Melanoma. Skin cancer. It’s hard to imagine but even worse being told you have it and then having to fight it.

I have numerous beauty marks all over my body. I used to live on farms a lot growing up, and never thought about wearing sunscreen or covering up. It wasn’t until I graduated high school that I had a random appointment with my doctor and she noticed two beauty marks on my back looked weird. So off I went to a specialist to have them removed and biopsied. I didn’t think anything about it except that the procedure hurt despite the freezing. Then I got the call. I was only in my late teens and didn’t tan on a regular basis, use tanning beds or anything like that. BAM! surprise! you are the new proud owner of melanoma!

What the hell?

My family just brushed it off – they already removed them you’re fine. Well I wasn’t fine. Withen a month I got terribly sick. I ended up on chemotherapy, lost a lot of hair ( I had a ton to begin with so lucky me) and just couldn’t get back on track. They did the treatment as a precaution and said I stood a high chance of it not returning.

Two years later…SURPRISE! I had begun to feel unwell and had taken a bath. Upon getting out of the bath I was looking in the mirror when my heart felt like it had stopped – one of the beauty marks previously removed had come back in the same spot and was looking ugly. I went to my doctor right away. No no no, I was told, it can’t be cancer we got rid of it. I argued to have tests done. In the meantime my stomach started to have problems and I was so distended I looked MORE pregnant than my sister who was actually pregnant at the time. I was so sick it was affecting everything from my personal life to my work life. 4 months later, 4 months of tests that would make even the person with the iron stomach squeamish, and what I already knew deep inside was confirmed: melanoma had returned for another visit.

Sooo back on the chemo and surgery for not one tumour but yay! three of them! cause the bloody cancer had matasticized! how wonderful!

Looking back I knew that when that round was over and my cancer had gone into remission that it was not over. I had really hoped and prayed that it would be but such was not to be the case…

Forward to fall 2008. I had moved far away from family to be closer to certain friends and to leave certain things behind me. A new beginning. Heh. Oh lookie what I notice in November…yup that stupid beauty mark – AGAIN. I couldn’t believe it. They said it’s very rare for beauty marks to grow back, and even more rare to grow new ones. You better believe it – I was growing new beauty marks, I even drew on myself to see if ones would appear in those areas and yup sure enough…

I went to the doctors here. I explained to them that I’ve been fighting melanoma for a number of years and it was supposed to be in remission. MRI and CT and X-rays reveal that what I thought was really true:melanoma. AGAIN. But this time it really had spread. 5 tumours in all, the worst one being in my brain.

I am angry, and frustrated. My medical bills are beyond anything I can overcome and my income is non exhistent. With no help from family I struggle daily to come up with a few dollars for food, treatments and bills.

I don’t know if I can win this battle without help…