Trisha Goddard has revealed she was tempted to keep her breast cancer a secret - even from her family.

The Channel 5 chatshow host revealed she had been diagnosed with the disease earlier in the month and has undergone two surgeries to remove cancerous tissue from both her breast and her lymph gland.

She explained yesterday that the cancer was spotted in a routine mammogram: “I squished it in between racing from one appointment to the next, and then forgot about it.”

“The next week they called me in and I just thought it would be the usual thing of going through the results.”

“But they said it was hard to see and wanted to give me an ultra-sound. Finally, the doctor said there was a lump and he thought it was cancer and I needed a biopsy. I just said: ‘Do it now’.”

“I was overwhelmed. [But luckily] I had a psychotherapy session after. I went along and said: ‘We’ve got something to talk about - I think I’ve got breast cancer.’”

“My therapist convinced me to tell my husband so I came home and told him but not the girls. I hate talking about things while I’m dealing with them. It’s more at night when you’re in bed when the feelings overwhelm you.”

“When I finally told the girls the following Monday, they were cross with me but I didn’t want my eldest feeling she couldn’t [go away to university] or be worried about me feeling ill. Our older daughter was in floods of tears but the younger one got on the computer and started doing lots of research.”

She added that Kylie Minogue’s breast cancer admission also helped her speak openly about it: “Thank God for her. She has helped me because, unknowingly, I had read so much about breast cancer.”

“I thought, ‘Hang on, girl, she is OK, you can be, too.’”