The actress Lisa Ray, famous for her role in the film Water, has contracted a rare form of blood cancer called Multiple Myeloma.

She has started writing about her experiences in trying to deal with the cancer while getting treatment in Canada. The 37 year old Toronto-born has starred in several British films.

The rare form of cancer, which destroys blood cells, is treatable but incurable. She revealed that she had privately been fighting the cancer since being diagnosed in June this year.

She described the process of finding out on her blog last week:

A few months ago my bone marrow started sending me messages.

The signals: I was always exhausted, pale, drained, and completely depleted of red blood cells. The lack of oxygen made me a serial yawner and spacier than a displaced Czarina. Little did I know, but my hemoglobin had fallen to levels where even a dedicated Blood sucker would turn their thoughts to revival.

She eventually stopped travelling around the world on work and returned to Canada for a full blood test. That is when she found out she had cancer.

The actress is starring in the upcoming film Cooking With Stella and had two of her films released in the UK earlier this year: I Can’t Think Straight and The World Unseen.

In early September she started a personal blog and called it her Yellow Diaries. She said she started it to, “give people an insight into my life.”

Last week she started writing about her initial discovery of the cancer and how she reacted to the news.

But right now I’m a Cancer intern, covert social watcher and I’m doing all this against the backdrop of preparing to premiere two films at the Toronto International Film Festival and wondering if I should have cancelled that meeting with that director while bloated up on my ‘roids’ or I should have just come clean.

‘Yes- I have cancer. The meds shift the shape of my body in ways I can’t predict- but I can still perform torridly well and are looks really still that important in showbiz anyways? I have so much more to say now than ever before…’

She is currently going through a steroids treatment and said she constantly felt hungry. MM may be incurable but it is not necessarily fatal. Ms Ray said she may live up to 20 years, possibly more with new treatments.

Part of her decision to go public about her cancer was due to the changes to her face and body.

She told the Toronto Globe and Mail that fans may notice her steroid induced (slight) bloating at the red carpet screening for Dilip Mehta’s Cooking With Stella, which will be screened at the Toronto International Film Festival this week.

She wrote on her blog last week:

So right now I’ve chosen not to mix therapies. There are even some things I love like green tea and grapefruit (well, ok, no one loves green tea!) that I can’t have as it works inhibits the work of the drugs I’m on. I have faith in this course of action. I am aiming for a stem cell transplant and to be symptom free by December.

Then focus on alternative therapies to rebuild full, wholesome health.

Even if I’m still a puffy Mammacita! As long as I’m healthy.

She says part of her aim by writing is to deal with the taboo around cancer and long-term illnesses.

She wrote:

No one in my family had ever had cancer. I had no reference point. So this brings me back to the subject of taboos. It’s so simple to illuminate the reality of living and healing a long term illness. We just have to talk. Openly.

You can read Yellow Diaries here.