Footy star slams 'sick' fashion trend among young Aussie women after surviving potentially deadly health scare
Australian and New South Wales rugby league star Emma Verran [née Tonegato], now with Cronulla Sharks, discovered melanoma during a routine check at a community screening event.
Sharing her story in a candid Instagram video captioned 'Everyone go get your skin checkedddddd please.'
Verran explained that a seemingly minor mole on her back turned out to be anything but, with subsequent testing confirming it was melanoma - one of the most aggressive and deadly forms of skin cancer.
'I don't normally do videos like this, but I just had a bit of a story to share,' she said,.
She shared the moment a foundation nurse suggested she get it looked at more closely, prompting a chain of events that may well have saved her life.
Three days after the biopsy, while in Origin camp, Verran was told she had melanoma and needed urgent surgery.
Despite the urgency of the diagnosis, Verran initially resisted immediate surgery, telling her doctor, 'I'm in Origin camp,' only for the doctor to respond firmly, 'This is really important'.
That sparked a negotiation that saw the surgery delayed until after the series.
Verran now realises how lucky she was that her instinct to check the harmless-looking mole likely saved her life.
Verran urged regular skin checks and slammed tanning trends, calling the normalisation of unprotected sun exposure 'sick.'
'I see all the tan line trends and stuff and it just makes me feel a bit sick, to be honest. Even friends of mine who don't wear sunscreen - they're literally so silly,' she told News Corp.
For Verran, the bronzed-skin trend is dangerous, with melanoma now the top cancer in Aussies aged 20–39.
Her concern is personal - despite her mum's warnings, Verran admits she once prioritised looking tanned over sun safety.
'I used to hate fake tan, I used to think it looked gross,' she said.
'Whereas now I'm all for it. I had a couple of years where I probably just wanted to be brown, to be tan, and now I know it's so important to stay in the shade, sit under an umbrella, and wear sunscreen.'
Even sunscreen hasn't always been easy for her - she has a sensitivity to a common ingredient found in most commercial formulas, so she relies on mineral-based options instead.
But she has learned that finding alternatives is far better than ignoring the issue altogether.
Her calm, composed video reached thousands, with fans thanking her and sharing their own skin cancer experiences.
'Great message, had the same thing happen to me earlier this year,' one follower wrote.
Another added, 'Great reminder for the rest of us - thank you for sharing and good luck for your next appointments.'
Others praised her honesty and strength, calling her story 'a great tutorial' and 'a show of character,' recognising the courage it took to speak so openly about something so personal.
Beyond footy, Verran works with Cronulla to run clinics, school visits, and events that connect locals to rugby league.
'I just love seeing people have a good time and engage with rugby league,' she said, 'and just the smiles on their faces … they're so passionate about the Sharks and it's just awesome to see.'
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Daily Mail
21 minutes ago
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Woman who can remember every single day of her life and recite every word of all SEVEN Harry Potter books reveals the 'awful' downside of her ability
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Rebecca, who has OCD, anxiety and autism as well as HSAM, is forced to relive difficult experiences due to her memory condition. She explained previously: 'If I'm remembering something negative, my emotions of that experience will come back. 'Sometimes people will say that I'm just deliberately not letting go, and I'm just like dwelling on the negatives in my life.' Another issue that Rebecca encounters has to do with the way that memories constantly 'flash' into her mind. Her mind is so busy that she requires distractions such as noise and light to go to sleep. Rebecca, who remembers almost every dream she has ever had and every birthday apart from the day she was born, relives events so vividly that she can actually feel pain when remembering a childhood injury. 'I remember my mum Janet placing me in the drivers seat of the car and taking a picture of me when I was 12 days old,' Rebecca said, 'that's my earliest memory.' 'I remember every day since then. Some of them I can't date exactly because I was too young to understand calendars, but I remember what I did that day, what the weather was like and so on.' But for Rebecca, her vivid memories often become a reality. 'When I relive memories, the emotions come back. So if it's something from when I was younger it's like my mind is an adult but my emotions are the age that I was then,' Rebecca said. WHAT IS HIGHLY SUPERIOR AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY (HSAM)? 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Rebecca and her mother got in touch with researchers at the University of California, and after passing a screening test, Rebecca was accepted into the study. Before Rebecca, the majority of study participants were aged 40 and over, so she has proved to be helpful in understanding the condition in younger people - recently travelling to the US and undergoing an MRI so researchers could look at her brain. 'Finding out about HSAM has been such a positive experience for Becky. I've seen her blossom. She's been more positive and able to do things independently, which has been excellent,' Janet added. 'She's realised that all these things were happening not because of any sort of deficiency with her - before there was the self-doubt and the feelings of not being good enough, but now we know that she just has a memory ability that she wasn't aware of.'
The Guardian
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