Michelle Monaghan Instagram – Actor Michelle Monaghan’s life changed when she was diagnosed with melanoma.⁠ ⁠ “I grew up in Iowa where I worked in fields throughout the summer. I would often not wear any sunscreen whatsoever, but we didn’t have a lot of sun-sense back then and there was very little information about skin cancer. We would go to the pool and run around town wearing very little sunscreen; we also wanted to be a little “sun-kissed” for our homecoming or our prom. I’m the gal who would buy the 10-pack at the tanning salon. I remember the very first time I went in for that 20-minute session; I came out burned to a crisp because I have such fair skin. Little did we all know at the time how very dangerous tanning beds are. ⁠ ⁠ I’d always had a mole — a little smaller than my pinky nail — on the back of my left calf. I never paid any attention to it. In fact, I didn’t know anything about changing moles, let alone what skin cancer was. I didn’t know it even existed. One day, in 2007, my husband noticed that my mole had changed.⁠ ⁠ …My dermatologist said that she thought it was fine but advised removing it to be on the safe side. I had a biopsy and the results came back a week later. ‘This is really dangerous,’ the dermatologist said. ‘Its melanoma.’ Even at that point, I still knew very little about skin cancer so I was like, ‘Okay!’ I didn’t know that melanoma could be fatal. Once I got off the phone, I told my husband that it was melanoma and he responded, ‘It’s melanoma? That’s serious.’ And it was. The dermatologist told me that I would need to have a more significant surgery and she took away about an inch of skin in every direction to make sure we caught all of the cancer cells. It was pretty major to have something cut out of me.”⁠ ⁠ Now, Michelle takes the sun *very* seriously. “I’m not here to sun shame anyone,” she says. “We all love the sun. We need it. But there’s a distinct lack of awareness around melanoma and sun safety.”⁠ ⁠ Read about her experience with melanoma and how she protects herself now at the 🔗in bio. Story as told to @jacqueline_kilikita #R29Articles #wearsunscreen #michellemonaghan @skincancerorg