Charrel was 20 when it turned out that he had aggressive skin cancer: 'The ground fell away from under my feet'

You are just entering your twenties, enjoying life and especially your part-time job on the beach and at sea with the Lifeguards. You catch every ray of sunshine. And then a doctor says: "You have skin cancer." It happened to Charrel Jalving, now 38 years old. His world collapsed in 2007 due to melanoma - the most dangerous and often fatal form of skin cancer due to rapid metastases - but he recovered.

With the current scorching days, the ' sunscreen discussion ' has been flaring up in the Netherlands in recent years. Opponents seem to dominate with loud shouts on social media, but the average Dutch person simply applies sunscreen. Some figures that were presented during the recent Skin Cancer Month: one in five Dutch people get skin cancer. Every year, a thousand people in our country die from skin cancer. 81 percent of Dutch people know that you should apply sunscreen every two hours when in the sun, but 20 percent also do so faithfully.

And oh yes, skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in our country and also the fastest increasing form.

Charrel Jalving from Schagerbrug is happy to be one of the ambassadors for the National Skin Fund because of his past. That is why Jalving is the main character in the video above. As a reasonably down-to-earth North Hollander, he is not the man to shout with a raised finger that you have to put on sunscreen. No, the man who had skin cancer has the following nice slogan: 'Keep, wear, put on sunscreen'.

It is Monday morning when Metro speaks to Charrel Jalving. He has just had 'a weekend at Concert at Sea', the festival in Zeeland where Suzan & Freek returned to the stage . Freek has metastatic lung cancer and the couple is expecting their first baby, a boy. That really hit home for the down-to-earth Charrel. "I experienced the performance from quite close by. How big is that chance? That you are a very famous couple, one gets cancer with no possibility of recovery and at the same time there is that pregnancy. What a horror scenario. At such a moment I am also really emotional, when I heard it I was crying in the car. You always reflect on something like that, especially when you have young children."

Jalving's own horror scenario began at the age of 19 with a spot near his knee. His mother certainly kept an eye on him as a child and teenager when it came to the sun on the North Holland coast. The family lived in Callantsoog and Charrel was able to get a cool summer job with the Rescue Brigade there. "I did regularly apply sunscreen back then," says the man with red hair, freckles and somewhat pale skin. "But if you're in the sun that often, you sometimes get sunburned unfortunately. I wasn't aware of the risks, apart from getting a little sunburned and a few days where you were bothered by it at that moment."

But then… “My mother suddenly said ‘hey, what’s that spot on your knee?’ She suggested that I go to the GP anyway and I went under the guise of ‘yeah mum’. My own GP had just died in a tragic accident and as a result the replacement GP in a village further away was extremely busy. He thought it was a wart and said ‘come and see me at the wart consultation’. A winter of long trousers quickly passes and months later my mother pointed out that spot on my leg again. My new GP in Callantsoog didn’t think it was a quiet spot and wanted a dermatologist to take a look.”

"Well, fine. So off to the hospital in Den Helder." Because of the unrest in the spot, he didn't really get a choice: it had to be cut. Charrel did get a choice of minimal or thorough cutting and 'cleaning' the whole thing as well as possible. He chose "a whole piece". "At that moment I almost found it all interesting. A week later I was sitting there for the results and the words suddenly came: malignant skin cancer. Because of the cutting, the edges were clean and they didn't see any reason to panic. I was shocked, who expects that at the age of 20?"

“I was supposed to come back for a check-up after two years in Den Helder after the skin cancer, but my GP said: 'What if a cancer cell escaped into your bloodstream? I want to put you through the mill of the Antoni van Leeuwen hospital in Amsterdam'. There I saw all these bald people or sick people in wheelchairs with a pole and a bag attached to it. I looked around with wide eyes. Like 'Gosh, those are all sick people who are sick and dying'. That was very confronting, but it showed me that I wasn't the only one. To be honest, I didn't feel like 'one of them' yet.”

The specialists at the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek found that Charrel's skin cancer had also 'delivered' metastases. The lymph nodes in his legs and lower abdomen had to be removed. "The ground sank beneath my feet. That wasn't the intention, was it? Because of the skin cancer, my future prospects in life suddenly disappeared. It's a moment that will always stay with me. At that age, you're still naive, something like that won't happen to me, will it?" So it did. And then a melanoma too, where the metastases really shouldn't end up in your brain, for example. That's the end of the story.

The story of this skin cancer patient turned out well, because Metro is finally on a video call with Charrel Jalving. The incision in his groin and lower abdomen to remove all the glands was fortunately successful. Of course, he accepted those few scars. Charrel later turned out to be 'clean' and has been for years now. Life quickly smiled at him again and now he is married and blessed with two children aged almost 4 and 2.

Charrel, as a man who had skin cancer, does not want to take a hard line against people who say all sorts of things about not putting on sunscreen when it is sunny. "I am not a scientist either. But I am convinced that you have to be careful with sun damage. Unfortunately, many people only discover it when the sun has already caused the damage. And you know what? Prevention is always better than cure."

Jalving uses the previously mentioned 'ward off, clothes, smear' for this. "Weren means staying out of the sun and clothes and smear, that's clear, right? Skin cancer is one of the fastest growing forms of cancer, but it is also a form that you can prevent, in my opinion, by consciously dealing with the sun and thus not suffering skin damage. I also see that people get more hours of sun these days and that also in the hottest part of the day." He was not able to prevent skin cancer himself, so he decided to do something for others through his story.

Is Charrel, who can now be found in marketing instead of on the beach, now an overly concerned father for his two little ones when it comes to the sun? “That is not the case at all, I am a realist. I am not someone who is afraid and I think you have to live. Life itself is of course already quite deadly, so enjoy yourself and don't worry too much. Just be aware of the sun. Think about when you let your children out in the sun and how. And put sunscreen on them so they don't burn. I am not someone who always wears a cap, who puts sunscreen on himself until he is completely white and walks around in a UV shirt. I think there is absolutely no need to scare people.”

If you would like to know more about (preventing) skin cancer, please visit this website .

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