Erin, 46, thought it was a stroke when she lost movement down one side at lunch. She had stage 4 melanoma – and only then realised the symptoms she’d ‘brushed off’

Mum-of-two Erin Graham was walking to lunch with her young children when, without warning, she lost control of the entire left side of her body.

The fit and healthy 46-year-old collapsed in the street and immediately feared she was having a stroke, but within just two hours, doctors delivered news far more terrifying than she could have imagined.

A CT scan revealed a tumour on Erin’s brain, and another mass in her lung.

Within days, the busy healthcare professional, who had been working full-time and raising her children, aged three and seven, was facing a stage four metastatic melanoma diagnosis.

‘I was just living my normal life, really, not knowing that I had anything looming underneath the surface,’ Erin, from Brisbane, told the Daily Mail.

The terrifying discovery began on April 11, when she was walking with her two children to meet a friend for lunch.

‘I just had a sudden loss of control and paralysis down my left side, and it caused me to fall down,’ she said.

After her first brain scan, doctors were confident from its characteristics that it wasn’t a primary brain tumour, meaning there was likely another tumour elsewhere in her body.

‘I think I expected to go in and then they’d say, “Look, we haven’t really been able to find anything, but you should maybe have a follow-up”.

‘Then they came in and cleared the kids out of the room. I was in complete shock.’

Later that night, scans revealed a large mass on her lung, which doctors initially suspected could be the primary cancer.

Just four days later, she was whisked into surgery where surgeons worked to remove the approximately one centimetre tumour from the top right side of her brain.

Its position close to her skull meant surgeons were able to access it, which is something Erin now considers one of the ‘silver linings’ of her diagnosis.

Despite its relatively small size, fluid and swelling surrounding the tumour had been putting pressure on her brain and was responsible for her alarming neurological symptoms.

It wasn’t until the tumour was sent to pathology after surgery that doctors discovered Erin had melanoma.

The diagnosis was particularly surprising because no primary melanoma had been found.

She had previously had a superficial melanoma removed a decade earlier, but said investigations found no evidence linking it to her current cancer.

Looking back, however, there had been subtle signs something wasn’t right, with Erin experiencing headaches, which she dismissed as something relatively harmless.

‘I put it down to maybe having a virus, or you’re dehydrated, you’re not drinking enough water, that sort of thing,’ she said.

In hindsight, she believes the headaches were caused by the swelling surrounding the brain tumour.

She had also noticed what felt like mild asthma and lingering respiratory symptoms after an illness, despite not suffering from asthma.

Erin’s diagnosis was considered stage four because the melanoma had spread to two places in her body. However, treatment for advanced melanoma has changed dramatically in recent years.

Following brain surgery just a few days after her initial scan, she underwent targeted radiation to the area where the tumour had been removed and began immunotherapy.

Unlike chemotherapy, immunotherapy works by harnessing the body’s immune system to recognise and attack cancer cells.

Erin said she has experienced some adverse effects requiring treatment, but so far, the results have been encouraging.

‘The immunotherapy has shown a really great effect for me so far and my prognosis is looking really positive,’ she said.

Her brain continues to be monitored with regular MRIs and has remained clear since surgery and radiation.

Meanwhile, the tumour in her lung has been shrinking and showing reduced metabolic activity – a key measure doctors are using to track how well her treatment is working.

Erin said her latest results have been so promising that she hopes she could potentially be disease-free within three to six months.

While she is enormously grateful to be responding so well, she is aware that immunotherapy does not work for everyone.

‘At the start, you actually don’t know if you’re going to be one of the people that will respond or not,’ she said.

‘You can’t help but confront the what-ifs and that terrifying possibility that it might not work for you.’

It’s why she believes continued investment in melanoma research remains so critical, and she wants Australians to understand that melanoma isn’t simply a suspicious mole that can always be spotted on the skin.

For her, there was no obvious lesion warning her that cancer was silently spreading through her body.

She had always been vigilant about skin checks and sunscreen, but now has a new appreciation for the cumulative nature of sun exposure and the importance of protective clothing, avoiding periods of high UV and regularly reapplying sunscreen.

She also urges people not to dismiss unexplained changes in their health.

‘I brushed off the headaches, and I brushed off the chesty symptoms,’ she said.

‘Just making sure people are having their skin checked regularly by a trained professional and not fobbing it off as a lesser type of cancer – this can and does kill.’

For her, one of the most difficult parts of the past few months has been how quickly her identity changed.

‘You go from being such a busy person juggling so many responsibilities and feeling really competent and capable… and then suddenly you’re kind of in this patient role,’ she said.

But with her treatment progressing well, Erin is finally beginning to look beyond her next appointment and is hoping to return to work as soon as her treatment concludes.

Now, by sharing what happened to her, she hopes another Australian might take a symptom seriously, book a skin check or think twice about seemingly harmless sun exposure.

‘I want people to know that melanoma can be deadly and affect every part of your body,’ Erin said.

‘The earlier it is detected and treated, the less of an impact it is going to have on your life and the less disabling it will be.’

‘Not all melanoma shows up as a brown spot on your skin.’