"Good Morning America" correspondent Amy Robach has been diagnosed with breast cancer and spoke about it for the first time on Monday's show, PEOPLE reported.
As part of the "Good Morning America" October Pink initiative, Robach underwent an on-air mammogram screening last month. Participating to encourage viewers to do the same, the journalist had no idea the exam would be so crucial for her.
"I was a little reluctant at first," she told colleague Robin Roberts on "Good Morning America" Monday morning."I'm 40, I'm the age and I've been putting it off."
Between traveling the world for work and keeping up with her kids, Robach delayed taking the exam for a year.
"Like so many women, I just kept pushing it off until now," Robach said. "I started thinking, wow, if I've put it off, how many other people have put it off as well?"
Doctors followed up the initial on-air mammogram with other exams, which Robach described as "a tornado of tests," and last week found that Robach has breast cancer.
Robach, who is wife to former "Melrose Place" actor Andrew Shue and mother to two daughters and three stepsons, was sidelined by the news, especially since her family has no history of breast cancer.
"It's still hard for me to say the words out loud," she said. "I have breast cancer."
Robach was joined by Shue and other cast members on the couch while making the announcement. The most difficult thing so far has been sharing the news with her family, she said.
"Telling my children was the toughest part," Robach said. "But that's when you get strong, because you have to be strong for other people."
In the ABC broadcast, the journalist said, "I know that I have a fight ahead of me, but I also know I have a lot worth fighting for, and I'm so grateful I got that mammogram that day at GMA. Robin's words are still echoing inside of me, if I got the mammogram on air and it saved one life, it's all worth it, she had said. It never occurred to me that that life would be mine."
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