Tessa James insists cancer will not stop her from having children with husband Nate Myles

EXCLUSIVE: Tessa James — who is now in remission from an aggressive form of cancer — says she holds out hope that one day she and husband Nate Myles will be parents.

IT was the heartbreaking decision Tessa James never thought she would have to make: begin treatment to start a family or begin treatment to save her life.

Diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer, the former Home and Away actor knew she could not delay chemotherapy to undergo fertility treatment.

But the 24-year-old — who is now in remission — holds out hope that one day she and husband NRL star Nate Myles will be parents.

“That was a shock for us initially, when that [diagnosis] is happening, and they throw that little curve ball too,” James said.

“So we went and saw a fertility specialist and went through all of that. Previously myself and Nate have been fine to have kids.

“I will be completely honest about it, we’ve had lengthy discussions and if I ever was to go down that road of freezing my eggs, I would basically be doing a round of IVF, and it would be a month or bit longer, and that would have meant I wouldn’t have been able to get treated [straight away].”

Tessa is feeling stronger

Tessa James pictured in LA

Tessa James is now in remission

“My doctor was great and put it in my hands and said; ‘whatever you want to do is fine’. He gave me the statistics and all of that and you know I think at that point, even now, I needed to look after me,” she said.

“I didn’t know if in a month I would have to have 12 months of treatment instead of six, because it was quite fast growing, so we decided to have treatment straight away.”

James was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in September last year and completed chemotherapy in February.

Tessa James and Nate Myles. Sunday Night.

Her father Stephen, who had suffered Non Hodgkins Lymphona in 2012 and went through chemotherapy, was a strength through this. James praised her mother Charis, sister Candy and her husband.

James said cancer shook up her attitude on life.

“Everything happens for a reason and I wasn’t living my life to its full, I wasn’t appreciating what I had.

“I was really hard on myself. I was really down on myself where I felt I should be [in my career]. I really wanted a job in LA and I was really down on myself. As much as I was a positive person,” she said.

“Looking back I used to think about a lot of things I didn’t have, it stopped me in my tracks. I think I needed to be stopped.”

James said she has now opened her mind to other parts of the acting world would like to do theatre again and film.

“I am still really determined to work ... I want to do a vast variety of things in Australia, LA and all around the world but I just want to work with great actors, I want to learn and be inspired ... that’s where I have changed, I am not so set on a certain thing. I just want to get better and work, in whatever form that might be.

“But if that doesn’t happen, it’s not the end of the world, I don’t need to be down on myself.

James admits the blackest days during her cancer treatment left her depressed and feeling utterly hopeless about her life, admitting at her worst she felt she “didn’t want to be here anymore”.

James said by the third round of chemotherapy last October she felt despondent.

Tessa James while vivisting Londoon, England with husband Nate Myles.

“I was a clean eating, healthy person, I’d never experienced that amount of drugs in my body ... the drugs were making me depressed and anxious,” she said.

“I would lie on the floor, on the ground, because that’s where I felt good ... I remember calling my dad saying; ‘I can’t do this anymore, I don’t know how I am going to get through this’.

“I was now in this vicious state of depression where I couldn’t see the end. I had 12 rounds and I was on the third.

“That’s when it hit [the reality of cancer]. But you need to hit that, to get through ...,” she said.

Tessa’s story airs tonight on Sunday Night at 7:00 on Seven.