By Kathy Passero

It wasn’t as if Diahann Carroll didn’t worry about her health.

For years, the renowned actress and singer had been careful to eat a balanced diet and to exercise regularly. Diabetes and heart disease run in her family and being diagnosed with one of these dreaded diseases sometimes crossed her mind.

But breast cancer? Not a single relative had ever been diagnosed with cancer of any kind, so she thought she was safe. When a routine 1998 exam revealed a lump, she was shocked. Her first response was to fear for her life. Her second was to fear for her livelihood.

“Having an illness like cancer is not very Hollywood glamour,” says Carroll, who turns 69 in July. “It’s not something many people in positions of hiring, firing, and creating roles for actors want to deal with.”

But breast cancer was not the first obstacle this pioneering African-American actress had faced. Born in Harlem in 1935, she had already survived her share of adversity. In the mid-1960s, she and her colleagues on the movie Hurry Sundown endured discrimination and death threats filming in Louisiana. On the heels of that, she sparked controversy as the title character in the groundbreaking TV series Julia, the first ever about an African-American professional woman. She had suffered through abusive romances and failed marriages and lived to tell about it.

So Carroll steeled herself to bravely face up to her cancer and find a way to get through it with her trademark quiet determination, grace, and resolve.

Pulling herself together after the initial shattering diagnosis, she began devouring all the literature she could find about breast cancer and asking questions. “I was so ill-informed,” she concedes. “It was amazing how much I didn’t know about breast cancer. But as I gathered more information, my fears began to ease. I realized I had options and a better chance for survival than I’d feared.”

Her growing knowledge soon led her to a radical decision: She would go public about her breast cancer and risk the ostracism or worse from her peers in Hollywood. What’s more, she would invite an ABC camera crew to accompany her to meet with her oncologists and to follow her into the radiation room for a televised special.

“I decided it was best to proceed with the attitude that there were many more women like myself who were uninformed and that perhaps it would be wise to allow others to take the journey with me,” she recalls. “Perhaps it would make me feel better about having to go through this. And it did.”

Counter to her fears about Hollywood’s response, Carroll said she received many calls of support. The most surprising came from fellow celebrities revealing that they, too, had gone through breast cancer, but kept it a secret. Carroll chose to undergo a lumpectomy and twelve weeks of radiation. The intensive treatments five times a week left her weak and nauseated.

But her stalwart friends and family showered her with love and moral support. “My friends would meet me to have lunch and encourage me. They brought me wonderful videos, wonderful music, and wonderful things to read.” They coaxed her to get out of the house, to stay connected to the world, and to wear pretty outfits and makeup, knowing it would lift her spirits no matter how sick she felt.

She supplemented the treatment with acupuncture, massage, visits to nutritionists, and anything else she thought might help her body heal.

“Taking care of yourself, getting out every day, and surrounding yourself with something that makes you happy—planning a wonderful lunch, going to a museum or the theater—is essential. People saw me around town dressed up in heels and none of them asked me about cancer. If you have a positive attitude, people don’t focus on your illness.”

As if the effects of radiation weren’t bad enough, Carroll developed chicken pox as a result of having such a severely compromised immune system and had to halt her cancer treatments temporarily. “I told myself ‘If you thought God was testing you before, here is another test of your mettle.’”

She is well aware that it is “not easy to face an attack on your physical self that could mean the end of your life.” Nor is it easy for her to give others advice about something so personal. “But ultimately you just have to face it with as much joy as you can, knowing that you’re angry, that you’re incapacitated, and that you don’t feel good,” she says.

Carroll has stayed true to her commitment to educate women everywhere about the life-saving benefits of mammograms and early detection of breast cancer.

“I was filming in the south not long ago and was on my way to the set one morning at the crack of dawn when I found three women in the hotel lobby waiting for me,” she recalls. “They told me they had heard a radio announcement I’d made about mammograms and had decided to go together because they had never had one.”

Two of the women discovered they had cancer. “They were so grateful they had heard my words,” she says. “I was equally grateful to them because when you’re constantly talking about cancer sometimes you begin to wonder if anyone’s listening.”

In addition to her advocacy work, Carroll — who has won a Tony Award, a Golden Globe, and an Oscar nomination in her four-decade-long career — keeps up a busy professional schedule, which includes preparing for a national singing tour. But no matter how crowded her calendar gets, she maintains her dedication to a healthy lifestyle, eating a diet that emphasizes fish, chicken, vegetables, and soy, and working with a personal trainer.

Six years after she was diagnosed, she is cancer free and happier than ever. Her ordeal left her with newfound wisdom and perspective about what truly matters in life. “I resolved to share my thoughts with the people I love—to say ‘I’d like some time alone with you so we can talk,’ or ‘I’d like to make a suggestion’ if I think my intervention might be helpful,” explains Carroll, who has two young grandchildren. “I resolved to do whatever I can today, because who knows? Tomorrow is not promised to anyone. I’ve tried to keep that attitude because it’s a wonderful, positive way to live.”

Kathy Passero is an award-winning writer and reporter living in Manhattan. Her work has been published in numerous national magazines including Biography, Health, InStyle, Self, Reader's Digest, and TV Guide. She is also the author of four nonfiction books.