Nervous Nellie

For most of my friends and family out there who do not know about my cancer...

A year ago, I finally went to the Dermatologist to have my moles checked. Out of the blue one day, I was at the Pediatricians office and as I was walking out I decided to walk over to the Dermatologist desk and schedule an appt. (which was of course out a couple of months). I finally get to my appt. and I can only have one thing checked at an appt. but if he has time he can check maybe 5. I didn't know what to look for as an abnormal mole so I didn't know which ones would be concerning. The Doctor ends up looking at several moles and he spots some on my legs that he finds abnormal (?) and wants to do a biopsy of one. This mole looks normal to me and is a little bigger than a pinhead but I guess he knows better than I do.

The biopsy was awful.

The day before Thanksgiving I get a voicemail from the Doctor himself asking me to call him back. After hearing this, I think "Oh crap" this can not be good if the Doctor himself is calling me and of course the office is closed by the time I get the message. Chad thinks it is no big deal and for me to not worry about it. At this point, I am thinking that I probably have pre-cancerous cells and he just wants to let me know to be more careful about check-ups in the future. I call him back on Monday and get the news...

I have Melanoma Cancer! I need to come in ASAP to have surgery, this is a life threatening disease and I need to notify all of my immediate family to be tested ASAP. What a day!

I go in 2 days later after much research online, tears and sleepless nights to have the surgery. I am thinking that he will have to do a 1 1/2 to 2 inch incision (from my research) and then go from there to make sure that this has not become fatal by entering my lymph nodes or bloodstream. If you personally have not been through this before, you cannot imagine the feelings and a little of the "Why Me?" that you have.

I go in for the surgery, Chad watches the whole thing (YUCK!) and 18 stitches on the outside later this is what I came out with. I should have taken a side view picture of my leg because they cut out a piece that is shaped like an eye and Chad says the the widest part in the middle was about 2-3 inches. Talk about a huge chunk! My leg had a huge dent in it and looked really funny. A year later and it is still not normal.
This picture was about a week after.


Results: Stage 1 Cancer bordering on stage 2 but edges of removal are clear. This means it just barely hadn't reached my lymph nodes and they got it all so I didn't have to go back for more surgery. All I can say is that this was Divine Inspiration because had I gone any longer it could have been fatal.

Recovery was really long because for some reason I am a very slow healer. I also had a really hard time walking because the movement would pull on the incision and was pretty painful. So, this is why I never got my Christmas cards mailed last year. I ended up throwing them in the garbage in February.

In January I went to my appt. at the Hunstman Cancer Institute...that was pleasant! It is so much fun to have a mole mapping of your whole body. That means a ton of pictures taken of my modestly naked body. And another Doctor now checking my naked-self over with a fine tooth magnifying glass. Yippee!

So, here is where the Nervous Nellie part comes into play. I have been supposed to be doing monthly self checks of my entire body, checked by my Gynecologist and Ophthalmologist, going to be checked by my Dermatologist every 3-6 months and going to the Huntsman center every 6 months to have mole mappings done. It was too overwhelming and unpleasant so I haven't done any of it. I have an appt. with my Dermatologist tomorrow and am scared to death of what may possibly happen.