Proud to be Pale: Sylvania Mother Honors Son's Memory - 13abc.com Toledo (OH) News, Weather and Sports

Melanoma is one of the most common cancers in people under 30. A Sylvania woman is on a mission to raise awareness in young people about the very real danger of this often deadly skin cancer. She has a very personal reason she's waging war on melanoma. It's what took her son's life last spring. He was only 25 years old.

Erik Hartzell's mother Kim describes the oldest of her four boys as just an all around happy person with a great smile. She says he was in army basic training when, at only 19, doctors diagnosed him with melanoma. A mole on the top of his ear was removed and he was treated with an immune booster known as interferon. Everything seemed okay. But, in March of 2011 Erik, now married with a baby boy... had trouble breathing. His mother says a surgeon tried to insert a tube to inflate a collapsed lung. She says she'll never forget when that doctor came back into the consultation room after that surgery. 

"Told us that he was very sorry but that Erik's lung and chest cavity was full of tumors. hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of tumors," says Kim Hartzell.

The family pursued some new treatments in Cleveland, but the fluid build up made the treatments unsafe. Angry at first, his mother says Erik finally came to peace with the fact that he was going to die. Almost a year after his death, she's established "proud to be Pale" in Erik's memory: an awareness event to always be held the third Sunday in May, the day her son died. 

"My mission with this is not only to raise money for melanoma research so there can be treatments and hopefully someday a cure," she says, "but also to raise awareness within the schools, within the community." 

What does melanoma look like? Watch for new spots on your skin, or changes in moles. Look for:

A: Asymmetry.

B: Borders that are irregular.

C: Varying color, including shades of brown, black, pink red white or even blue.

D: Diameter... if the spot is larger than six millimeters.

Kim says she doesn't want one more family to go through what they have. 

"You know, I talked to Erik every day on the phone at least once a day, and, it's just not fair, its just not fair."

Proud to be Pale's first event is this coming Sunday at Sylvania's Olander Park from 10 to 5. It will raise money to go to the Melanoma Research Foundation, and feature a 5k walk, music, a bounce house, barbeque style food and more.