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Khloe Kardashian has opened up about a personal health scare she faced as a teenager, revealing she was diagnosed with melanoma at just 19 years old, shortly after losing her father, Robert Kardashian, to oesophageal cancer.
Speaking on the Khloe in Wonderland podcast, the reality star, now 41, recalled, "My first bout of skin cancer, I was 19 years old. When you're 19, you don't really think about how scary things can be, so I don't remember a lot." She explained that her father died in September 2003, and "months later I found out I had skin cancer on my back."
Despite the diagnosis, Khloe chose not to tell anyone in her family. "I literally didn't even tell my family because I knew I just had to get this removed and I'll be fine," she said. "I didn't want to worry anyone." Instead, she handled it on her own: "I literally drove myself to the doctor, got all this skin removed and that was it. I didn't think much about it."
Nearly two decades later, in 2022, Khloe noticed a small bump on her face. Assuming it was acne, she said, "I was convinced it was that cystic pimple. It would not go away. I was trying to pick it, all these things." For over a year, she sought facials and asked multiple people about it, but "no one thought it was weird" since it matched her skin tone. "I do have a lot of beauty marks all over me, but they're brown. So I was like, 'Gosh, maybe this is a skin colour mole.' I didn't know what it was."
Eventually, during a facial, a professional recommended a biopsy. "So, we cut it out and within days they found out it was melanoma," Khloé said. The cancer, located along her cheek line, required careful removal. "You also have to take enough skin, like healthy skin, around it to make sure the cells didn't spread."
She turned to a trusted plastic surgeon and family friend for the procedure. "The scary part is you don't know how much they need to remove until they start cutting into you," she said. "We did it. Everything was perfect. He got all they needed the first time." She is cancer free now.
