Goody keeping children out of cancer battle

Jade Goody said today she has kept the truth about her odds of surviving cervical cancer from her two sons to protect them.

Doctors have given the 27-year-old former 'Big Brother' contestant a 40% chance of beating the disease.

Goody told the News of the World: “My boys don’t know how sick I am. They obviously know that something is not right with Mummy because I’m bald. And they call me baldy.

“...I’m not going to prepare a five and a four-year-old that their mummy might not be here. I’m just not going to do that.”

She revealed her fears for the future in an extensive interview with journalist Carole Malone, who was a fellow contestant on 'Celebrity Big Brother' in 2007 when a race row erupted over Goody’s treatment of Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty.

The star described her devastation at losing her hair following chemotherapy treatment, saying she was “fighting for her femininity”, and adding: “even though I’ve got a disease that could kill me, I still want to look pretty.”

Saying she was tired of hiding her baldness under scarves and hats, Goody posed for the newspaper with her head uncovered.

“My whole life I’ve had to laugh at myself before other people do. I’ve had to deal with stuff that other people have never had to deal with. It’s better that I say bad things about me before others do,” she said.

“And that’s why I’m doing this now. I know people will say, ’Why is she whacking her bald head out in a newspaper?’

“There’s going to come a time soon when I take off my headscarf and I don’t want to walk into Tesco’s or wherever and have people staring at me with their mouths open.

“And yes, maybe it’s easier for me to do something like this because I’ve lived my life in the public eye. It’s what I do. But I actually am sensitive. I am human and I want to get this over with.”

Goody was taking part in the Indian version of 'Big Brother' last year when she discovered she had cervical cancer.

She jetted home after show producers called her to the Diary Room to break the devastating news.

She had to undergo a hysterectomy after learning that the cancer had spread to her womb.