Just weeks after announcing her breast cancer diagnosis, Nicole Eggert revealed that doctors found cancer in her lymph nodes.
“Self-examination is saying I kick myself.” [for not doing them frequently]” she recently told Inside Edition. According to the Daily Mail.
“That’s the only thing I should have done.”
The Baywatch alum, 52, also blamed breast implants she had as a teenager for making her cancer harder to detect.
“If I didn’t have breasts and had smaller, more natural breasts, I’m sure I would have felt it sooner,” she said.
Recalling the moment she learned she had been diagnosed with stage 2 cribriform cancer, she added: She said: “My heart dropped, I lost all my hearing, everything just sank in.”
The actress told People in January that she received the rare diagnosis after finding a lump in her left breast that was “throbbing and painful.”
Eggert said the hardest part of being diagnosed with cancer was thinking about leaving behind her daughters Keegan, 12, and Dilyn, 25.
“[Dilyn’s] Although I am an adult, I have a 12-year-old child at home and I am the only one caring for him. I have no family. I don’t have anything,” she explained.
“As soon as I heard this, I knew I couldn’t give in to this. This is what I have to get through.”
Eggert also spoke candidly about her regrets about going under the knife to enlarge her breasts as a teenager.
“It was a stupid decision by an 18-year-old,” she said.
She also said she felt pressured to get the implants after the red swimsuit she wore in Baywatch didn’t do her any good.
“When I have to wear that dress and it’s so flat and pleated…I’m like, ‘What is this?'” she recalled.
Eggert also opened up on Instagram about having to visit her doctor frequently during her breast cancer treatment.
“Hours of my life these days are consumed by medical services, appointments, and being on hold for further fixes,” she captioned a Jan. 12 selfie. “Something has to change…”
