Cancer Scare Number 2

When I was a teenager, we lived six houses down from the community pool.  Every summer day was either spent poolside, or windowside waiting to see if the storm would dissipate so we could go to the pool.  A little bit later, I became a lifeguard at that same pool.  After doing that for a few years, I spent a summer working outside at a State Park.  And while all this was going on, I would take the occasional day job at a local farmer, or my friend's farm helping to bale hay.  What does any of this have to do with anything?  Well, I don't remember using sunscreen at all.  I am sure I did at least a few times, but I certainly don't remember it. At least I wasn't as bad as some of the girls I lifeguarded with, that used Crisco for a week.  Now you might think I am saying that just to be funny, but I am dead serious, they broke out the Crisco shortening and slathered it on, and I am sure you will be surprised by this, the next week they had sun poisoning and had to stay indoors for several days (meaning those of us who did NOT use Crisco had to pull double duty on the lifeguard chairs/sun).  As I grew older, bad habits with sunscreen certainly didn't improve.

That leads to today's topic.  It takes me about four hours to mow our lawn.  The first mow of the season, the sun didn't seem too bright or hot so I didn't think much about sunscreen...until I started burning, but by then I only had an hour of mowing left and it seemed silly to stop in the middle just to put some on, after all the damage was already done, right?  Well, over the next few days of painful and cold showers, I notice a raised  bump on my arm that didn't go away.  After having my experience with testicular cancer I determined the best course of action would be to ignore it and see if it went away.  After a month I started getting worried.  I looked up information on some medical websites that told me I had approximately 17 minutes to live before that bump completely took over my body.  Don't get me wrong there is some good health information on the internet, but a lot more horrible health information.  A search of any malady will lead you to results from  certain and impending death, to "just ignore it and lay your lifecrystal upon whatever hurts".  Somewhere in the middle lies the actual good information, and you have to figure out what that is, and if you knew what it was you wouldn't be doing a blind internet search for it to begin with.  I won't say where my advice falls on this spectrum, but it is probably near the ends.

After consistent (but correct) nagging from my wife, I decided to call my oncologist to see what dermatologist he recommended.  Have you ever heard of those restaurants that you have to wait three or four years to get a table?  Dermatologists' waiting lists are slightly longer.  Luckily, because of a cancellation (or death, I didn't want to ask) I was able to get an appointment just one more month away.  The whole time I am waiting, I am torn because although I want the bump to go away, I don't want to go to the doctor after the month wait and say, "Well, it was here and it looked really ugly, but then it got small and disappeared yesterday."  But I didn't have to worry, the bump stuck around.

Finally, the day arrived for the dermatologist visit...literally one day after we got back from a Florida beach vacation.  Walking into a dermatologist's office really tan feels much like walking into an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting with a quarter of a bottle of Rum Jumbie (I imagine...).  When I finally get taken back to the doctor, they give you a paper blanket (which is slightly smaller than a Kleenex) and tell you to disrobe.  See, just because a patch of skin hasn't been exposed to the sun, that doesn't mean you won't still get skin cancer there.  So the doctor checks everywhere...everywhere!  In the movies, when you see the doctor walk in the room and the patient is naked, there is usually some boom chicka wow wow music playing.  The real situation has no music, and is a whole different experience (which is good because I didn't want a pizza boy walking in the scene too).  Basically, you stand there while the doctor looks over every millimeter of your body occasionally poking or tugging at things while wrinkling her nose.  The whole time you have to fight the urge to make excuses on why you have abused your skin and been too tan in some areas, or too pasty in others, or too flabby in others, and remark on how cold it is in the room.  After feeling like you are a rental car being inspected to be turned back in, the doctor starts talking again and gets out a marker.  She points out various anomalies and explains what they are, what causes them, whether you need to keep an eye one them.  It was very informative.  For instance, now I know that there are such things as "penis freckles" that guys can get as they get older...I have probably said too much.  Moving on!  The next step is the marker.  Feeling much like the guy who passed out way too early at the party, the doctor starts drawing circles and "x"s and who know what else.  After getting dressed, she said, "This one I am going to freeze off and these two I am going to take."  Happy to have my clothes back on (and not to have any penis freckles marked), I didn't really stop to think what "going to take" meant.

The freezing was nothing.  A bit of itchy, burning type feeling, but no biggie.  Then, I found out what "going to take" meant for the other two.   First, they stick a needle next to the thing they are taking to numb it up.  Then they start shaving that thing down until it is either gone, or they have a big enough sample to test (which as near as I can tell requires you to shave down to the bone).  For the one on my arm, it was a breeze.  Slight stick, a little pressure, and a band-aid.  The other was right next to my eye.  Now the local anesthesia they gave me, not only made things go numb, but it caused my eye to blink uncontrollably.  We are talking like the little light that lets you know your hard drive is running type of uncontrollably.  Then they take the razor thing  NEXT TO YOUR EYE, and after giving the medication to cause spastic twitching they say, "Now hold still..."  I have had much more painful procedures, and much longer procedures, but this was definitely the most annoying in my life.  I am told I am free to go, with one eye open and the other neither remaining open or closed, giving me all the depth perception of walking with a strobe light.  Thinking "Safety First" I thought I should probably wait it out in the lobby before I try driving with "strobe eye".  "How long does this last?", I ask.  "It will wear off in about two or three hours.", was the reply, like it was no big deal to wink at everyone within a five mile radius for the next 180 minutes.  I decided to just drive carefully home, and whatever I do, don't get out of the car.  Hungry, I just pulled into a White Castle drive-thru, because I figured at White Castle a guy winking furiously would still not be the most memorable character they will see that day.

Luckily, I had an oncologist appointment the next day.  I say "luckily" because two weeks earlier I had a CAT scan, so when I received a clean bill of health from the oncologist I knew regardless of my skin results, it hadn't reached my lymph nodes and my blood tests were fine.  At first, the skin samples didn't bother me.  But the longer it took for the results to come back, the more scanxiety set in.  In the two weeks of waiting, I used sunscreen religiously.  I used it almost as much as I checked the mailbox, email, and phone messages waiting for the results to come back.  Finally, the letter came in the mail that said "benign (non-malignant)", which made me laugh because if you don't know what the word "benign" means, will you know what "non-malignant" means?  Maybe they should say "benign (you don't have cancer)" because that is all people want to understand about that.  

So, a good scare to wake me up.  But since part of what I do for a living requires me to know about "rems" and "rads" and all that good stuff, I know that radiation (yes the sun is emitting radiation) builds up over a lifetime, I know that my careless youth means I need to be even more careful now.  If there is something good that came of out this scare, it's that I am taking my lessons learned and applying them to my six month old before the damage starts.  So what if his skin is so pale it's almost clear, one day he will thank me for it.