I am the girl who gets excited when I receive an email from an old co-worker who tells me she has scheduled an appointment with her dermatologist. I am the girl who is thrilled when an old enemy emails me just to say she will never step foot in a tanning salon again. I am definitely the girl who loves hearing that her tanning bed loving friends received the A-OK from their dermatologist.
Today is a cold, super windy, lazy Saturday. So, of course, Mr. Spots is playing video games and I am reading and Facebook stalking. Today I randomly came across something that angered me and inspired me.
A girl from my hometown, almost a stranger, had posted that she was going to get a spray tan. The very first comment in response to her status update said something about how spray tans will give you stripes and the person advised, "Just go to the tanning bed." The next comment was the complete opposite. It said something like, "Don't listen to Wrinkles. She'll be sorry when she's 40 and looks like she is 60. Get the spray tan!" The girl who originally posted the status shared my story and said, "I have too much to live for...her story and reading her story opened my eyes...I'd rather be pale than have cancer :)"
Success!
Not only is this young mother staying out of tanning beds, she's also not giving into the pressure of her peers! Woo hoo! This makes me ridiculously excited.
Sometimes when I start to think that sharing my story, posting things far too personal to share with strangers, and annoying my friends and family with "Wear sunscreen!" lectures, I see something like this that makes me remember people are listening.
I know that my purpose is to save others from the hell that is melanoma. I hate that it took an actual diagnosis for me to learn the seriousness of melanoma and to find one of my purposes in life, but I know that this is it.
I will not stay quiet. For me, remaining quiet about this cancer would be giving in to melanoma and I refuse to ever do such a thing.
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