Bad News

With all of the iMac hoopla going on after vacation, I realized I never posted about my biopsy results.

I have skin cancer.

I really don't think it's as bad as it sounds. But still, those words - SKIN CANCER - have maybe thrown me into a small fit of depression.

It's a basal cell carcinoma - "the kind of skin cancer one would rather have" (as if I'd want to have any) - small growing and localized. It sucks, because my rosacea has calmed down exponentially since I started using Finacea, and my face is finally starting to look much less red again.

I have a consultation appointment with a MOHS specialist on July 11. I'll have to have surgery to remove the cancer. I'm still terrified I'll have a large hole or indentation on the side of my nose. I'm scared that I won't want to go out of the house because everyone will be looking at a hole on my face. Call me vain, but that's how I feel.

Voicing my fears to Dave doesn't help much - he usually tells me not to worry about it until I see the doctor, so he really doesn't want to hear it. He's right, but come on! How could anyone not worry about it? And my mom just lays into me right away about smoking - last time I checked I couldn't really get skin cancer from smoking. I told her I can just thank my fair-haired, fair-skinned, green-eyed Irish heritage for my ability to burn to a crisp every time I go into the sun. And getting lectured from someone who never wore a drop of sunscreen in her life while out in the sun kind of frosts my ass. But that's what mothers are for, I guess. So my only place to really vent about it is here.

At least my computer won't care if I have a hole on my face!