Tara Palmer-Tomkinson has told how she feared she would die when doctors discovered she had a brain tumour earlier this year. The 44-year-old socialite has been receiving treatment for the non-malignant growth in her pituitary gland since January, and said it has now cleared. "I've carried this secret for a year," she told the Daily Mail. "I wanted to deal with my illness privately, but there have been so many rumours flying around."
Tara revealed: "I went to the doctors to talk about my latest blood test results when I got back from skiing in January. I said, 'What does this mean? Can you translate it?' And the doctor said, 'As I suspected, you have a brain tumour.'
"I got terribly frightened. I started thinking, 'I'm going to die, I'm going to die. I've only got a couple of weeks to live.' Stuff like that."
She continued: "I actually feel very lucky. My growth was non-malignant but it affected the production of prolactin. I've been with people who have malignant brain tumours so I don't want to be like, 'Hey, look at me.' I have been – touch wood – luckier. I've taken medication and, thankfully, it seems to have gone away for now."
Tara said that the blood tests also revealed that she was suffering from an auto-immune disease which causes tiredness, joint pain and acute anaemia. Having battled cocaine addiction in the past, the star criticised some media publications for blaming her recent fragility on drugs. "That's always their take on it… cocaine," she said. "That was so many years ago. But not many people can contemplate Tara's life without it."
She told the publication: "I'm not the person I was, I'm much calmer. I don't go to places like Ibiza because the party world scares me. It used to really matter what people thought and said about me. Now, it doesn't bother me whether people write that I'm off my face, on my face, in my face, whatever. It's all pretty trivial compared to this."