after-prom party. Or her own experience with cigarettes, which began behind the school gym in seventh grade and ended a year later, when she saw a smoker’s lung during a school presentation.

Seeing that lung there, diseased and bloated, made her realize what she was doing to herself and to her dreams for the future, she said.

In the Canyon Park auditorium, she gave students a chance to see for themselves, too, as she held up donated human organs damaged by unhealthy lifestyle choices: a tongue exposed to chewing tobacco, the lungs and hearts of tobacco and marijuana smokers.

“We don’t tell them not to do things; we just show them what can happen,” Ketchum said of herself and fellow presenters of “The Real Inside Story,” registered respiratory therapist Rebecca Rose and registered nurse Colleen Williams.

Since its inception in 1989 at the former Everett General Hospital, “The Real Inside Story” has reached thousands of children and teen-agers across Snohomish County. In January, Providence Everett Medical Center donated “The Real Inside Story” to Choice & Consequence, which was formed in 2002 to take the program statewide.

Between 1997 and 2003 alone, Ketchum has presented the program to more than 78,000 students. At her home are binders filled with more than 8,000 letters from children who have connected to her message.

“I just got a letter from a boy at Kamiak saying that he quit smoking that day,” Ketchum said during a recent interview.

Along with presenting age-appropriate material to elementary, middle school and high school students, the three “Organ Ladies,” as they are known, have been asked to attend PTA meetings, YMCA events and adult health fairs, said Williams, volunteer general manager for Choice & Consequence. The nonprofit also has developed “We’re Kicking Ash,” a tobacco cessation program offered to businesses and other organizations.

Although all of Choice & Consequence’s programs come with a service fee to cover their costs, the nonprofit’s goal is to be in a financial position to offer school programs free of charge, Williams said.

In May, the organization received word that it would be included in the 2004 brochure for the Combined Federal Campaigns of King County and North Puget Sound, a workplace-giving program, and would be eligible to receive funds from both campaigns.

For Ketchum, who first presented “The Real Inside Story” 15 years ago at North Middle School in Everett, the program is about connecting with kids, opening their eyes to the consequences that come with unhealthy choices and, hopefully, inspiring them to choose wisely.

“These are our kids; these are our friends’ kids. They are our future,” she said.

For more information, call 360-631-2673 or go online to www.choiceandconsequence.org.

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