Skin cancer victim has chunk of nose cut out after excessive sunbed use

A SERIAL sunbed user has spoken out to warn others about the dangers of bronzing. WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT.

DANGER: Jade Thrasher was addicted to tanning from the age of 13

Jade Thrasher had been having 20-minute tanning sessions three times a week for the past 11 years.

It wasn’t until the 26-year-old noticed a clear spot forming on her nose, which kept bursting and wouldn’t heal, that she sought medical help.

After a string of biopsies Jade found out the growth was life-threatening skin cancer.

HORROR: Jade had to have a hole cut out of her nose

Jade said: "There was so much pressure to be tanned – everyone wanted to be bronzed.

"It is seen as unattractive to be pale where we live in Nashville, Tennessee."

When she got engaged to Matthew six years ago, Jade’s tanning schedule became more intense to prepare for her wedding.

She said: "I would spend 20 minutes on the sunbed six or seven times a week.”

After her skin cancer diagnosis, doctors told her that she’d have to have the cells cut away.

LOVE: Jade wanted to be brown for her wedding to Matthew

But they wouldn’t know how much of her nose they’d have to take off until the day of the procedure – which Jade said was the "scariest part" of her ordeal.

In the end surgeons cut out a circle the size of a five pence piece. When she first saw the hole, she had a "sinking feeling”.

Luckily she underwent plastic surgery on the same day and doctors removed six inches of the skin from her chest to replace what had been taken from her nose.

As the cancer had been caught early, she didn’t need chemotherapy or radiotherapy but she returned to hospital for laser surgery on her chest and another procedure to sand down her nose.

Shockingly medics told her the cancer could have been there for up to five years without her knowing.

Jade said: "There's always going to be a scar on my nose, but it's not noticeable. The scar on my chest is more obvious.

"I was scared that I would look significantly different. It could have been a lot worse than it was."

Luckily she made a full recovery, but Jade has sworn off sunbeds for good. She says she’s "basically a vampire now" and hardly ever goes in the sun.

Jade, who began tanning at the age of 13, is speaking out to warn to other youngsters that being bronzed is simply not worth it.

She said: "I want teenagers to see the photo of the hole in my nose so that they know what could happen.

"I used to have a sunbed in my house, but I've thrown it in the trash.

"I didn't want to sell it, because I didn't want anybody else to go through what I went through.

"When you're a teenager you think you're invincible. But I covered my face while using the sunbed and I still got cancer.

"I definitely regret the years of tanning, but in a way I saved my skin at a young age because I got cancer."

SCARRED: Jade had to have skin from her chest cut away

Jade added: "You have to be confident in your own skin, regardless of what colour it is.

"Everybody is beautiful in their own way and you should never do anything that's going to harm you."