Mom of two shares graphic photos of her skin cancer battle to raise awareness
Before and after her most recent surgery (Judy Cloud/Facebook)
Thinking about heading to a tanning bed to get rid of your pasty winter skin? These photos will make you think twice.
Judy Cloud, a 49-year-old mother of two, is sharing some pretty sobering photos of how spending her youth in tanning beds has affected her life.
In a series of photos posted to Facebook, in an album simply titled “Skin Cancer,” Cloud shows before/after images of her 21-year battle with skin cancer.
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“This is skin cancer. This is the result of using tanning beds when I was younger. This is the result of having numerous sunburns as a child and teen, and not being religious about applying sunscreen, and staying out in the sun far too long as a teen and into my 20s and even early 30s,” she writes.
Judy Cloud/Facebook
Cloud was first diagnosed with skin cancer in 1995 when she went to the dermatologist to get a scab examined. The scab turned out to be skin cancer. She explains how this past September, she had her fourth surgery to remove basel cell sarcoma (the most common type of skin cancer) – the most invasive surgery yet.
“I had a three-hour surgery, and I was under general anesthesia. I spent two hours in recovery. I had 23 places surgically removed in one day - 10 by excision (meaning I had 10 places on me that had stitches) and 13 by laser. I had to take two weeks off work because I was to spend the two weeks following surgery immobile, lying on a couch during the day with my legs elevated and lying in bed at night with my legs elevated,” she writes. “I worried about blood clots and I worried about getting pneumonia, both of which could happen post-surgery with immobility. I couldn’t take a real shower for two weeks because my lower legs were wrapped and I couldn’t get the wraps wet.”
Judy Cloud/Facebook
She also explains how doctors had to go into a muscle around her mouth to remove some of the cancer, which left her unable to chew extremely soft or crunchy foods, and also left her with numbness around her mouth.
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Cloud also delves into the cost of her surgeries and procedures.
“Total billed for my outpatient procedure? $26,845.87,” she writes. “I know tanning salons advertise tanning packages that are cheap. Does a surgery to correct what the tanning bed does to you still make the tanning special sound cheap?”
Coupled with recent news that people who avoid the sun can look up to 20 years younger, it’s pretty hard to not think twice about heading to the tanning salon.
Two weeks after surgery (Judy Cloud/Facebook)
The photos were originally posted a few months ago, but are just beginning to garner the attention they deserve – currently, the album has been shared more than 100,000 times.
“My 20-year-old self would never share [these pictures] and my 30-year-old self would never share them, but when my doctor said I was going to have another surgery, I said, ‘I’m going to document it this time and post it afterwards,’” Cloud tells SELF. “I never thought I would show myself on Facebook without makeup on let alone without makeup on and looking so injured. But, I’m old enough now to know this is needed.”
