Lisa Ray: Didn’t React After I Was Told I Had Cancer

Lisa Ray: Didn’t React After I Was Told I Had Cancer

Lisa Ray poses with a copy of her book, Close to the Bone

Actor, model and cancer survivor Lisa Ray has revealed how she reacted after her doctor told her she had multiple myeloma.

The actor, while speaking at Sahitya AajTak 2019, opened up about how she did not react at all, after her doctor told her the cancer was fatal.

Also Read: Lisa Ray Gives a Peek Into What to Expect from Her Cancer Memoir

Lisa Ray, ActorMy doctor was scared because after he announced to me that I had multiple myeloma, I didn’t react. Even though he said it was incurable and fatal. In my mind, I was thinking that my body has been trying to give me signals for months, and I was ignoring them. Then I got this strongest possible message. Intuitively, I knew something was wrong. But I didn’t have the courage to do anything, because I was trained to ignore what my body was telling me. In our profession, you can’t go home when you’re sick. You pop medicines and get on with work. In addition, I hadn’t really dealt with the trauma of the accident I was in. What do we do when we don’t want to face something? We keep busy. I did that. Until finally I had to stop, listen to my body, heal and make changes. In a strange way, I realised it was a time of reckoning. I knew it wasn’t the end of me, I knew I wasn’t going to die, but I also knew it wasn’t going to be easy.

Also Read: Lisa Ray Opens up About an Eating Disorder That Took Years to Heal

The trauma that Lisa mentions in the above statement is one that involved her family, that occured just as her career had taken off.

Lisa Ray, Activist and Actor.I met Maureen Wadia after that with all those pictures. And then, we left for Canada. Soon after we were back in Canada, my family and I met with an accident and my mom lost the ability to walk in that accident. Call it luck, but I was supposed to be sitting where my mom was sitting in the car. We had exchanged our seats. That was supposed to be me in place of my mother. And then, on the other end of the world in India, my image was released on the cover of Gladrags magazine. So, my career started on the edge of a blade. One end was fame and on the other end was trauma.

Lisa has documented her battle with cancer in the book, Close To The Bone, which was released in May 2019.