Boy Meets World actress Danielle Fishel has announced she has been diagnosed with an early form of breast cancer and will be undergoing surgery.
The US sitcom star is best known for her role as Topanga Lawrence, the love interest of protagonist Cory Matthews – played by Ben Savage – from 1993 to 2000.
The pair also starred in Disney’s spin-off Girl Meets World from 2014 until 2017, which also starred US pop star Sabrina Carpenter.
“I was recently diagnosed with DCIS, which stands for Ductal carcinoma in situ, which is a form of breast cancer,” Fishel said on the Pod Meets World podcast she shares with her Boy Meets World co-stars Rider Strong and Will Friedle.
Strong, who played Cory’s on-screen best friend Shawn Hunter, and and Friedle, who played Cory’s older brother Eric Matthews, were “two of the first people” Fishel told about her diagnosis.
“It is very, very, very early, it’s technically stage zero,” the 43-year-old said.
“I’m going to be fine, I’m having surgery to remove it, I’m going to be on some follow-up treatment – I’ve had to make a lot of decisions over the last couple of days.”
Fishel said she thought she would be the “suffer in silence” type and would not tell anyone outside of her intimate circle until she was “on the other side of it”.
However, reading work from US author Glennon Doyle helped change her mind.
“She (Doyle) often talks about how a lot of people like to save sharing their experiences until they’ve come out the other side of it, so that they’re able to say ‘here’s the pretty picture of it all, here’s what I’ve learned, the end of the story’.
“But the place you have the most to learn from is at the very beginning of the story or at the messy middle of a story.”
Fishel said her first instinct was to “clam up” and only share the news with her immediate family and was only going to tell “a few select friends”.
However, she said the more people she spoke to, the more people she found with shared experiences of being diagnosed with cancer.
“The only reason I caught this cancer when it is still stage zero is because the day I got my text message that my yearly mammogram was coming up, I made the appointment,” she said.
“They found it so, so, so, so early that I’m going to be fine.
“I want to share this because I hope it will encourage anyone to get in there. If it’s time for your appointment (or) if you’ve never had an appointment before, get in there.
“If you have to find out that you have cancer, find out when it’s at stage zero if possible.”
Fishel said she has some “big decisions” to make regarding her treatment, adding “I don’t have all the answers yet” but she wanted to let fans know “I’m going to be fine”.
