I am not a morning person. I blame that on the fact that I was born around noon and my internal clock was then set for me to be an afternoon-type person. So, I missed the recent story on the Today Show (which airs when I’m still stumbling around semi-coherently in the morning getting ready for work) about an Austin woman with a rare form of melanoma – that is not pink melanoma.
Fortunately, there is this thing called the internet where you can catch up 😉 and this particular story really caught my eye. For one, it is about a woman in Austin dealing with a rare form of melanoma that didn’t present as a “typical” melanoma lesion – so I think we should be friends just because of that. But it’s also eye-catching because of the photos in the story. (Click and share with people who tan…seriously, they need the wake-up call…)
Bethany Greenway had what is known as desmoplastic melanoma, which often appears on the exposed areas of the head and neck. According to the article, it accounts for fewer than 4 percent of melanomas. This type of melanoma is often misdiagnosed because it doesn’t look like the dark mole melanoma we’re used to seeing (how oddly familiar this description is). Instead it can look like a big freckle, a keloid scar, or a fleshy bump. The melanoma cells in this type are surrounded by fibrous tissue. It can take a long time to grow but obviously, it can also be very disfiguring.
(Side note – I honestly had never heard of this variant of melanoma before and you know that I nerd out on melanoma stuff to share with you.)
Fortunately, Ms. Greenway was able to have the cancer removed and has been clear for over a year now. And she seems to have a pretty healthy sense of humor despite everything she’s gone through. It’s a little scary to think about being diagnosed with something like what she had; but I guess the outcome could have been a lot worse had she not caught it when she did. I’m hoping she has a very long cancer-free life ahead of her.
Moral of the story – the usual one I always harp on about. Go see a doctor if something on your skin doesn’t look right, or has changed in an odd way, or has gotten bigger or a different color. And because of this story, I will never be able to look at Spongebob Squarepants the same way…