Well, friends, third time is a charm. I have skin cancer again. And while so far I have been extremely lucky in the cancer lottery (basal cell carcinoma), this time it's melanoma. Fortunately caught it early. So I will be having Mohs Surgery for a 3rd time later this month. We're early enough in the process that the doctors don't believe there's any need to look at the lymph nodes.
But things can change. None of my cancers have presented in a normal manner, so things could change while I'm in the doctor's office. All three were only diagnosed because I requested (on the first one demanded) a biopsy.
Many of my new friends here never knew Jay Lake. But he showed us the way. Face cancer head on. It will not control me. When my grandfather had cancer, it was spoken of in whispers for some fear of summoning it like speaking the name of the devil. Now we speak about it openly and I wear my scars with some pride (although I now have to wear a hat while outside, and that covers the first two). But that won't be the case for this one. This site is on my left temple, just over the eyebrow. While I'll follow wound management instructions and try and make the scar as small as possible, it will be very visible.
This will disrupt work, and I'm sorry about that. I tried to make it the least disruptive I could while not delaying surgery too long. This surgery will be a little more involved than the previous, and the incision will be deeper, but it still will only be a local anesthetic, and I'll be released the same day. Except for temporary lifting restrictions while it starts healing, and I expect to be driven mad by seeing a bandage just at the edge of my vision (the band-aid from the biopsy was bad enough), there won't be much inconvenience from the surgery.
Wear sunscreen, get your kids to wear sunscreen. Check yourself often. Don't delay getting something weird looked at. My first cancer was just a dry spot on my scalp. Cancer caught early is treatable and survivable (for this I have over 95% survival rate for both 5 and 10 years).
So, once more, fuck cancer.
3 comments:
Dammit. I'm so sorry to hear this, Steve. I'm glad it was caught early, and I hope they're able to get it taken care of as quickly and cleanly as possible.
Steve what the hell man. Let this heal and be the end of it.
Hey Jim and Doug, thanks. It's mostly scheduling work things (I haven't posted recently on changes to the work life, I'll need to do that). Short story, I'm working full time at the hospital and part time as a designer. So what would have been easy peasy 2 months ago is now filled with applying for medical leave approval, changing schedules (even though the schedule for the time of the surgery hasn't been released yet, and at the hospital we're still on an altered schedule) and… well, this is getting into the longer story. But yes. You'd think working in a hospital setting saying, "Hey, I need surgery" would be met with, "sorry about that, how can we accommodate you" instead of "fill out these forms with a 3rd party and we'll see if they approve it."
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