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View Full Version : Pretty sure I have superficial spreading melanoma



jaynespain3105
28-09-17, 12:05
I have managed to resist posting in here for a while and of late my HA has been a lot better. This summer's obsession with moles had started to wane away. Then an appointment I had made for a full body mole check starting looming (it's tomorrow) and I started obsessively checking mole again. Sort of to pre empt anything surprising me at my appointment.

I am quite good at keeping an eye on my moles. But this week I feel that the first time perhaps ever I looked at a mole at the top back of my leg properly for the first time ever. It's always been there, at least since I was a teenager. And at a glance in the mirror it never stood out to me in any way. But I siddently looked closely at it in good light and realised it's a pretty worrying looking mole.

Down the rabbit hole of Dr Google I go. As if I could know any more about what Google has to say about melanoma than I already do. I fed it through the skin vision app roughly 20 times. It comes back as medium risk. It is irregular shaped (not unusual for my moles) 6mm at it's larger diameter, 3 colours (2 shades of brown is quite normal for my moles but this has an area of pink too). I don't know if it has always looked like that. I have gone through all my photos and can only find photos from a distance showing it was always there but no up close shots.

It isn't bleeding, or ulcerating or itchy or anything like. The surface is smooth. It's just very irregular.

I am not looking for reassurance as I know you can't give me that but I just wanted somewhere to talk about it as I am really nervous about tomorrow. I thought about cancelling and just going to my GP but feel that as the mole check clinic can use a dermascope on me tomorrow I may as well keep that appointment and get their opinion before seeing my GP. Which I will do on Monday unless the screening appointment miraculously reassures me. I just feel so mad at myself that I could miss this mole. I mean, I have a lot, but how could I not know if it has changed or not?

I am bracing myself for tomorrow. I have to travel roughly 2 hours for my appointment on my own. I am not sure how I will get through it.

On the positive side I am assuming the fact that it isn't itching, raised, bleeding etc. Will likely mean that if it is melanoma I will have caught it reasonably early. Based case scenario it could be an atypical mole. If it hasn't changed then I will have had it checked before as I've had them all he looked at.

After this I am definitely booking in for a mole map so this doesn't happen again.

Will let you know what they say tomorrow.

budgie1979
28-09-17, 17:52
Nothing to be done about it now, and you're getting it professionally looked at tomorrow, so just try to stop thinking about it for today. When these thoughts pop up, just say to yourself "I can't do anything today, and I'm doing the right thing by having this looked at." When I have had similar skin issues that concern me, I will even cover them with a bandage to discourage myself from constantly looking at it and getting worked up. I expect this is probably just an atypical mole, in which case you can snap a close up picture of it to refer to in the future when you think it may have changed. I did that with one mole on my leg that had irregular margins but the dermatologist said looked normal under the dermascope. Eventually it did change a bit, and I was able to show the picture to the doctor and she agreed it had changed and removed the mole. It wasn't cancer even then, but I'm glad I don't have to look at it anymore and wonder.

jaynespain3105
28-09-17, 21:53
Thank you so much for your reply. I am feeling calmer tonight just looking forward to my appointment being over with tomorrow! I will update to say how it goes. Always best to know one way or the other.

Thanks again for replying.

jaynespain3105
01-10-17, 20:09
I just thought I would post a quick update on this for anyone who may have followed although perhaps not the place for it as very much feeling a health issue than a health anxiety one right now.

I went to my appointment and the screening nurse was very concerned about the same mole I was. Plus another two. �� I am waiting for a report on the dermoscopic images in order to find out which of them I need a referral for to have removed and pathology done.

One thing I will say is that faced with what is in many ways your greatest fear, it is 100% no worse than the health anxiety when nothing was wrong. And that's a valuable lesson indeed.

Fingers crossed not all 3 of my suspected melanomas are melanoma and if any of them are that they are thin.

NervUs
01-10-17, 20:21
Stay strong! Try not to jump ahead to any scenarios before you know what the pathology says.