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Ray Romano is opening up about something his family has kept private for two years: his wife Anna's battle with breast cancer. In the new issue of People, the Everybody Loves Raymond star reveals that his wife of 24 years learned she had stage-one invasive breast cancer after a mammogram and biopsy in February 2010.
"The reason we're going public is to share our experience, yeah, but to have an effect," says Romano, 54. "We dodged a bullet. Now we want to give back."
Though Anna, 48, has made a full recovery, it wasn't an easy road. Ray's wife went through four rounds of chemotherapy, during which she lost her hair. Even harder than her treatment was balancing it with being a mom to four children: Ally, 21, twins Greg and Matt, 19, and Joe, 14.
"I take on everybody's stress, but this had to be all about me," she told People. "I'm not like that!"
Now, like her fellow breast cancer survivor Giuliana Rancic, Anna is hoping to use her story to help and inspire other women.
"Our goal is to help people," says Romano, who recently starred on TNT's Men of a Certain Age.
Ray and Anna, the inspiration for Patricia Heaton's Everybody Loves Raymond character, met in 1984 when they were both working as bank tellers. In a 2009 interview with Redbook, Ray praised Anna for keeping him grounded.
"She does all the real-life stuff that counts -- making sure the kids are going to school and all that," said the actor. "I married a saint -- well, a saint who curses."
