Tanorexic young mother dies of skin cancer after seven years of sunbeds
Thursday, July 05, 2007

20070705_Zita_Farrelly.jpg
Zita Farrelly
A young mum died of skin cancer after using a sunbed twice a day for seven years. Zita Farrelly, 29, died just three days after her daughter's first birthday. The mum-of-two from Salford, started using sunbeds when she was 14 and gave them up at 21 but by then it was too late.

Zita Farrelly: started using sunbeds when she was 14 and gave them up at 21 but by then it was too late. She found a mole on her leg last August and was diagnosed with the skin cancer melanoma.

Doctors told Zita they believed the cancer was caused by the amount of time she spent on deadly sunbeds. Despite receiving chemotherapy and treatment at cancer hospital Christies specialists were unable to save her and just nine months later she was dead. And her partner and her aunt are now warning others of the danger of the machines.

Her partner Phil Burtwistle said that sunbeds had "destroyed the family's life". Zita with her partner Phil Burtwistle. He said that sunbeds had 'destroyed the family's life.' He said: "Zita told me days before she died that she wished she could make a documentary about the dangers of using them. She said if only one person was saved by seeing what had happened to her, she'd be happy.

"People need to know that they can be so dangerous." "I've basically spent the last year watching my girlfriend die before my eyes. "I don't want any family to go through what I went through, and I think people should avoid sunbeds at all costs.

"It's hard because they are on every street corner, but there are other ways to tan, like spray tans and the fake moisturisers you can get." He told how one of Zita's final wishes was to see her daughter Phebie with her presents on her first birthday.

Zita Farrelly, a mother of two, died just three days after her daughter's first birthday. "She battled on and managed to keep herself awake to see that," said Phil. "But soon after, she fell asleep and never woke up again."

Phil who is now caring for their two children Phebie and seven-year-old Caldhan says the worst things is knowing the children will have to grow up without their mum who would have been 30 in two weeks.

"Although Phebie is too young to know what is going on Caldhan is finding it really hard to cope, Phil said "He's alright while he is busy, but as soon as he stops, he really misses his mother."

Zita, who would have celebrated her 30th birthday in two weeks Her aunt, Tina Farrelly, appealed for others to learn from her niece's death.

"I see young girls coming out of tanning salons burned and looking like lobsters," she said.

"I feel like grabbing them and telling them what can happen. If they knew the pain Zita went through, I'm sure it would make them stop using them."

Tina added: "She saved up for a sunbed when she got her first job. Her mum stopped her using it more than a couple of times a week, but she would go to a friend's house to use theirs.

"When fake tans and health warnings came out she stopped using them . . . but unfortunately she stopped too late."

Zita's funeral will take place tomorrow at St James RC Church, with a celebration of the former telephonist's life.

Tina said: "Nobody is allowed to wear black and we've asked everyone to bring helium-filled balloons to release when she's buried. Her coffin is fluorescent pink and she'll be in a carriage drawn by shire horses."

Phil, added: "She picked what she wanted for the funeral and would hate people to be upset. It should be a happy occasion."

A fund-raising party will be held July 18 and to celebrate, which would have been her 30th birthday, in aid of St Ann's Hospice, where she was nursed through her final days.

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first impressions are cheap auditions
situations are long goodbyes

This is so sad. People always think 'oh it will never be me'

btw everyone tans are completely gross pale is the way to go.

You don't have to use sunbeds to get skin cancer in your twenties. My cousin was diagnosed with a melanoma at 27. She had it treated then, but it was obviously too late because its massively spread now. She turned 29 two weeks ago and I fear that is going to be her last birthday.

i would sincerely hope that the message that using a sunbed twice a day for seven fucking years could cause cancer is one that they wont have to spread to many people.

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My sister uses tanning beds all the time. I'm constantly worried about her. She won't stop either it drives me crazy!!

Natural tans look much better, anyway.
It's sad that she died, but I honestly can't see the attraction in lying in a cancer machine for hours a week.

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Jeeeesus.

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if you wanna be tanned then spray tans are the way to go! I had one a week or so ago and it looked natural.

I cant understand why anyone would want to use sunbeds anyway!

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Spray tans are obviously way safer. I still think I'd look stupid with one though!

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i never want any form of a tan

today my dentists secretary woman said to me "you suit being pale with your dark hair, natural is always best" then i told her i was a natural blonde.

and then i read that hair dye gives you cancer too.

It's very sad and all..but it's also pretty stupid.... Of course it's not healthy! It's not even good if you do it once a week so of course 2 times per day will kill you!

My sister does the sunbed tanning as well. It pisses me off and she's a scientist for god's sake! she knows everything about the human body and health and such. It's ridiculous. And when i tell her to stop going she gets pissed...


And also. I don't wanna be disrespectful but a fluorescent pink coffin? That's just so classy.

my cousin and a girl i work with are obsessed with tanning. i try to talk them out of it but they won't listen to me.

i used a tanning bed for 20 minutes a day, every day for a couple years when i was younger. and stupid.

now it makes me sick to think that i did that to myself.

self tanner is your friend.

I was diagnosed with intermediate stage melanoma when I was 30. I've never been in a tanning bed. Ever. Nor did I tan much as a teenager outside. My doctors best guess is that it was caused by a severe sunburn from track and field day at school in the 5th grade. I had to have very extensive surgery and am now permanently disfigured thanks to this, but I am alive.

Skin cancer really can kill you. I have pics, but I won't post them because they are too graphic. If anybody wants to see what can happen to you, pm me. And for heaven's sake, spread the word.

I really worry about this one. I am not a sunbed user, I don't spend a lot of time tanning, but I am a redhead and I have burnt to the point of blistering more times then I can count (even with suncream on). Watching my cousin die of melanoma now is making me fucking paranoid. And I have about a gadbillion moles to keep an eye on.

can you get mole maps done where you are? they map the size and position of your moles and you go in for regular check ups to make sure they haven't changed. it could be worth getting done if you have quite a few.

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Well they do have that here, there is a place in London called The Mole Clinic that offers them because it specialises in nothing but suspect moles. However I will boycott them forever because my cousin went to them about her mole twice and said she was worried about it and they said it was fine. It was only when it started bleeding a few months later that she saw her GP who instantly recognised it was a melanoma. By that stage it had already spread to her lymph nodes and treatment failed. So I am loathe to actually pay money to these people when they can't recognise a textbook melanoma!

Mine was also originally recognized by my GP. The best rule of thumb is to go in and have an all over check once a year. Do it now so that your doctor can get a good baseline of what moles you already have so that he can recognize change or spot new ones. I really can't stress how important it is. I never thought something like this could happen to me. There is also a genetic component, so if you have family members who have had it you need to be extra vigilant. My mother actually was diagnosed with it as well, but not until after I had already been through my ordeal.

some times it is also genetic...

I am pale and love my fairness