Julie's story

My journey with melanoma began in 1989 with a skin melanoma. It returned again in 1997 and it was discovered again in 2005 (by pure luck!) in the lymph nodes in the axilla. I was having a breast ultra sound for niggly pains in the left breast and there it was all in behind the right breast! I think they thought at first it might have been breast cancer, but the biopsy showed it was the melanoma back again. I had surgery, and they removed over 40 lymph nodes from the area, six of which were tumour. Then the next year it showed up again in the CT scan in the same area and I had more surgery and then radiation.

After the first surgery in 2005 I went to the Sydney Melanoma Centre for treatment. I have been on the VCML vaccine since then. It was originally only meant to be for two years but when I went back to Sydney at the end of the two years they wanted to keep me on it. As scans have shown no further spread I was only too pleased to do so. Last year they started a weaning off process where I only have the injection every three months.

Melanoma is a nasty little number as it moves so silently. I imagine I would be dead by now if I hadn't checked out that breast niggle. Scary thought! I'm very passionate about folks realising just how serious melanoma is. I just think in Australia it is taken far more seriously. I find that there is far more awareness generally of how deadly it is. The documentaries I have watched here seem pretty tame, only showing people with skin melanomas ... and I don't think they really give the message that it can kill you. In saying that I like the way the younger generation are covering up more with the slip, slop, slap, slide, seek campaigns. Maybe it's more people of my generation that seem in denial!