Victory to the Death Star...

My hand holding down Trevor's leg...

My dear, sweet husband is quite possibly the whitest person I know. And I mean this literally. As in the color of his skin. He is so white, he is blue. And if he has been in the sun, pink. Tragically, despite all evidence to the contrary, Trevor has always believed that he can tan. This line of thinking has never ended any way but badly. We have aloe vera plants scattered around our house like some people have throw pillows.

So imagine my alarm when a tiny mole appeared on his nose, not a quarter of an inch from his right eye.

Then, it started growing.

Of course, Trevor wasn’t all that concerned about it, and ignored my suggestion that he should get it checked out. So, for months, the mole just kind of hung out on the side of Trevor’s nose. Mocking me.

[Time for a brief digression I think is relevant to the story]
(Trevor disagrees):

In June, for no particular reason, I stumbled across the book Dear John while at Borders and was suddenly overcome with the desire to read it. As in: NOW! This was bizarre, mainly because I am not particularly fond of Nicholas Sparks and, in general, loathe sappy love stories. And yet the NEED to read Dear John immediately was overwhelming. I finished the book in two sittings.

I don’t want to spoil the book for anyone who wants to read it, but one of the characters *might* come down with malignant melanoma. This is not a spoiler if you choose to watch the movie, because – for reasons completely unknown to me – Hollywood decided to change EVERYTHING about the actual story (I STILL don't understand why it was necessary to CHANGE the illness. Why, Hollywood? WHY?!). But in the book, one of the male characters *may* have had a mole on his leg that mysteriously started to bleed. But because he is an a$$hole, he ignored it for six months, and by the time he actually had a doctor check it out, the cancer had spread and everything (in typical Nicholas Sparks fashion) was just plain awful. Blah, blah, blah…the end.

For some reason, I couldn't get the whole “bleeding mole” thing out of my head. It nagged at me day and night. It wasn't like I had a mole or freckle that worried me or anything like that. But I was overwhelmed (I've apparently been overwhelmed a lot this summer) with the sudden need to schedule an appointment with the dermatologist. I needed to come up with a realistic reason why I needed an appointment, though. You know, other than "I read this Nicholas Sparks' book..." So, after thinking about it for a couple of days, I decided to schedule a skin check with my doctor for two very unDear John reasons:

1. I hadn’t been in a couple of years, and figured turning 30 was enough of a reason to have a doctor look over my moles and freckles.



2. I was hoping Trevor would be inspired by my example and would schedule an appointment for himself.

My appointment was scheduled for the afternoon of August 19th.

[END DIGRESSION]

So, Trevor and I arrived in Colorado for two glorious relaxing weeks in the mountains, and – wouldn’t you know it – the mole on his nose turns all red and angry and starts to bleed.

Sound familiar?!

Cut to: Deals freaking out. Complete mental hysteria. Imminent breakdown.

I immediately started to beg and plead with Trevor to make an appointment with a dermatologist as soon as possible. But Trevor wasn’t nearly as concerned as I was, and outright REFUSED (refused!!!) to read Dear John or take anything seriously that the author of The Notebook has ever written. Something about Nicholas Sparks being an author of fiction, and his lack of a medical degree. Whatever, Trevor.

Once we returned to Dallas, though, I was finally able to convince hubby dearest to call the dermatologist. This was only achieved after my excessive nagging turned to threats and tantrums (hey, I was worried!). Except when Trevor called to make an appointment, he managed to omit tiny little details like “I have a mole less than an inch from my freaking eye that keeps growing and now spontaneously BLEEDS”. The receptionist, thinking it was just another routine skin check, scheduled Trevor for sometime in early October.

Since I HAD read Dear John, October was not acceptable. I KNEW how THAT story ended. Luckily, Trevor was scheduled to see the same doctor in October that I was on the 19th of August. So, I decided to describe my husband’s mole to the doctor during my check up, and gauge whether or not my concern was justified.

To my utter amazement, the dermatologist was just as concerned as I was, and had me call Trevor and reschedule his appointment on the doctor’s lunch break the very next week.

Upon examining Trevor, the good doctor decided to immediately remove the mole from Trevor’s face and send it off to be analyzed. The results came back on Monday, and – guess what – it was cancer!

THANK YOU, NICHOLAS SPARKS!!!

Luckily, it isn’t the scary kind of skin cancer. Just a little Basal cell carcinoma. Still, I am oh-so glad it is gone. Did I mention that it was really freakin' close to Trevor's eye? His EYE!!! Yeah...bye-bye little moley! Good riddance!

The end of this story (other than important lesson learned) is that Trevor texted (yes, TEXTED!) his mother with the results of his mole biopsy. Something to the effect of: “Test results back. It is cancer. Talk to you later. Love, Trevor”. His mother – alarmed by such a message – immediately called Trevor for further explanation. However Trevor couldn’t be bothered to talk to her about it because he was “at work”. So, Camilla - in near hysterics - called me. Apparently, mothers freak out after receiving random text messages from their sons informing them that they have cancer (shocker!). So, yeah. That was a fun conversation. Nothing quite like having to talk your mother-in-law off a cliff first thing on a Monday morning. And, as a side note, it is not easy to convince a mother that everything is okay when the conversation starts off with "cancer". This logic, however rational, still escapes Trevor.

In other news, I see lots of floppy hats and high SPFs in our future. And, for my part, I think I am going to lay off the Nicolas Sparks for awhile.