Gruen Von Behrens

Throughout my High School career I’ve listened to many speakers talk about their lives: their accomplishments, their struggles, and their perseverance. None of these speakers really touched my heart or affected my life, except for one. Gruen Von Behrens is a true hero in my eyes. Starting his nicotine addiction at thirteen years old and ending it at sixteen, after it was too late. He developed cancer, hurt his family and friends, and destroyed his body. He personally reaches out to students all across the United States; most importantly, he reached out to me and to my friends, impacting our lives in many ways.

Gruen started chewing tobacco at the age of thirteen, thinking it was completely harmless, just the “cool thing to do.” By the time he was sixteen he had developed cancer in his mouth, Squamous Cell Carcinoma. Doctors gave him a presumed 75% chance of survival. This was news that no one wanted to hear, let alone a sixteen year old boy. Gruen was a star baseball player; he had dreams and goals for his life, only to find out that something as ridiculous as chewing tobacco would crush them all. Gruen has undergone over forty surgeries to try to repair the parts of his mouth and jaw that the cancer had destroyed. He has more courage than any person I’ve ever met. Even after all the surgery, his face still wasn’t repaired back to normal. People often make rude remarks about him when he goes in public, but he doesn’t seem to let it get to him. The remarks don’t stop Gruen from educating kids about the dangers of chewing tobacco, and smoking too. Traveling around the country, he presents his story to the younger, high school generation. Gruen works with the National Spit Tobacco Education Program and wants everyone to know the dangers of chewing. It’s not all fun and games after all, as he had thought when he was thirteen.

Gruen actually cares about each and every one of us. He saw how chewing completely ruined his life, and he doesn’t want the same thing for anyone else. Like he says in his speech, “No one told me that my face would look like this. No one told me about the dangers of chewing tobacco. If I had known what I know now, I never would have put a dip in my mouth.” Those being his exact feelings, he doesn’t ever want a person to say the same thing once he/she develops cancer. Gruen knows that everyone has a dream and he doesn’t want something as little as chewing tobacco to ruin those dreams and keep you from being who you were made to be.

Gruen’s story greatly affected my life. I used to smoke, until I had the pleasure of listening to his story. He repeated many times, “Chewing (or smoking) hurts everyone, not just you. It will hurt your parents, your family, and your friends; the people that care about you unconditionally. It’s a selfish habit, and I don’t want any of you to let it pull you down.” After hearing those words, and thinking about the people that mattered to me so much, I knew that I didn’t want to hurt them, and I didn’t want to hurt myself. I have dreams of becoming an English teacher, and I knew that I couldn’t do that once I developed cancer, so I stopped smoking. Many of my close friends also took in what he said, and threw their half full cans of chew and packs of cigarettes in the garbage during lunch that day. His words saved my life and many other people that I care about, it’s amazing to think of all the young people that are learning from someone else’s mistakes, and changing.

Gruen is a very motivational and inspiring person, and I’m glad that I had the chance to listen to his words of wisdom. He cares greatly about every young person who might even be thinking about trying that first dip. He helped me to stop smoking, a habit I had been trying to quit for a few months before I heard his story. The fact that he will continue to speak to people for as long as he can truly is heroic. I know that if I looked the same way he did, with all due respect, I wouldn’t stand in front of a million people and talk. That’s a definite heroic act and I’m glad that my life has been so greatly impacted and I hope that others will learn as well.