By this time I was intrigued to see what else the bots wanted to help me with, so I had a browse through some of the information they'd sent me.
What about my diagnosis of actinic keratosis? AK to those in the know, but not to me. I still couldn't pronounce it but that didn't matter. It wasn't cancer, and that did matter.
Unfortunately it didn't take me long to spot another take on this. It wasn't cancer, but it wasn't too far from it because there was apparently a 'very small' risk it could progress into that thing I'd noticed in the second nurse's notes. Equally unpronounceable to me at the time, it was called squamous cell carcinoma and the first nurse's referral had been made on the pathway of that name.
That sounded to me like cancer. It even came with its own medical acronym of SCC. I was getting the hang of this jargon pretty quickly. I'd even managed to work out the pathway in question wasn't something to walk along while you admire the view. At the same time, it was important to me that I didn't become too familiar with it because I didn't want it to take over my life. I didn't want to know too much about it and I definitely didn't want to talk its talk.
These areas of sun damage on my scalp continued to perplex me. All the information I'd been sent or accessed via the links from the bots made something very clear to me. Aside from hereditary factors and skin type, my lifestyle was mainly to blame. Somehow or other it was my fault. Not all of it, but most of it.
Of all the misconceptions I've personally experienced, this is probably the most common. It's my fault.
Doubtless with the best of intentions, I've received all sorts of unsolicited advice to use sun cream and avoid the midday sun and so on and so forth. In response I silently scream I've always done this and, yes, I've also avoided the sun whenever I could. But I know I'm on a loser. The prospect of a nice sunny day being something to fear is beyond most people's comprehension.
Prior to the bots contacting me, I used to volunteer at a large country park. I did some patrolling and a bit of litter picking and enjoyed the social contact that went with it. But that all had to stop when I was given the diagnosis. As I parted company with the friends I met there I told them I was going to train to be a vampire (to be clear, as in avoiding daylight, not biting necks). But I recently came across a better description of the same reclusive process when I heard about a GP advising someone to "live the life of a cave dweller". That's exactly what I'd chosen to do and I still do it.
So, I knew what was wrong with me. I also knew how important it was to stop it in its tracks. Okay, so the chances of it becoming cancerous were so slim that I might as well ignore that possibility. After all, I've never bought a lottery ticket and expected to win, but I still wanted to get the treatment right.
And that's where Efudix comes into this story.
