nancyclay68

I’m a natural redhead, teen in the 80s when everyone I knew believed sunblock was for babies and small children. I grew up in a town with lakes in every direction and can not even begin to count the number of blistering burns I’ve had over the years. Ashamed to admit that I did the tanning bed thing in the 90s and early 2000 even though I’m a redhead and “tan” for me is about a shade beyond pale. I was also adopted as a newborn so I have no medical history to refer back to. I have an incredibly high tolerance for pain and don’t have a hypochondriac’s bone in my body – which is to say I tend to let things slide when I probably shouldn’t. In fact, the only reason I went to a dermatologist in the first place was I had an age related growth that I wanted removed. Since I was there she asked if I minded if she looked me over real quick. She found the spot on my back. If it weren’t for a little bit of vanity I don’t think it would have occurred to me to ever go see a dermatologist and it also means I would have ignored the melanoma that I did get for much, much longer thinking it was just another sign of getting old. The fact that it appeared and progressed in 8 months makes me think I could easily have put it off until it was seriously advanced and travelling unhindered in my body. Now I tell every single person in my life to at least do a skin check on themselves and to never ignore oddities when they apear.