James Van Der Beek is reflecting on the hardest year of his life.
On his 48th birthday, the Dawson’s Creek alum spoke out about how his battle with stage 3 colorectal cancer, which he first revealed last year, has affected his marriage to Kimberly Van Der Beek as well as the lives of their six kids—Olivia, 14, Joshua, 13, Annabel, 11, Emilia, 8, Gwendolyn, 6, Jeremiah, 2.
“Today’s my birthday, and it has been the hardest year of my life,” James said in a selfie video shared on his Instagram March 8. “When I was younger, I used to define myself as an actor, right Which was never really all that fulfilling. And then I became a husband, and that was much better. And then I became a father, and that was the ultimate.”
The Varsity Blues star, who married Kimberly in 2010, continued, “I could define myself then as a loving, capable, strong, supportive husband, father, provider, steward of the land that we’re so lucky to live on. And for a long time, that felt like a really good definition to the question, ‘Who am I? What am I?’ And then this year, I had to look my own mortality in the eye.”