Second nose

So I have had this situation growing on my shin for a few years. It's only been this kind of bump thing, nothing major, not really anything to think about, let alone fret about. But after December's Cabo trip, I noticed it started to grow. Actually, it grew kind of fast and I was messing with it a little one night and off it popped. Nothing major. Just like a dry patch. Except then it gained some momentum and in a few days it was growing bigger, and then darker, and then one day I looked down and there it was, this second nose in the middle of my shin.

So I decided to be an adult and call the doctor. It started to throb when I talked about it, like it knew suddenly it was the center of attention and was trying to show off. It didn't really hurt, it just sort of throbbed. Pulsed, maybe. Puffing out its chest. It's brown, looking-like-a-second-nose chest.

I was at work, and I mentioned it to some coworkers, as I will do when I am trying to avoid things like being an adult and calling the doctor. Another coworker had a situation on her leg as well - different kind of situation, but nevertheless, a situation. So we decided we'd both call our doctors.

When I went in and showed it to my normal doctor, he didn't seem concerned (not that it probably didn't gross him out kind of, but I think they teach you not to look horrified when your patient shows you the second nose on their shin), and told me he'd refer me to dermatology. I asked him if I should be concerned, and he said if it was the bad kind of situation, he'd have had me downstairs in dermatology already, and he thought it would be fine if I just made an appointment in regular time. So when I got back to work I phoned dermatology and they scheduled an appointment for today.

In the meantime, another coworker and I named this second nose. The second nose became a sort of part of me, and I was learning to dress around the second nose and cover the second nose with my finger when I shaved my legs. Since the second nose realized it wasn't such a big deal anymore, the throbbing stopped and it was just another .2 pounds I was carrying around. No big deal.

Today I went in for my appointment thinking that I would leave with the second nose intact; I did not. He shot it up with anesthetic and sliced (dug?) that baby off (I didn't watch. I told him I had to lay down because I didn't want to see, but wouldn't shut up and demanded a play-by-play accounting of the removal). He checked the rest of ... me... for a third or fourth nose, but found nothing. Then he told me it was clear I did an awful lot of sunbathing and that for someone as fair-skinned as I this was not a really good idea. Then he cauterized the divot (it's a divot), waved around the little bottle he had put it in, slapped a bandaid on it and told me not to freak out if it looked deeper while it healed. He did not say anything about it running, like it's doing now.

I'm a wimp so I haven't pulled off the bandaid to clean it or wipe away the runniness of it, but sooner or later I'm going to have to. Which means I have to look at it, and I don't want to. This is what people like me do - avoid stuff like second noses and what they become.

A third nostril.

Ew.