This week we learned melanoma cases, which is skin cancer's most aggressive form, have significantly risen. Federal cancer researchers looked at thousands of skin cancer cases from the last three decades. They found while young men's melanoma rates have been stable since 1980, young women's rates jumped by 50 percent.

Those statistics have many experts convinced young women are tanning at alarmingly higher rates than they ever have in the past. This is particularly disturbing because, since 1980, so much information has come out about skin cancer's dangers. Still the numbers, and the information, seem not to be working. With those statistics in mind, a Valdez woman, currently fighting melanoma, literally wanted us to show you the face of skin cancer.

A warning: what you're about to see, and read, will be unnerving.

"It was quite the thing to be tan. California girl tan, " says Valdez's Sue Kuckertz.

Music from the 1960's alludes to that California tan. It is what Kuckertz, and her friends strived for growing up during that decade in Chicago. "I went to the beach almost every day. That's what we did. We went to the beach. So I used to burn," Kuckertz added.

Caring about that golden glow moved on, just as Kuckertz's teens and 20s did. Then, nearly 30 years later, she discovered a spot on her face.

Kuckertz said, "I had a little mark on the side of my face. Just a couple of weeks ago."

The tanning she did as a young lady suddenly meant skin cancer, melanoma, all those years later. Sue Kuckertz is just one of skin cancer's many faces.

Kuckertz said "I wanted to come on TV to show people the risk of sun exposure. And the consequences of it." Kuckertz's raw face represents melanoma's harsh reality.

The only treatment answer Kuckertz's doctor gave her was a medical cream drawing the skin cancer out.

Kuckertz's dark spot early warning sign made her go to the doctor early. It's just one of melanoma's warning signs, which

mayoclinic.com tells us also include:
    * a large brownish spot with other, darker spots anywhere on your body
    * a simple mole that changes color, size or feeling; and, in some cases, bleeds
    * any strange skin bumps with red, white, blackish-blueish borders
    * shiny, firm, dome-shaped bumps
    * even dark lesions on your palms, soles, fingertips and toes, or on the mucous membranes lining your mouth or nose.

A month after her treatment Kuckertz says she's doing well; although more treatments are in her future.

"I'm hoping that I don't have to go through a third one."

That's cancer's reality. While you can treat it, in most cases, it's never gone from your life.

Kuckertz said, "I'm not worried about it because I take the precautions. And the first little sign of it I'll go to the doctor."

With that mindset, Sue Kuckertz wants you to remember her face and think of it, if you get that tanning urge.

Kuckertz said, "...not to do this sort of thing. Because there is no side effect immediately. I want them to know it's no joke. And that I had no idea that's how much cancer was in my skin. And it was drawing it all out. Be cautious. Be wise. You don't have to be tan. The wise thing to do is not be tan."

Sue Kuckertz is CBS 11 News' Executive Producer Carolyn Kuckertz's mother. CBS 11 News thanks her sincerely for sharing her story. We wish her nothing but good thoughts for her future treatments. Please use her story as such an important reminder: why you always need to wear sunscreen.

Tanning bed industry representatives told CBS News melanoma rates are rising because there are now better detection methods. Dermatologists, however, wholeheartedly disagree. According to recent reports, especially here in Alaska, we lack the sun's vitamin, Vitamin D. Dermatologists say think about taking that vitamin in pill form, instead of soaking up the sun's rays.

To contact Matthew, call 907-273-3186.