Skin Cancer on my Eyelid

I had a what I thought was a sty on my left lower eyelid for a few years. It would get bigger and bigger and then finally it started to spread further. I decided it was time to get it checked out.


I went to a big time eye center here in Dayton.  The first Doctor was concerned enough with it that he contacted one of the eye plastic surgeons to see if he could come see me right away. Someone must have been looking out for me because he happened to be in between Patients. He came over right away. He was concerned enough that he scheduled a biopsy of the area the following week. The Nurse came into schedule me and told me how lucky I was.....there was normally a 2 to 3 month waiting period to see this Doctor.

                                                                Left eye before biopsy

So I came back the next week for the biopsy. The biopsy went well. They numbed the area and the area around it. When I got home I went to bed to rest awhile. When I woke up I had terrible pain in my left eye. It was red and swollen. Long story short.......I had rubbed my eye in my sleep and because I could not feel it I rubbed it hard enough to give myself a corneal abrasion.

                                                                Corneal Abrasion

                                                     Eye after biopsy and cornial abrasion


So after a week of treating the cornial abrasion and a scare that I might have lost some vision in my left eye, I got the results. It was Basal Cell Carcinoma. The Doctor was concerned enough with it that we told the nurse to bump some surgery's and get me in the next week. He explained to me that the area would have to be removed and that he would have to go 2 to 3 mm beyond it to get clean margins. Depending how much they had to remove would determine how much reconstruction they would have to do. With those words, I got a little worried. I have had skin cancer before but in regions that they could just cut it out or burn it out. We are talking my face here........reconstruction?!?!? I am real scared!!


So a week goes by. I have lots of people praying for me and I am praying hard too. Thank you all!


So another long story short.........the surgery went well. It was not best case scenario and a section about as wide as a finger tip had to be removed. The Doctor had to cut the corner of my eye in order to get enough skin to close the area. He reconstructed the corner of my eye by pulling the upper lid down and sewing it together.

                                                      

                                                After getting the Post Op dressing off

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                                                                2 Days after Surgery

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                                           7 Days after surgery after getting half of the stitches out

I get the rest of the stitches out next week. The Doctor says I will have "relatively normal looking eyelid" when it is all said and done.


So the moral of the story is........if you have areas on your body that don't look right, go get them checked out.


It could be skin cancer!!!