These were not the exact words that came out of his mouth, but those are the words that I chose to hear. It is something you hope you never have to hear, either coming from a physician or a loved one. It changes your life forever, whether the end result is good or bad.
Wait. This is not the best place to start. Let me go back a bit and give a bit of history leading up to this point.
I have always been fair-skinned. I blame my heritage, growing up as half Irish. As such, I have a very pale complexion and will get very sunburned if left in the oven for too long. I'm surprised I don't have red hair. I also have a good deal of moles and freckles about my body. In particular, I have two very large moles on my back which worried my mother when I was younger. After getting checked out by our family doctor, I was told they were not abnormal but to keep an eye on them due to their size.
Cue later in my life. I am older and moved out and "found" a large, dime sized mole on my left thigh. I say found in quotes, because I'm pretty sure I've had it for a while. But, for whatever reason, I noticed it enough for it to worry me. All my mind could think about was the moles on my back and what my family doctor had said. But, not one to fool around with my health, I turned to Dr. Internet to see if I could figure out if it was abnormal or not. This is when I found out about the ABCDE's.
The ABCDE's is a system to determine if a mole might possibly be a melanoma, merely by sight. The only way you can ever be 100% about something is to test it. But given my lack of health insurance, my meager paycheck, and my own stubbornness, this would do for now. But I also told myself it looked bad, I'd get it taken care of. So, I went through each letter one by one and compared the definitions as well as pictures to my own.
First, A: Asymmetrical. Melanoma often has a shape which is not circular in appearance. However, mine was roughly round in shape.
Next, B: Border. Melanoma usually grows with a jagged border. Again, mine was perfectly round and smooth. Still no issues.
Third, C: Color. Melanoma usually shows up as a dark brown or black, even sometimes red. Mine was almost a leather brown, like the color of an expensive couch.
Then, D: Diameter. Size is a big factor in determining if a mole might be cancerous. Here is where I hit a snag. Mine was roughly the size of a dime, while a normal size is no bigger than a pencil eraser. I got worried, but immediately thought of the ones I had on my back. The doctor told me those were fine, even with their given size. I told myself not to worry about it.
Finally, E: Evolving. Otherwise known as watching for changes, melanoma continuously grows and is a sure sign of possible cancer involvement. As far as I could tell, there was no growth. Sure, it was big. But I'd keep an eye on it and if I ever noticed any changes I'd get it checked out.
For now, I held off on going to the doctor. This was contingent on the above factors, and if I ever noticed any changes to get it checked out immediately.
Fast forward to November or December of 2010. I can't recall the exact day, but it started bleeding. This didn't happen out of the blue, instead I noticed it in the shower. My initial thought was I scratched it or rubbed it too hard while soaping myself down. I bandaged it up and waited for it to heal itself. But, it never really did. Again, I stubbornly attributed this to... "I must have ripped the scab off in the shower again" or "I scratched it off itching my leg in bed". It wasn't constantly bleeding, but I'd have to go through this routine about ever 2-3 weeks or so.
That was until it began to grow. At first it just looked like a mole growing on my mole. I thought it might have just been the scar tissue building up but at this point, it was simply too worrisome for me to ignore any longer. I told my wife about it and we got an appointment set up in May 2011 with the dermatologist, which was right after we returned from a week long cruise.
"You have cancer".
I remember it clearly...
I have always been fair-skinned. I blame my heritage, growing up as half Irish. As such, I have a very pale complexion and will get very sunburned if left in the oven for too long. I'm surprised I don't have red hair. I also have a good deal of moles and freckles about my body. In particular, I have two very large moles on my back which worried my mother when I was younger. After getting checked out by our family doctor, I was told they were not abnormal but to keep an eye on them due to their size.
Cue later in my life. I am older and moved out and "found" a large, dime sized mole on my left thigh. I say found in quotes, because I'm pretty sure I've had it for a while. But, for whatever reason, I noticed it enough for it to worry me. All my mind could think about was the moles on my back and what my family doctor had said. But, not one to fool around with my health, I turned to Dr. Internet to see if I could figure out if it was abnormal or not. This is when I found out about the ABCDE's.
The ABCDE's is a system to determine if a mole might possibly be a melanoma, merely by sight. The only way you can ever be 100% about something is to test it. But given my lack of health insurance, my meager paycheck, and my own stubbornness, this would do for now. But I also told myself it looked bad, I'd get it taken care of. So, I went through each letter one by one and compared the definitions as well as pictures to my own.
First, A: Asymmetrical. Melanoma often has a shape which is not circular in appearance. However, mine was roughly round in shape.
Next, B: Border. Melanoma usually grows with a jagged border. Again, mine was perfectly round and smooth. Still no issues.
Third, C: Color. Melanoma usually shows up as a dark brown or black, even sometimes red. Mine was almost a leather brown, like the color of an expensive couch.
Then, D: Diameter. Size is a big factor in determining if a mole might be cancerous. Here is where I hit a snag. Mine was roughly the size of a dime, while a normal size is no bigger than a pencil eraser. I got worried, but immediately thought of the ones I had on my back. The doctor told me those were fine, even with their given size. I told myself not to worry about it.
Finally, E: Evolving. Otherwise known as watching for changes, melanoma continuously grows and is a sure sign of possible cancer involvement. As far as I could tell, there was no growth. Sure, it was big. But I'd keep an eye on it and if I ever noticed any changes I'd get it checked out.
For now, I held off on going to the doctor. This was contingent on the above factors, and if I ever noticed any changes to get it checked out immediately.
Fast forward to November or December of 2010. I can't recall the exact day, but it started bleeding. This didn't happen out of the blue, instead I noticed it in the shower. My initial thought was I scratched it or rubbed it too hard while soaping myself down. I bandaged it up and waited for it to heal itself. But, it never really did. Again, I stubbornly attributed this to... "I must have ripped the scab off in the shower again" or "I scratched it off itching my leg in bed". It wasn't constantly bleeding, but I'd have to go through this routine about ever 2-3 weeks or so.
That was until it began to grow. At first it just looked like a mole growing on my mole. I thought it might have just been the scar tissue building up but at this point, it was simply too worrisome for me to ignore any longer. I told my wife about it and we got an appointment set up in May 2011 with the dermatologist, which was right after we returned from a week long cruise.
"You have cancer".
I remember it clearly...
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