I’m absolutely in bits and have convinced myself I’ve got melanoma.
I’ve had a mole on my ribcage (an area where I was sunburnt badly as a child) for about 13 years. I’ve never liked it and mentioned it to the doctor several times over the years and have meticulously kept an eye on it for any changes. Whilst it was dark, it appeared to have smooth edges and hasn’t grown, changed colour and is under 6mm.
Then a few weeks ago it started to get itchy and when scratched it bled so thought I better get it checked. The doctor today seemed really concerned about how dark it was and showed me the microscopic picture, where to my horror I could see that it wasn’t one colour at all, but had varying shades of dark brown and tan and the edges weren’t smooth at all (I suppose with the size and location I couldn’t see this clearly).
The doctor kept on saying it was an “ugly duckling” and needed to be checked. I said I was very concerned I’ve had this at least a decade and they just said not to worry about and they’d refer me to have it checked.
After googling it appears “ugly duckling” moles are likely to be melanoma and I’ve been in tears about it all afternoon. I’ve had this mole for over 10 years and have convinced myself it’s going to have spread everywhere and I’m going to leave my three small children with no mother. Another thing that’s terrifying me is that when looking up threads about this to try and calm myself down, I kept on coming across posts saying things like “get it checked out straight away, my uncle left his for two years and it didn’t end well for him” - I’ve had this for at least 13. I’m absolutely devastated and can’t calm down about it. I’m so angry with myself for not pushing to have it checked when I first saw it and for thinking it looked fine when it didn’t.
I know I need to not think about it until the appointment but lord knows how long that’ll take as we’re not in the U.K. I can feel my anxiety spiralling out of control and just can’t calm down at all.