Biopsy Updates

I just realized that I never really updated on this nasty topic, so I will do so now! :) If anyone was paying attention, in January I had to go to the dermatologist and get checked for weird moles and such and they took 3 biopsies - 2 from my shoulder and one on my leg. Well when the results came back, the one on the leg was normal and the 2 on my shoulder showed some pre-cancer cells (this is the scary word they use - they also call them atypical cells which is less scary, but for some reason people don't know what I'm talking about when I use that word, so yeah...they are the same thing) which are basically just cells that are a little "off" and could potentially turn cancerous if left alone. Does not mean that they WILL turn, just that they could.

Anyway, as a result I had to go back in at the end of February to get more skin chopped out of my shoulder to clean out those atypical cells. When this happens they have 2 options for cutting the things out. The first option is just to cut, which is what happened with the first spot they found on my 2 years ago. They just cut out a shape and try to go deep, long and wide enough to get them all. In my case, my first case of atypical cells ended up with a 3 inch football shaped incision - wasn't pretty or pleasant. They generally only do this if there are a lot of cells in that area. when there are less cells, or the cells are concentrated and not widespread, then they do what they call a punch. You know, like a hole punch...in your skin. Well this is what they had to do to my shoulder was two punches that were then sewn shut, leaving me with two 3/4 inch stitched up lines.

They hurt like a bugger for just over a week (because they were on my shoulder blade so anytime I used my left arm or did something that stretched the skin, it would pull at the stitches) but healed up quite nicely by the time my 2 weeks was up and I was able to get my stitches out. That is, until I had to change the bandages at home. Apparently, I may be allergic to the Band-Aid's with the antibiotic crap on them. I didn't even want to use those ones, but the other ones I had were too small so I had to, and after a day of wearing those my shoulder was itching like crazy! So I took off the Band-Aid and saw that I had a HUGE red rash around both incisions! Yeah, good times just keep rolling with these devil things! Now it's been 5 days and the rash is still there and still itching like crazy, so I have to go in AGAIN to have my shoulder looked at. I know that this is far from the worst thing in the world, but it doesn't make it less annoying.

Anyway, so that is my fun story - hopefully the butcher will have something to make my shoulder look and feel all the way better so I can just deal with the regular scars. And again - WEAR SUNSCREEN PEOPLE!!!