Abnormal

In October of 2006, I went to the Dermatologist for the first time. My mom kept telling me to go and since I knew my medical insurance was coming to an end, I booked all my doctor's appointments including my first trip to the Dermatologist. To give you a little background, I am covered in moles and freckles. I grew up at the beach and town pools and can maybe count on one hand how many times I remember being truly sunburned. Ok, back to the month of October 2006. I go to my DR and she looks at me and says "you've had way too much sun exposure." That's the first thing she says to me as part of the exam. I tell her my background etc etc. She has now looked at multiple spots on my body under a magnifying glass (no joke). She comes across a spot on my leg that looks suspicious so she says I'm going to remove this. "I am going to inject you with a local anesthetic and then scrape it off." Ew. Gross. Long story short, she did this procedure and I ended up crying. Not by choice. It just happened. I don't like doctor's offices and I especially don't like needles so this frightened me some. A week passes by and I get the results. "There are some pre-cancerous cells. So I want you to come back in." Luckily Mom was coming into town shortly after and I had her come with me. DR gives us 3 options. 1) We can watch it closely (I LOVE this option!) 2) We can do the same thing we did last time and remove a little more or 3) Cut a large diamond shape out of my leg. Luckily DR was not too keen on option 3. So Mom talked to DR to confirm that choosing option 1 was still a safe option knowing what the results of the test were. It's totally fine. So great, no more cutting. Wrong. Somehow we get onto the conversation about a spot on my back. A fairly large one. So just to be safe, she removes it. I was shaky but much better than the time before. And I had Mom with me. So all is good. A week later, I get the results. Normal. Woot woot!

Last Thursday I went back for my 6 month check-up. In the interim from the last appointment and this one, she has requested that I take Total Body Medical Photos. So I walk into the office with my folder of photos (which are by no means a boost in self esteem). She gets through about 90-95% of my body (while referencing the photos) and says "everything looks good so far." Wrong again. She finds a spot on my upper back, almost on my left shoulder. She looks at it multiple times with her new little gadget that has a little light and eye hole thingy and says "I see specks of red in this one so I want to remove it." Oh goody! So by this time, I am much more calm through the whole process and am very proud of myself! She does it, it takes like less than a minute and I'm back to putting on my clothes and walking out the door. Yesterday I get a phone call from my DR asking to call her back. I knew this was not a good sign. "There are a few abnormalities. It's not melanoma but I want you to come back and I want to cut deeper and wider without giving you stitches. That will make your life much easier." "Is it like my leg or something different?" "It's like your leg." Okay then.

So I now have had 3 moles removed and 2 of the 3 have come back with abnormalities. So I will be going back to have more of me removed for testing. I am a little scared but at the same time I know this has to be done for my health. But it still doesn't lessen the fear. There is still the factor of the unknown and I really think that's what is frightening to me.