Today is Melanoma Monday. The first Monday in May is dedicated to promoting taking care of our skin and being proactive in preventing skin cancer. It should serve as a reminder for each person’s annual skin check, or it may be the thing that convinces you to go get your first ever skin check. The story is too long to share all of it, but I lost my mom when she was 55 because of melanoma. There are multiple forms of skin cancer, but melanoma is the most dangerous.
Here is a really good chart showing the ABCDEs of melanoma. I saw a chart very similar to this in Seventeen Magazine when I was ~13. A few months later, my mom mentioned that she had a weird looking mole on her collarbone. It was large, multiple colors, and it started peeling and bleeding. I told her about the article and chart from Seventeen Magazine and encouraged my mom to seek out a dermatologist who immediately removed the mole. The dermatologist knew right when she saw it that it was melanoma, but obviously it had to be confirmed by a pathologist. I still go to the same dermatologist who diagnosed her, and she has said that I likely gave my mom a few extra years of life by telling her she needed to have it looked at. If you recognize any of these types of moles on your body or on the body of a loved one, please have it checked out by a dermatologist. If you need a recommendation on where to go or where to start, please let me know. It could save a life.
