Tanning addict mum's warning to others after horror skin cancer ordeal
WARNING – GRAPHIC CONTENT: A mother-of-two has warned others to avoid using tanning beds after she endured a horrifying skin cancer ordeal which left her with a giant hole in the side of her face.
As a young adult, stay at home mum Carrie Doles, 34, from the US city of Chicago, was fixated with being tanned and started using tanning beds at just 18, even using them every day for four-years whilst at university.
Yet her obsession proved to be costly, with Ms Doles developing skin cancer which left her with crippling headaches that felt as if she’d been “struck by lightning”.
“In college I would go tanning every day. I didn’t know what skin care was then, I was young and felt I didn’t need to take care of my skin at such a young age,” Ms Doles revealed.
In 2010, MS Doles noticed a small pencil sized scab that appeared on her left temple which would fall off only to reappear again.
This continued for six months before she went to a dermatologist who said it was skin cancer just two-weeks before her wedding to husband, Chris.
Not wanting to scar her skin for the big day, Ms Doles’ doctor postponed her biopsy for two-weeks until after her wedding and another week later confirmed that she had basal cell skin cancer at just 26-years-old.
Naive outlook over dangers of the sun
Ms Doles thought that this non-melanoma skin cancer was the ‘good kind’ so wasn’t too worried but she had a shock when the day of her surgery came around and she was the youngest person in the waiting room with the other patients being in their seventies.
“It scared me to have been diagnosed with a skin cancer at such a young age but I was always under the assumption that basal cell was the ‘good kind of cancer’ and it would be no big deal,” she said.
“They numbed me up and started to cut. It was a crazy feeling. I didn’t feel them cutting but I heard it.”
Doctors had to carry out the removal procedure to cut out the cancer a total of six times as it wasn’t clear where the affected and healthy cells were.
This left her with a gaping hole at the side of her face which was stitched up by a plastic surgeon the next day.
In 2014, Ms Doles’ cancer came back for a second time in the same place but was removed by a head, neck and throat specialist at a cancer treatment centre.
Surgery left her with paralysis on the left side of her face that she still suffers with today and her left eye is constantly watering.
“Every now and then I get bad headaches. It feels like I am being struck by lightning in that area. I still cannot raise my left eyebrow,” she revealed.
Mother’s warning over sun
Ms Doles now takes her skin care routine very seriously and goes into schools to tell her story and discourage other young people from worshipping the sun and tanning beds like she did.
“I always wear an SPF of thirty all day every day before I put my makeup on and even in the winter,” she said.
“I don’t lay out in the sun anymore and if I am out, I wear a large brimmed hat and seek shade as much as possible. I also use intense moisturiser on a daily and nightly basis.
“Tanning whether outside or in a tanning bed is so bad for you and your skin. Not only will you get wrinkles but your risk of developing skin cancer is increased.
“Stop tanning. Your skin will thank you when you are older.”
– Australscope
