Joel Siegel Shares His Cancer Story
June 26 -- Joel Siegel, who brings Good Morning America its movie reviews and entertainment news, was grappling with quite a bit of drama of his own recently.
Siegel went to the hospital last Wednesday for cancer surgery on his right lung, three and a half years after his treatment for colon cancer. That cancer metastasized in his right lung, and he had the cancerous growth removed. He is doing well, and expects to be back on the show very soon.
Although his chances for recovery were excellent, one of the big questions on his mind had been what to tell his 3-year-old son Dylan. On Good Morning America, four parents who survived cancer explained to Siegel how they faced the same question.
Helping Others Through
Siegel said he was prompted to talk about the cancer by his friends and colleagues on the show, who thought his own questions about talking to his son would help others. And Siegel said he wanted to help put cancer on the same footing as any other treatable disease.
"This is not a death sentence for me," Siegel said. "They're going to snip it out. It's very small. It's self-contained."
Still, despite knowing that he would be OK, the question arose about what he would tell Dylan.
"Last time [I had cancer] Dylan was one and a half years old, he didn't know anything," Siegel said. "But he's 3-years-old. He knows. What do you tell a kid?"
Full Disclosure Suggested
One dad, Peter Barcellona, who was diagnosed with testicular cancer three years ago, said he did not tell his four daughters until after the cancer had spread to his abdomen.
"I realized it was further along than I had thought, so I sat thechildren down before I came here to New York to Sloan Kettering [cancer center] to tell them exactly what I was in store for," Barcelona, who is 40, said.
The girls, now ages 5 to 17, were more scared not knowing, he said. Once they did know, they asked a lot of questions as he went through chemotherapy.
Ellen Pavia, 39, has two children who are now 7 and 10. She was diagnosed last May with breast cancer and she opted to tell her children everything.
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