Tina Knowles surprised the Beyhive in a recent interview when she revealed that she was previously diagnosed with breast cancer. In a clip of an interview scheduled to air on April 23, Knowles opened up to Gayle King about the moment the doctors discovered two tumors in her breasts, one that was benign and another that was cancerous.
“I’ve always tried to take care of myself. I just … was in disbelief,” Knowles said, getting emotional. “It was stage one, which I thought was the earliest stage. And then when I told my sister she said, ‘No, actually there’s a zero.’”
According to the American Cancer Society, women over the age of 55 should receive mammograms every one to two years. However, Knowles explained that she missed her routine screening in 2020 due to the pandemic and didn’t reschedule it until last year.
“If I had gone for my mammogram, I would have got it at the zero stage,” she continued. “Thank God it was still very small and hadn’t spread. It was a very slow-spreading cancer.”
In August, Knowles decided to have a lumpectomy to remove the tumor from her left breast.
Ahead of the procedure, she was supported by her daughters, Beyoncé and Solange, and her niece, Angie Beyincé, who stayed by her side at the hospital, easing her nerves with laughter and TikTok videos.
“I was nervous,” Knowles said. “And so they started just joking with me. I start laughing. I get out of my head. … Then I said, ‘I’m just so happy that y’all are here.’ And I thought about the song ‘Walk With Me,’ which they used to sing all the time.”
Before surgery, Solange and Angie sang the song to her. “It’s about God walking with you into something and protecting you,” Knowles said, tearfully. “And I went in there feeling just like God has got me.”
But the journey didn’t end there. Weeks later, she nearly missed Glamour’s 2024 “Women of the Year” ceremony after a post-surgical infection left her weak. Her family, especially Beyoncé, stepped in to discourage her from going.
“Mama, you’re not yourself,” Knowles recalls the superstar telling her, “Your health is more important. Don’t go.”
However, Knowles’ decision to attend was intentional. “A lot of my life, I just refused to be recognized,” she said. “I would never take an award. I would never want the attention … and this was me saying, ‘I deserve this.’”
Standing in that room, she spoke not just as a survivor, but as a mother, a woman, a force.
During her speech, Knowles acknowledged the support of her daughters. “That’s why when I said, you know, with them, I could get through anything, nobody knew what I was talking about,” she said.
