Mother-of-two warns of the dangers of tanning beds with a photo of her skin cancer scar

The mother-of-two wants other parents to keep their children away from tanning beds

A mum has shared a selfie of her scarred face on Facebook to warn of the dangers of tanning beds.

Mallory Lubbock, a mother-of-two from Iowa, recently had a skin cancer spot removed from her top lip - the result of her days as a teenager spent in tanning beds.

After the painful procedure, Lubbock, 26, shared photos on her Facebook, where she described the future doctors checkups she will have to endure and criticised her younger self for tanning in tanning beds.

Lubbock wrote: “So, today I got my first cancerous spot removed. I now get to go back for suture removal/wound check, an appointment to get my WHOLE body checked out, VERY routine check-ups for a long while, and then routine check-ups for life, and almost 100% certainly many more painful a** appointments of getting skin cancer taken off my body.

“Damn it 16-year-old Mallory that went tanning every single day for 2 years. I will try like hell to make sure my daughter will not be laying in a single tanning bed while she is under my roof and I hope her just hearing about and seeing Mama go through this will be enough.”

Lubbock then advised other parents to take her warning seriously and keep their children out of the dangerous beds.

“You guys. Get your daughters out of tanning beds. Get your 16-year-old sister out of them. It’s so not worth it. Is tan skin REALLY worth it?” the mum asked.

Concluding her post, Lubbock wrote: “I am now the mom at the beach with the umbrella and my spf 100 HEAVILY applied. Never ever ever did I think this would happen to me (who does?)”

In the photos, Lubbock shows off a heavily bandaged upper lip, as well as a deep scar that extends to her nose.

The images are difficult to look at - which Lubbock hopes will be enough to scare other people away from tanning beds.

The mum-of-two told Yahoo: “I remember seeing skin cancer posts on Facebook and thinking, ‘Oh, that’ll never happen to me.’ I wanted to bring awareness to not only what can happen when you’re out in the sun without sunscreen but also in a tanning bed.”

Tanning beds can be just as dangerous, if not more so, than tanning in the sun.

According to SkinCancer.org: “people who first use a tanning bed before age 35 increase their risk for melanoma by 75 per cent.”

Melanoma is the most dangerous form of skin cancer and although it is not the most common, it causes the most deaths, according to SkinCancer.org.

On Facebook, many people are praising Lubbock for sharing the warning, which has since been shared close to 200 times.

The Independent has reached out to Lubbock for comment.