"Skin Cancer & Tanning-Stephanie's Story" Stephanie: "My name is Stephanie, and I'm 19 yrs. old. Two years ago I think, my mom came to me, I had just gotten home from somewhere, and she came up to me. She had a very grave expression on her, and she was like Steph I have to tell you something serious, I have skin cancer. It scared me, I was like woah. She went to the dermatologist, and they said if they hadn't detected it within the next 3 months it could have been terminal; she could have died from it. Basically what I wanted to lead this into is, the whole media, the whole pop culture of going tanning; a few of my friends are actually kind of obsessed with it, and I just feel like society plays it up too much to be too important, to look bronze and dark. Even though I honestly love the sun, I feel very alive in the sun, I feel like in the summer, letting myself enjoy the sun is good. It's good for my mental health, it's good for my emotional well-being, but also you know you have to ration it, especially when I'm pre-disposed to skin cancer. I don't wanna put myself out there to get it. Tanning is not a terrible thing, it's not something that you should totally stop yourself from doing, but you have to be able to manage it yourself, and no when enough is enough."