Margaret ‘Irwin’ Adkins

July 18, 1950 – February 21, 2010

Wife, Mother, Nana, Scorekeeper, Scrapbooker, Friend

My mother wore many hats and all of them were about taking care of everyone that she cared for so much. Driving to softball and baseball tournements, scrapbooking every memory, planning trips that would bring us all together and just calling to say ‘i love you’…every day.

One day a trip to the doctor, the next to a PET scan and the next a referral to an oncologist. When you think it could be nothing, things can move very fast into something. Finding out that the symptoms and treatments that the doctor are discussing fall into the Stage 4 catagory can just take your breath away.

Over the next year and a half, not only were we planning trips to chemo/radiation and picking out wigs but we were also planning mine and my sister’s weddings for the following year. My mother took on multiple surgeries in order to attempt to remove the cancer that was spreading too fast to catch. It was already in the lymph nodes when it was found, but then to the lungs and then the brain a year later. She passed away before our weddings but she was there with us for every moment in our minds and in our hearts.

After all that my family and friends have been through with this experience, the only word that comes to mind is PREVENTION. My family and I have made a promise to each other that we will go for a yearly dermatology appointment. Unfortunately, the only real treatment that will “cure” melanoma up to this point is surgery once the cancer is found. After a certain point, it just feels like a chase. So the title “outpacing” melanoma seems like a perfect title for the cause.

Emily Bolinger