I thought itchy tum was just pregnancy stretch marks but it was skin cancer mole
Mum Lauri Murphy, 30, used to use sunbeds and loved a tan. Skin cancer changed all that. Now Lauri, a bookkeeper from Birkenhead, Mersey side, urges everyone to act if they notice changes in their moles.
Sitting in the doctor’s surgery, my precious newborn baby on my lap, I almost collapsed when I heard those three dreaded words.
“I’m not going to beat around the bush,” my GP said. “You have cancer.”
I just sat there staring at the wall, I couldn’t take in anything else after he said “cancer”.
I thought I was going to die. Dad had come with me and he grabbed my hand, trying to reassure me. He told me I’d be fine, but I couldn’t really hear him. It was horrible, just like a nightmare.
I hugged my baby tighter as tears flooded my eyes, blurring my vision as much as the news had skewed my thoughts.
All I could think of were my babies – Oscar, five, and Oliver who is now one – and how they’d have to grow up without a mother. How I’d never get to see them grow up.
PREGNANT
Over the next few weeks I’d cry over everything.
And I kept staring blankly at things, over and over again, just thinking, “I’m going to die.”
I remembered how a mole on my stomach had become stupidly itchy when I was six months pregnant with Oliver.
My skin is very fair and I have lots of moles and freckles but they had never itched like that before.
And whenever I showered, the rest of my skin would turn pink from the heat but there would always be a white ring around the mole on my belly.
But I ignored it because I thought it was just a symptom of my belly stretching and changing with pregnancy.
I gravely regret that decision to ignore it now. But, luckily, I did not ignore it for ever.
Months after having Oliver, the itching had not stopped and it still had a white ring around the area whenever I showered.
Then I started to worry. I knew then that it wasn’t normal.
I went to my GP, they looked at it through the microscope and said, “We’ll take it off.”
They carved and scraped it off that day but then I had to wait another two weeks for the outcome of the tests. When the results arrived, my GP rang and told me to come in straight away, which brought me to the surgery that day. He told me I had cancer as soon as I sat down.
But we caught it when it was still a superficial melanoma.
My doctor told me I may have saved my own life when I walked into the surgery a fortnight earlier.
If I had ignored the warning signs, five years down the line it probably would have gone deeper into my body and spread to my bones. My dad had malignant melanoma which, luckily, he caught too before it had spread.
He always told me to check my moles – and to get them checked by a doctor if I ever noticed any changes to them.
I’m glad he told me because otherwise I may not have gone to the doctor when I did. I’ve had six moles removed so far – including one on my neck and another on my thigh – and I have to go back for regular checks.
More will probably have to come off. But I’d rather have a thousand scars than cancer.
Now I don’t ever want to go on a sunshine holiday again. I’d rather go camping in the woods with my boys and partner Sam. I have very fair skin and when I was younger I used sunbeds a lot and oil when I was on holidays. I regret doing that now.
Now I use factor 50 and wear a hat whenever I’m in the sun and warn others about what happened to me. If you ever notice a change in your moles, please go and see your doctor.
Early detection is vital. That trip to your doctor could very well save your life.