Cancer

by Jennie Roles Walter

5 ft by 3 ft • Oil $$650

This piece represents my personal struggle with melanoma cancer that initially began a little over 3 years ago. I painted myself nude to represent how vulnerable and uncomfortable I feel everytime I have to undergo to a “body check” for the various new and old moles I have all over my body. I am unfortunately very self-conscious so this bi-annual checkup is something I loathe but have to endure for my own health. I cannot even remember how moles I have had removed; I have little scars all over my body. When I was younger I tanned very often starting in high school and on into my college years against the persistence of my mother. It was my mother’s same persistence to get the mole on my thigh biopsied in 2005 that led to my diagnosis. The day I got the call that I had melanoma I felt like I couldn’t breathe and that I was choking which is why I exaggerated the size of my face, throat and eyes in this piece. I honestly thought that phone call was a death sentence. The only other person I knew that had been diagnosed with Melanoma had passed away. His biopsy was incorrectly deemed non-cancerous so his undiagnosed melanoma spread to his brain and within a year he was dead. So being told you have Melanoma, was like hearing, “ You are going to die.” Thank God we caught the Melanoma in time and through checkups, sunscreen and no tanning beds I can help keep the disease at bay. The green figures in the lower right of the piece represent all the people that prayed for my healing. I literally think my mother contacted every church in Middle-Tennessee on my behalf! I do believe in the power of prayer and believe that it is because of God’s grace that we got an early diagnosis. Actually, once again due to mother’s invincible persistence when my regular doctor was unable to remove the Melanoma in a time frame we were happy with she and my father paid for me go to a specialist in Murfreesboro who discovered a second stage 2 Melanoma that my doctor had initially missed so I was lucky twice! The blue figure and hand to the right of me represents God sending his healing in turn answering the prayers being asked of him. The dark demonic figures on the left represent the literal hell that some cancer victims/fighters have to endure; so ugly and ungodly. This was a difficult piece for me to paint on many levels. I felt like I had to paint exactly how I felt as that disease crept into my life and how it still affects me. I hope that other women can relate to me concerning this subject find some comfort in this piece.