Coleen Nolan fears sister Linda will 'give up' as she shares cancer battle heartache

Coleen Nolan has shared that her sister, Linda Nolan, is bravely facing breast cancer without wanting to know her prognosis, as the disease has also spread to her brain, bones, and liver.

The 59-year-old former member of The Nolans opened up about her family's struggles following Sir Chris Hoy's announcement that his cancer is terminal. Having experienced the loss of another sister, Bernie Nolan, to breast cancer in 2013, Coleen empathises deeply with the Hoy family's current ordeal.

During Tuesday's (October 22) episode of Loose Women, Coleen expressed her understanding of the emotions Sir Chris and his loved ones might be grappling with.

She then spoke candidly about her sister Linda's daily fight against cancer, telling the panel, audience, and viewers: "I know my sister Linda at the moment, who's been amazing and is still amazing, I'm in awe of her every day."

Coleen continued, revealing Linda's perspective on her illness: "But I know, for her, one of the things she doesn't want to know is how long she's got left. Because she feels that once she's given that prognosis that it would probably make her just give up trying to live," reports the Mirror.

With great emotion, Coleen added that Linda is currently undergoing treatment, which is giving her the strength to carry on: "At the moment, she's still having treatment and that's what's keeping her going you know, 'as long as they're still going to treat me then I'm going to keep on going'."

Despite Linda's positive outlook and ongoing treatment, Coleen has observed moments recently where she sensed her sister might have contemplated "not being here" anymore.

She elaborated: "But she does say more often than not now, she'll say things like 'well no, let's do that this week because I might not be here next week'. Or she'll say she's now doing more because she's 'living each day like it might be my last day' and 'I might not have tomorrow' so that mindset has changed."

Coleen, along with her well-known family, has faced numerous cancer scares and personal struggles - the ITV star herself previously applied cream for skin cancer, and her other sister Anne is also now free from cancer.

In spite of the havoc wreaked by the illness on her and her relatives, she remains "shocked" when hearing about others affected by cancer - especially Sir Chris Hoy who she described as "fit" and "athletic".

Speaking to the panel, she said on the subject: "I was still shocked to learn about Chris, you know he is such a fit and athletic man that you just don't think this can happen."

Loose Women airs weekdays on ITV1, from 12:30pm.