CNN anchor Sara Sidner fought back tears as she revealed her stage 3 breast cancer diagnosis at age 51.
Sidner currently serves as a co-anchor of the morning edition of CNN News Central.
The Miami Lakes, Florida native made her emotional announcement on CNN News Central on Monday.
She concluded her segment by asking viewers to recall the names 8 women who they know and love.
“Statistically, one of them will get or have breast cancer. I am that one in eight in my friend group,” she said.
“I have never been sick a day in my life. I don’t smoke, I rarely drink. Breast cancer does not run in my family,” she added. “And yet here I am with stage 3 breast cancer.”
Sidner said she is in her second month of chemotherapy treatments. She also plans to undergo radiation therapy and a double mastectomy.
Sara, who is biracial, said a stage 3 breast cancer diagnosis is not a “death sentence” anymore for a majority of women.
She was shocked by the statistics that show Black women are more likely to die from breast cancer than whites, due to lack of access to good health care.
“If you happen to be a Black woman, you are 41 percent more likely to die from breast cancer than your White counterparts. Forty-one percent,” she explained.
Sidner learned she had breast cancer after she discovered a lump in her breast during a self-exam.
A biopsy confirmed that the lump was malignant (cancerous) and had progressed to stage 3.
Stage 3 means the cancer has spread from its original location to nearby lymph nodes or organs.
Stage 4 is the most advanced stage of cancer that has spread to other parts of the body and has the highest mortality rate.
“When I got the news, I didn’t tell anybody, not even my mother or husband or sisters or friends. I just needed to process it,” Sidner said.
She urged women to perform their own self-exams and get a mammogram once a year (starting at age 40) to try to catch it early — “before I did.”
Sidner said she “thanked cancer” for choosing her. “I am learning that no matter what hell we go through in life, that I am still madly in love with this life,” she said while choking back tears.
“And just being alive feels really different for me now.”
