See that lovely little spot above my eyebrow?

No big deal, right?  Just a scratch, or maybe something gouged my forehead right there.

Except that it's been there since we lived in Marysville.

Last spring, when it had scabbed over and then reopened enough for me to notice it and be aware that something was off, I already had an appointment with a doctor for a checkup, so I mentioned it to her.

I already knew I needed to see a dermatologist for a mole check so I added the spot to my list of complaints. I called for a consult and discovered that getting an appointment with a dermatologist takes roughly as long as human gestation.

Besides, I was pretty sure I already knew what it was.  A bit of medical knowledge and access to Google makes me an expert, you see.

Skin cancer.  Basal cell carcinoma.

Not melanoma, not life-threatening unless I choose to leave it alone for the next decade and see what happens, and yet...

When I used to tan, mom would get so mad at me and I'd tell her with our family history I was going to get some sort of cancer; I was just picking the type. 

Perhaps not my best-thought-out plan.

The ironic part is that I always kept my face covered when I tanned.  This spot is your general, run-of-the-mill, too-much-cumulative-sun-exposure skin cancer.

Makes me wonder about the other parts of my body that have had non-routine exposure.


Now that I know it's there, I just want it gone.  Who wants to willingly leave cancer cells in their body?  Who would knowingly ignore something so harmful?

Revelation time: SO many things can have deeper meanings!

Can the word 'cancer' mean more than just abnormal, destructive cells? 

Could it mean destructive behaviors?

Could there be many more things in my body that are a type of cancer?

Things I don't notice at first, or don't realize their destructive potential?

Like yelling.  Mom did it.  Dad did it.  I do it.

But, just like cancer, it spreads.

It starts as yelling to alert a child to danger.

Slowly, it progresses to yelling any time you need to get a person's attention.

And before you know it, your response to any situation is rage.

Not only is it your response, it becomes your child's automatic response too.

If you know it's cancer, you can cut it out before it has a change to damage and destroy.  But can you always tell what cancer looks like?

Obviously not.  It doesn't wave a red flag and say "here I am, come weed me out of your life!"

It- the cancerous, sinful behaviours that so easily invade- starts out so innocuous, so benign, and by the time you recognize the behaviors for what they are, they've grown into the very fiber of you, and become nearly impossible to remove.

Oh, that I would have the wisdom and insight to recognize the cancers in me as easily as the cancer on me.