Delta Goodrem: I Faced Cancer With The World Watching

30:57It was pretty, it was pretty wild. It just all happened at the same time. The song took off. It went number one. The, the, the album, it just all started. It just was like a beautiful, the character having the storyline. We only had this small window before I started airing on Neighbours to make the album. Right. Make Innocent Eyes. And, um, the beauty in it was, He really was innocent. It was, I'd write a simple, you know, a song by myself or I'd get to start to do a couple of co-writes with Gary Barlow and Elliot Kennedy. Yes, I saw that. He was one of the first people I ever wrote with. Did he contact you?

31:38No, we were connected through label when he was producing and I went to Manchester and, you know, I was 16 and I was one of his first kind of, one of his begin-again's of doing production in his time. And he's obviously been a special friend ever since. Yeah. So we are at the best time of your life. For sure. Everything. You have worked so hard to get. It's not like it was handed to you on a platter. You literally grafted to get to this amazing position where you've got a number one best-selling album and a job on the biggest TV show in the world ever, and you get hit with some news that changed your life in a massive way.

32:35When did you know you were unwell? That's a great question. I it was hard to decipher between how much work I was doing and if I was unwell because it was not normal what was happening in the sense that it was so so exciting and so incredible and and I still got to I mean I see the pattern of I was still getting to have fun I was on set with my friends you know but acting and I still had a bit of protection bubble. It's like when I was at school. I'd still go and do these things, but I still had a bit of a protection bubble where I would go to neighbours. But then on the weekends we were flying over to do Top of the Pops and, you know, UK shows.

33:20And singing those, having those moments and learning how to deal with the extra nerves. Obviously that was a whole new toolkit on how to deal with that. You could sing great when there's nobody there, but then when you have all this adrenaline and this, you know, other sensories, is how do you drop in and stay in your heart? And I kind of went through all those quick, rapid fire, how do I learn? Yeah, that's amazing. And also I had a deep not wanting to ever disappoint anyone or, you know, wanting to give everyone as much as I had. And I was definitely giving more than I had ability to keep for my own energy, which is what started to happen.

34:03And, you know, if someone would come up to me and they, you know, they liked, they loved the music or they'd been touched, then I had this like wanting to give my like my blood and soul to people. So I kind of was just this vessel of too much, you know, given not enough, probably looking after how to be able to balance what was happening. But it's very hard when there was, you know, we were doing, no word of a lie, 12 to 14 hour signings. I remember being at High Point Shopping Centre and I just remember I said to them, is anybody there? This was very early. I was like, did anybody come? And they were like, oh, look to me and they're like, yeah, there's a few people here.

34:50I was like, oh, okay. Born to Try just out on the radio. It was getting a lot of momentum, but I still, I didn't have the concept of that physicality of people taking it into their homes yet. And it was CD before streaming or anything. And I just remember these two doors opening and I remember just going and just seeing just seas of people and just going, wow, something's happening. You know, this is big and this is phenomenal. and, you know, the album stayed number one for seven and a half months and it was a pretty wild. Obviously that would be exhausting in itself. So I started to get a few rashes.

35:34This sounds, as a symptomatic kind of conversation, I started to, my immune system was starting to break down where you start to have night sweats, which is something that I've, you know, you learn later on. And I had started to see all these like immune rashes And I'd go to the doctor and they would say, no sign, you're stressed. It was very, and I understand, like I said, very hard for people to decipher between you're flying to the UK for a weekend. Yes. And then you're flying back. Lost Without You had just gone number, I think, two on the charts. And so then we'll fly over on the weekend and do the TVs on the weekend.

36:15So we would fly over, then I'd fly back and have to be on set. and so I can see it was hard but I ended up finding a lump so my sorry this side my a tiny lump had started to sort of developed and I I felt I would feel it and I was like you couldn't see it but you could just feel it that's interesting but then it started to get bigger and to jump past the immune rashes and things that were kind of happening and my general starting to feel exhausted right I started to I remember I had done a day on set I'd done a meet and greet dinner my parents were not at the um at my at the apartment in Melbourne this night um I was you know I was living half by myself already at this point and I remember walking to the apartment and kind of just remember everything was sort of moving and swaying and And another day of just me going, I'm just so tired.

37:17I'm just so tired. But I wouldn't surrender. I'm just not someone who surrenders easily to my detriment. And I'll just keep going. And I just, you know, sort of kept pushing. Went to bed. And I woke up at 3.31. And I wrote a song about called 3.31. I basically had a nightmare and saw like a very dark figure. and came to me on a grave with a note. And at 3.31 I woke up drenched. I was head to toe like I'd been in the ocean. And I was frozen with fear, completely frozen, just still after what I had just seen and that I'd woken up like I'd been in a bath. my first sort of thoughts were maybe someone has broken in or there's danger or I just was like danger danger is happening something is dangerous and then I thought maybe I'm just having a premonition or maybe something is you know so but I called my mom called my mom called the home phone you know to wake them up in the household something's going to happen to me I something's going to happen.

38:39I don't know what's wrong. Something's going to happen. And then they said, you know, my mom was like, it's okay. Stay calm. Um, and then I called another friend, I think, and woke them up. And the runner on set, who's still one of my best friends as well today, I called her, woke her up and said, can you please, um, come here? I'm, I'm, I didn't go back to sleep. I was just shaken. Stayed awake, got to neighbours. My call was 5.30 or something anyway, so I was up anyway. We drove to neighbours, my girlfriend, Lutz and I, and I told everyone, I said, something's going to happen. Something's going to happen to me.

39:17I don't know what's happening. And they're all like, Delta, you're just really tired. I was like, no, I'm very scared. This is just quite crazy though. You knew. Yes, it was. I told everyone and it wasn't like I was backwards. I was like, something's going to happen. And then I was like, you know what? And I started to read a book. I don't read that much, but at that I started to immerse into just, I was reading a book called The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Malayan Kandura. And I thought that was an interesting book that I was reading at that time. And I just remember kind of immersing in the plane, reading this book.

39:54And then I landed and my mom and Pete, my product manager who I told you about earlier they booked me in for the hospital on Monday they were like let's just let's just book around on Monday she's telling us something's up on Sunday the paper had my I was on the front page of the national paper for the first time now we'd had our third number one single we'd just broken the record album was number one the UK we just debuted at number two and I was on a flight that week to head to the States. And then obviously that paper ran on Sunday. Monday, I was having an interview with Rolling Stone. They'd been following me for three months or something.

40:37And I just, I just, I was just, I just remember being lost it. And then gone in, done the tests, was a little overwhelmed with these biopsy needles going into my neck and all those and thought and I'd gone in by myself just ran into the doctor that they'd booked gone in just in I'd fainted from this huge needle for that going into your neck's tumors was a obviously ended up being a tumor but um I saw it on his face as well and I could see that in you I saw I didn't know the words cancer at all but did he know but I did see it in his face yes he's again subsequently still my doctor um and I saw it on his face something went back to the studio and then um with by the night time there was a knock at the door my mum walked in and then my brother walked in and I said what's wrong and they said we have to take you to the hospital and I said why why and that was the first word that first time I heard they think you have cancer now it's number one on the chart singles albums globally except for the states and then my whole world changed I feel for you at this point this is hard you know your wildest dreams are coming true yes and you get the worst news yes possible to hear and I'm quite interested to ask you your understanding of cancer what because when I was younger it was like cancer equals death sentence yeah well yes at that point I didn't have much to go off as a positive train of thought my physical reaction was just shaking and I kept a diary my diary explains that I felt like I was trapped I was in a corner like a like an animal in a corner where you just there's nowhere to go you just you just start shaking and you I just remember that I had to have surgery the next morning straight into it um they were going to remove the tumors and see what was there so where were your tumors uh in my neck but just the was it just the one or were there a few there well there was quite a mess um and then it had just obviously gone for a little a little ride around town in the body um but that was where my my um where the mass was which i have my little scar you know my warrior wounds that we have all of us all of us in our lives but this is just you know this is a long time ago and i'm proud to be healthy and what's come of it but to dive into it um it was obviously then life is completely different than you with hematologists oncologists you have another another world and at that time so you were trying to deal with that did you take a hiatus from everything and just try and get better or were you concurrently doing you know little bit of singing or no and how much did you tell people well it wasn't really it there was there was going to be no um escaping this moment was the music had just taken on a life of its own right and i'd been taken in by especially my home country um and and so beautifully here in the uk too um and different parts of the world i'd been taken in to to their homes that it was like so insane it was so basically we had the operation the next day by the Thursday people had started to realize from the hospital somebody had said something or started to kind of get out there by the Friday we had to share because again we were you know we were booked on things there was there was major shows coming up there was so then news broke and it was just everywhere and the papers were filled with well wishes and like you'd open the national paper every day and my journey was a very public journey in it's that I had people were very much with me and I I really felt that and I understood quickly that not everyone gets that and I'm very grateful that people were so connected to giving me strength in that time.

45:18You know, the one thing I went to was like a number ones sort of, not an awards but it was like a press conference and I remember there's this clip, there's this one. I'd already sort of started losing my hair a little bit and we chopped it. It was kind of the first time I'd sort of spoken after getting a little bit of the swing of what was going to be my world for a minute and just saying there'd be good times and bad times. And I appreciated, you know, everyone's love and support. And I lived on a cul-de-sac divina where basically people camped. It was camera crews. The whole of the country was sitting outside my door.

46:00and so many people sent letters obviously before social. There was a lot of letters and with the papers being national. I mean Elton John called me on my first day of chemo and wished me luck. Isn't that a beautiful thing? Just beautiful. Can I say something quite funny? Yes, tell me. David got in touch and said that he and Elton, when I had my operation. I have no doubt. But they're not lovely people. Yes, it's beautiful. That's an incredibly warm-hearted. I agree. kind thing to do. Exactly. And you never forget it. You never forget it. No, you never forget people that are kind to you when you are really down.

46:38100%. So I never have forgotten that people out there in the world were very good to me. That's always kept me having a light of understanding of how good people are out there as well. But I would be sent all these letters and our house was a bit of a Mecca. So it became people would drop in The house looked like it was a florist. There was just so much activity at our family home. It's like a train station. People are knocking, dropping in. Journalists are knocking on the door. We were, and I'm just an 18-year-old, just now just kind of just working out how to manage all of that. It's crazy. Just manage just now is health.

47:22Was it frightening? Oh, my goodness. Of course. the frightening you know the normal journey of when you're in the middle of the night um worried about like you want to stay awake because you don't want to fall asleep because you're like am i am i okay just stay awake just stay awake you know in case anything happens so you go through all those different you know your arms are sore from all the different um treatments and all those kind of things but this one like people i shared this on my tour but But he would just knock on the door to the point where one time this Australian, he knocks on the door, comes in with a cake and he's like, I thought maybe my brother knew.

48:06I thought somebody came in, comes in, brings this cake and is like, oh, you know, how are you feeling? I'm like, good, good, good. He says, I really love Lost Without You. I was like, thank you, thank you. Then I realised, do you know him? Mum's like, do you know him? Like, no. So my dad, he just flew from Hobart, came, brought me a cake, wanted me to feel better. He's like, well, I'm leaving in the morning, but I'm just glad everyone's feeling okay in the Goodroom household and I'll be off. We accidentally let him in. I'd never seen him before in my life. I didn't know who he was. You know what?

48:39He's still telling that story now. He left and he was like, I wish you well, mate. And I was like, thank you so much. And then we all laughed because I was like, never saw him again. But just remember he came in with cake. Like people were just very, the album was still number one for months and months after that. Then the next biggest thing was our ARIA Awards, which was our big night. I had, you know, it was the first time I'd ever seen myself bald with no hair and no eye and it was my big night of collecting very gratefully these beautiful statues that I had dreamed about all my life and it wasn't exactly how I imagined it But what depth and what – I had a little blonde wig that I'd gotten made and the room was this huge room at the Sydney Superdome and the electricity was insane.

49:29I had a nurse backstage and I had my most beautiful pink dress that I had got made by this designer, Lisa Ho, and I felt like a total princess for the night. Wow. That was really special. The next day I went back to reality and back to the next stage, which was the radiotherapy chapter. So how long was your treatment for? Well, the thing was it took a lot longer than it's – because it's quite – you know, even though these memories come to my mind, I would say that whether it was the kind of year that was a lock and change in a year, I tried to start doing work. my advice would have been maybe to anybody is to really take the time to never rush back into anything even though it was correct time does change and but as a jump forward I mean for 22 years since that day I've worked hard at raising 120 million with that hospital and being able to Wait, wait.

50:39You raised$120 million for the hospital. Well, since that day, yes, I've worked very hard with them to be able to make sure. So something good has come from it. Yay. That's amazing. We have had something good come from it. Oh, my God. $120 million. Yes, yes. Oh, my God, that's incredible. Yes. No, well, at that time, people were trying to donate as well to the hospital. Yes, of course, yes. Because they're so grateful for looking after you. For sure, which was beautiful. But then obviously I started my foundation, the Delta Goodrum Foundation. I only started that five years ago, but I worked with St.

51:21Vincent's. That was obviously meant to be a part of my story and my story is meant to be different. It's not meant to be the traditional route. So how did you find your way out of it? Because we know that you're a grateful person we know that you're a positive person you're a hustler you you know you but you'd been literally drained yeah of everything you had to get better yeah how did you come back I think it was just slow I think it was a slow I think I wouldn't say that I came back to myself until many years later wow I think I was in a I think it's I think and I don't know if you feel this but I feel it's like a bomb goes off in the house.

52:04A lot of shrapnel gets hit. Families are impacted. People's lives change. You know, mum and dad didn't cope as well with having, you know, so much attention in our regular loving family house, having people project on them or us or, you know. So, you know, a lot of intensity then happened and that intensity then came a lot of being lost and life looking different and me trying to get back to where I was but everything was different and I wasn't the long-haired piano playing girl. You know, it just was very different after that chapter. God, I mean something comes from everything. Yes, yeah. But I think particularly when you're an artist you can draw on every experience that you're going through.

52:56For sure, for sure. I would like to just sort of talk about the changes that happen because obviously you are you and you are where, but you're still only 18, 19. Yes, only 18. This is so young. I think it's one thing to go through a life-changing illness when you're older, but 18 and trying to process that, but also at the same time with this enormous career and responsibility with that. But also all this stuff that's happening to your family, you know, as an adult, you can think, look, it's not my fault. It's just but as a child, did you ever carry any of that and think, oh, if it wasn't for me and being famous and this wouldn't all be happening?

53:42I mean, I definitely felt, you know, of course, I felt a responsibility that my family don't choose the arts or that that comes with public life. But I think that, you know, they never lay that on me. But I would, you know, I do. I think that like, you know, it was it's definitely brings a lot of intensity. It was just that chapter, so beautiful with what the music was doing. What a magical lightning in a bottle. That doesn't happen and I'm so treasure that time. And then life kind of steps in and sometimes it has other plans, you know. So I was doing the best I could. It's very unique. certain senses.

54:41Then there was a lot of sort of pressure that this, this and this, and we're going to do this. And it just wasn't all turning out. It was a very different trajectory. My hair is growing back. I'm trying to, you know, I'm 19 now. You've got a mullet. I've got a mullet. It's the worst haircut in the world. I've lost all fashion sense. My 2004 and 2005 era of clothes are horrendous in every aspect. And, yeah, I think it just all kind of rocked and I got a little bit lost then. But you got back on track. Yes. And more amazing albums. But then I really want to talk about another massive begin again that you had at 34.

55:30Yeah, yeah, yeah, true. Because I've never heard it was like a calcification or something. Yeah, for sure. In your throat. Yep. So I'd been a coach on The Voice for like 10 years. So we did Team Delta one a couple of times just for the record. How much fun was that? So much fun. Surrounded by music, people's dreams coming true. It was amazing. Great. I was going to come over to the UK. I hadn't been here in years. I thought I'm going to do a writing trip. And I had no idea what that psychological report has happened here on this. But I basically, from the radiation, the knock-on effect of what had sort of been around this area.

56:04I've got a very long neck as well. Divina's so it's always causing a bit of problems. So elegant. It's got problems. It's very cheap. My voice, my head. But basically it got a calcium, a buildup of calcium. It's like a little rock, like a stone. And I had gone to the – I was about to get on a plane to head back. I was in L.A. to head back to Sydney. And it basically kind of got infected and blew up. And I got on the plane. Classic Delta. Classic. I'm ill. Yes, get on the plane. That's a great idea. It's a great idea. And I'd gone to the doctor and he, again, stupidly, he was like, do you want me just to try and get it out now?

56:48And I was like, sure, just get it out. Just whatever you have to do, just get it out. And it didn't work. And so then it was obviously open wound on the plane. I landed. I was ill. I was ill. So sick. and went straight to hospital and then tried to get the infection down, et cetera, et cetera, realised we had to get the gland removed. It had basically kind of died, so to speak. It was just going to stay as quite a large sort of round ball, so to speak. So he said, we'll have to remove the salivary gland. I said, okay. We have the operation, goes for a very long time. And my family and Matt and everyone were sort of just went for a little bit longer than expected.

57:40Came out, they had tried to be quite precise, making sure that my tongue and everything was out of the way. Obviously with vocals. But what had happened, my tongue had been maybe clamped or something too strong. And so it had bruised the nerve, which means then the nerve receptors are not talking to the brain. on her number 12 is not talking to the bride. So when I woke up, again, it was a little bit one of those things of, I think this is a little longer, sort of had that feeling, but trying not to. It was my birthday. Was it you? It's June 34. Wow. You woke up on your birthday. Well, I didn't wake up, but I was in the hospital that week.

58:24It was like my birthday week and I couldn't speak yet. And we thought, is it swelling? and I was really, I could, you can hear the foliage. I speak very much like it's kind of like a, like you can't hear, like you can't speak, there's no pronunciation. And then obviously we were walking up and I said to, there's a doctor who took out my tumours as well and I was like, Really? Yeah. And I was like, is everything okay? And he was like, I think so. I think so. Maybe not. I was like, okay. And then we realized it was a nerve damage and so it was a paralysis. The problem with that is you don't know when that will heal.

59:07There's no timeline. Yeah, because nerves can heal for up to 10 years, can't they? Totally. So we didn't know whether this was going to be six months, two months, a year, five years. So the biggest surrender in that was allowing that I don't have control of this at all. There is no control. I'd love to talk to you about that. Because knowing you a little bit from learning about your past, I know that you feel that you can kind of control the part like where you're going. If you work hard, you are committed, you're professional, you're nice to people, you can get what you need and get where you want to go to.

59:49But sometimes your hands get ripped off the steering wheel. But how hard was that for you to realize that you had no control over this whatsoever? Well, I think that it was a really amazing reset. It really was. Like, you know, even just getting back to that silence and listening rather than talking and just getting that clarity of like, you know, I think I'd started to put those little eyelashes on. I'd started to sort of have my little, I just sort of started getting rid of just anything that wasn't, you know, me as in, you know, just like hair pieces of this and this. I just started to sort of be like get back to my very natural authentic authentic self and that chapter was essential to my life again that was like a I can't actually imagine being where I am without that moment that happened so when you decided to go for the reset was that a conscious something good has to come out of this absolutely yeah absolutely I was like okay um obviously it was the more you fought against something like that the more stressful that is because when you can't communicate and you're completely in your body and you're going I can't express myself and I can't like say like I can't talk I can't man it was the it's like the more you do that the more scary it is the worse it is so you'd have to just slowly just really had to learn how to surrender and I think I had held on to a lot still I think I had sort of been hard on myself and you know sort of not you know life and sort of crisscrossing and doing all these you know I've had wonderful amazing chapters nothing I would change to be where I am today but at that time I was still quite hard on myself and I think I had to learn to let go move on to everything you mentioned Matt earlier yes how did you meet Matt Matt came in 2016 or 15 16 16 and just came in to play guitar.

1:02:23He was my guitarist. I was just like, yes. I was like, I have a hot guitarist. I was like, oh, he's a very good-looking guitarist, isn't he? And he says he was so focused because he was so excited to do the job. He'd got a call up. He was like, amazing. I'd love to play for Delta. And he was so prepared and focused on learning the songs. I like you. Yeah, he was so... That's what you'd be like, you know what I mean? He was like not one, total pro. And he genuinely was just himself because he just loved music, really loves music. And we became best friends first. It was without a doubt friendship first.

1:03:04That's so nice. Yeah. And how long have you been together now? I mean, we're still confused if it was seven, eight years. Yeah, but that's a long time, isn't it? Yeah. Delta, I'm going to wrap it up there and just say thank you. Thank you so much. I've got goosebumps. Literally, I'm like, it's been so nice getting to know you. I admire you so much and your resilience and your ability to see the good come out of every dark place, the light, find the light and head towards it. May it be a lot of light for both of us. Yeah. And for all watching. Yeah. Yeah. I love you. I love you.

1:03:52Thank you.