when natalie richardson was diagnosed with advanced melanoma at age 37, she didn’t fully grasp the gravity of her prognosis — until her medical oncologist broke the news that richardson, a single mom whose twin daughters were then 11, likely wouldn’t see them graduate from high school. “she explained that i had a 26 per cent chance of surviving five years if i did nothing, or 28 per cent if i did the treatment that was available at the time,” richardson recalls of that day in 2014. “when i realized there were no other options, i panicked. we all panicked — my kids, my family. everyone was just stunned.”
roughly a month before that meeting, richardson had been at her family doctor’s office with one of her daughters for a sore throat. “after her appointment, she said, ‘mom, maybe you should show the doctor your mole,’” richardson says. over the previous six months, a beauty-mark-like mole on her hip, there since birth, had grown larger, changing shape and colour.
treatment was challenging for richardson and hard on her two daughters (seen here in 2013), but eight years after her diagnosis, testing continues to show no sign of a recurrence.
busy with work and parenting, she’d put off having it checked. richardson’s doctor sent her to have the mole removed and biopsied. after testing confirmed the presence of melanoma, she underwent a sentinel node biopsy, a surgical procedure to determine whether cancer has spread into the lymphatic system. in natalie’s case, it had. ct scans further revealed a tumour on richardson’s thyroid. thankfully, this turned out to be a highly curable form of thyroid cancer.