A mum says she woke up paralysed on the operating table as surgeons cut away a huge carcinoma from her upper lip – and claims skin cancer has “taken my body from me”.
Kory Feltz, 46, has spent nearly two decades battling repeated skin cancer diagnoses after first being told she had the disease at just 27.
The mum-of-two says multiple procedures have left her severely scarred.
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Now she lives in fear that every new blemish could be another tumour.
“I wake up and check my body, holding my breath, terrified I’ll find something new,” Kory, who is from Madera, California, US, told Need To Know.
“The fear of another diagnosis never really leaves – it just sits quietly in the background, waiting.
“My reflection reminds me of what I’ve lost.
“The surgeries have changed my face and my body.
“I drool because of the deformity left behind, and I see people stare.
“I feel embarrassed and insecure.
“It’s like cancer took my body from me and I don’t get a say in what happens to it anymore.”
Kory, mum to Charlie, 19, and Jack, 13, was first diagnosed with Squamous Cell Carcinoma (SCC) in 2007 after a suspicious mass was discovered in her calf during treatment for varicose veins.
She was referred to the University of California, San Francisco and enrolled in a residential research trial.
It took three surgeries to remove the cancer completely.
That same year she was also treated for Basal Cell Carcinoma (BCC) on her upper lip, which was removed with minimal scarring.
Kory after surgery. (Jam Press/@burnt.freckle)
But in 2015, she spotted what looked like a harmless pink pimple on her lip – and says she “knew” it was serious.
She said: “I recognised it because it mimicked the one on my leg.
“It presented as a small pink pimple with a tiny white head.
“I tried to pop it, but nothing came out; the white head remained.
“Within a week, it began to resemble a tiny cauliflower.”
Unable to get a dermatology appointment for a month, Kory says the growth expanded to nearly an inch across her upper lip in just two weeks.
She said: “I was terrified, knowing how much had been taken from my leg and having first-hand surgical experience with these cancers.
“I was frantic, scared, and filled with guilt and anger that I had done this to myself.
“I went into the office to show them my lip and beg for an earlier appointment.
“After the front office staff saw it, they fit me in that day due to a cancellation – I was in surgery within two weeks.”
The December 2015 operation still haunts her.
She said: “I remember waking up during surgery and feeling them tugging at my face – this happened multiple times.
“The worst part was that I used to work in surgery, specifically in this area, and I knew from their words that the margins weren’t clear because they kept tugging over and over.
“It scared me beyond belief, I was under heavy sedation and could do nothing.
“I was paralysed.
“When I woke up, I asked the nurse and my husband, jokingly, if I looked like Kylie Kardashian.
“Both of them sighed and looked as though their dog had died.”
Kory has since undergone Mohs surgery, skin freezes, biopsies, injections and light therapy.
She now uses a topical chemotherapy cream twice a day for 14 days at a time to target precancerous lesions – a treatment she describes as brutal.
She said: “The first time I did the chemo cream treatment, I was not prepared for what to expect.
“There was only one woman who had posted an image online – it looked brutal but doable, considering what I was facing.”
The side effects include nausea, headaches, body aches, mouth sores and extreme fatigue.
By the final days of treatment, she says her skin becomes cracked, bleeding and painfully raw.
According to Kory, the days immediately after finishing the course are “the worst and most painful”, with healing taking up to three weeks.
She admits she carries deep guilt over using tanning beds and failing to use SPF when she was younger.
Kory said: “What beats me up the most is the guilt.
“Knowing I chased a tan obsessively – tanning without SPF, using tanning beds.
“I feel like I should have known better; like I did this to myself.
“That shame can be louder than the diagnosis some days.
“And yet, I still wake up and face it even when I’m scared or exhausted.”
She says dealing with people’s reactions has been another battle.
Kory said: “Others try to be kind but say things like ‘I didn’t even notice your scar’ when it’s obvious they do.
“I know they don’t mean harm, but it feels like we’re both pretending.
“Sometimes I wish someone would just say ‘that’s a big scar and you still look great’.
“Honesty feels better than forced comfort. In person, the staring is the hardest; the double takes, the whispers.
“It makes me hyper-aware of my mouth and my scars and reminds me of my story.
“I struggle to leave the house sometimes.
“There are days I feel restricted not physically, but emotionally.
“I have to prepare myself for the world before I walk into it.”
Kory credits her husband of 21 years, Paul, and their sons for helping her cope.
She said: “The chemo cream treatments have been the hardest for them so far.
“The moaning in pain during showers, while reapplying the chemo cream, or when putting on Aquaphor or a pain-relieving ointment, is difficult to hide.
“They visibly tense up when I tell them it’s almost time to start treatment again.
“My husband has modelled such natural caregiving that the boys have picked up on it beautifully.
“I do share some of the emotions and realities with them – not only so they understand the importance of sunscreen, but also because we have an open relationship and talk about our feelings often.
“It is very hard on them.”
Now Kory is urging others to check their skin regularly and never ignore unusual changes.
She added: “I think what people should know is that skin cancer doesn’t end after the surgery.
“It follows you.
“It lives in your thoughts, in your routines, in the way you look at your own body.
“It’s not just scars, it’s fear, guilt, pain, and learning how to exist in a body that feels different. But it’s also resilience.
“And if my story makes even one person choose SPF, get a skin check or skip a tanning bed, then at least some of this has a purpose.”
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