Kerry Katona has revealed she had a secret cancer scare last year.
The TV personality admitted she feared the worst after discovering a lump on her armpit, and thought she only had months left to live.
Appearing on Channel Four’s Steph’s Packed Lunch, the Atomic Kitten star explained: “It was really really scary. I did a photoshoot for my clothing range and there was a picture of my arm up.”
“You can see the lump on my armpit. Someone put a comment to get it checked,” the mum-of-five recalled, but admitted she ignored the lump at first.
“I was in the shower and I shaved that armpit and I thought, ‘yeah it is a bit of a big lump,’ and then when I’ve gone to shave the other armpit I was like the difference in the lump that was here to this armpit.”
“The last six weeks my right breast had swollen out times five times bigger than my left. I had surgery about a year and a half before on my breasts.”
“Everything was all fine and then six weeks prior to the lump, I kept getting a really achy feeling in my breast. It was so painful.”
“I thought something’s not right, the surgery has gone wrong. And then when I found the lump I did the worst thing you could possibly do, I went on Google.”
“The difference in the breast was so dramatic that I’ve come out of the shower to my fiance and I’m immediately crying,” Kerry recalled.
“I thought I’d gone through addiction, I’ve gone through bankruptcy, I’ve gone through mental health and I can control all of those, that’s in my power.”
“And then I thought that’s it, I’m going to go to the doctors and they’re going to tell me… it really upsets me… you’ve got three, six months left,” she said, fighting back tears.
“This was after Sarah Harding got diagnosed. That made me feel we’re not invincible, whether you’re on the TV, whether you’re a judge or lawyer or TV presenter. It doesn’t matter who you are. You’re not invincible to whether it’s Covid or cancer.”
View this post on Instagram
“It was so overwhelming that I thought, ‘god, this is it.’ When I found the lump, I thought ‘my goodness, I’ve not got a will. Whose going to look after the kids?’”
“Luckily it turned out to be my lymph node, that had been damaged in the surgery,” Kerry shared.
“I’ve still not had it fixed, this breast is still a lot bigger. To get it fixed I’ll lose a third of my breast, but I’ve just left it for now.”
“I sat there crying thinking ‘oh my goodness’ and I realised the importance of life. I felt really grateful.”
