Man Brings Vivid Message About Spit Tobacco Use

Source from:  By BILL SCHWANKE of the Missoulian 03/06/2008

Watch a video about the dangers of spit tobacco FLORENCE - They say a picture is worth a thousand words. When it comes to Gruen Von Behrens' message about the dangers of using spit tobacco, that might be understating it. A spit tobacco user since he was 13, Von Behrens - diagnosed with oral cancer about four years later - shows the obvious results of 34 surgeries that have resulted in the removal of his lower teeth and jawbone, the loss of half of his tongue and neck muscles, and the replacement five years ago of his entire lower jawbone. Following an appearance on a nationwide MTV broadcast, Von Behrens started getting phone calls asking him to make appearances. He says his "life's been a whirlwind ever since." Over the last nine years, Von Behrens has been in 45 of the 50 states and every Canadian province speaking to more than a million kids about the perils of spit tobacco. His Montana tour started last Monday in Plentywood and wrapped up Friday in Darby, Corvallis and Florence. In between were stops in Wolf Point, Malta, Havre, Shelby, Sunburst, Browning, Kalispell, Columbia Falls and Whitefish. His message to the students at Florence-Carlton High School was about the dangers of tobacco, but he also touched heavily on relationships - how people, especially young people, tend to treat people who act or look different. Now 30, Von Behrens told students how spit tobacco - a product often associated with professional baseball players and other athletes - wrenched the prospect of a promising baseball career away from him. Von Behrens, who grew up in a farm community of 750 people in the Midwest, makes no excuses for his young introduction to tobacco. "It was just part of my culture," he explains. "It was part of where I grew up. It was just part of who I was and who my family was. In that (rural) area, it was just part of what people did. "We were so naive about tobacco." Von Behrens said the reaction to his appearance and message is pretty much the same wherever he goes. "Kids are usually spellbound," he said, "very respectful, and they really want to hear what I have to say. I think that they realize that I'm not here to complain to them, I'm not here to ridicule anybody. "I just want them to have a fair choice in their life and I think that they really respect that." One message Von Behrens tries to get across is that the amount of spit tobacco one uses doesn't really matter. "I wasn't that heavy of a user," he noted. "I was using just as much as the next guy was, maybe three-fourths to a tin a day. I've seen guys use two or three cans a day." So what do kids ask him when given the chance? Von Behrens said common questions address how he eats, how much his medical expenses have been, if he has a girlfriend, why it's still legal to sell tobacco products. "Kids can come up with some pretty neat questions," he said. He is married. Von Behrens and his wife have a 2-year-old daughter. Von Behrens said he sees some differences between rural and urban kids, although they are equally attentive. "I think the urban kids are just used to talking to other people more often and they're more comfortable asking questions in a public arena," he explained. While it's hard to track the direct results of his efforts, Von Behrens can cite a couple of promising things. First, all of his family members and friends quit using tobacco when they saw what happened to him. And after he went through the jaw-replacement surgery five years ago, he received 35,000 get well and thank-you cards from kids throughout the country saying they appreciated that he came to their school. Many told him that "they never used tobacco because of me" or sent "a simple get well note because of how I touched them when I was there." According to Jason Swant, program manager for the Montana Tobacco Use Prevention program, 12 percent of Montana men use spit tobacco. That's twice the national average. Perhaps more alarming is that 22 percent of Montana senior high school boys are regular users despite the fact that spit tobacco users are 50 times more likely to develop oral cancer than non-users. "Gruen really drives home the message for kids who may already be using tobacco," Swant said. "I think it causes them to think, 'Wow, look what happened to Gruen,' and they consider that when making decisions about ... their tobacco use." Enditem