Melanoma Awareness Month

In the midst of a pandemic and three months postpartum from having my second baby, I found a bump on the crown of my head. On November 3, 2020, I was diagnosed with malignant melanoma.

It is, without a doubt, an absolute miracle I found this mole. I’ve never used a tanning bed and can’t recall the last time I had anything that resembled a tan line, so I wasn’t exactly “keeping an eye out” for anything suspicious and it certainly doesn’t help having very thick, dark hair. However, having a baby slows the go-go-go of life in a lot of ways. You have to pause for those initial feedings every 2-3 hours, and that’s when I found it—while nursing, admiring how badly I needed to find time to take a shower.

Thankfully, after what felt like an eternity between the initial biopsy and my wide excision and sentinel lymph node biopsy, I got the news there was only residual melanoma in-situ remaining. My lymph nodes were clear. I am stage 1B. Sure, I would need some magical reconstruction work done to my scalp to remove the bald spot from the skin graft I was left with up there, but that’s okay (September 2021 Wash U fixed me right up).

I found myself wanting to do something small (manageable with two young kids and my full time job while recovering from surgery) to help raise awareness. To encourage people to make the dermatologist appointment and get their skin checked. If it could happen to me, the girl who never tanned, it could happen to someone else I care deeply about.

In my spare time, I crafted the following illustrations and social posts to share with my friends and family, encouraging them to stop putting it off. To wear the sunscreen. To buy the hat.

Several family members and friends reached out to tell me they scheduled a dermatologist appointment after sharing my story. A high school friend even finally encouraged her husband to get a spot looked at on his back. Unfortunately, it did turn out to be a melanoma, but, I like to think she saved his life that day.