Yahoo News How Victoria Derbyshire broke cancer news to her sons
Victoria Derbyshire opened up about her cancer battle on ITV's Lorraine today.
The broadcaster revealed that one of the hardest parts of her journey to recovery was telling her primary school-aged sons about her diagnosis.
"There was a period of time over a week where I was having so many tests done, biopsies and scans – I didn't know if breast cancer was going to kill me or not," she said.
"I was left waiting to find out, and it was a really distressing time."
Before breaking the news to her children, Victoria and husband Mark Sandell decided to wait until they had all the facts from the doctors.
"When it became clear my cancer was treatable, that's when we told our children," she explained.
"A friend of mine had beat breast cancer, so we we said to them, 'Look, she's alive, she's well, we will get through this as a family'.
"My oldest son was 11, and he asked me, 'Aren't you angry you've got breast cancer? Because I am.' I told him I wasn't. I didn't want to waste my energy on being angry. I wanted to be positive and get through it."
While Victoria tried her best to be positive throughout her journey, she feared she could die when she had a mastectomy to remove the cancer.
Although she trusted the surgeon, she wasn't sure she would wake up from the operation and so she decided to write a letter to her children in case she died.
"The night before, I told my husband that I'd put the letters in a drawer and that if anything happened, to give them to the boys," the journalist continued.
"Last month, I explained to my sons what I had done and showed them the letters. They read them, cried, handed them back to me, then ran outside to play football because that's what little boys do."
Victoria famously documented her cancer battle online through a series of blogs and video diaries, in a bid to help people understand the treatment involved.
Today, she released a book about beating the disease titled Dear Cancer, Love Victoria: A Mum's Diary of Hope.
"Because I am a journalist, I thought, 'I want to document this'," she explained. "If I don't know what chemotherapy involves then I bet there are others that don't.
"I have decided to do this because I want to shine a light on cancer and demystify the kind of treatment you are offered if you receive a breast cancer diagnosis."
Lorraine airs on weekdays from 8.30am on ITV.
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