Mark Ruffalo opens up about decision to keep brain tumor ‘size of a golf ball’ secret from wife

Mark Ruffalo has opened up about finding out he had a brain tumor and having to tell his wife.

In 2000, the Poor Things actor had a 'crazy' dream he was diagnosed with a brain tumor and shortly after, that dream became a reality.

The 56-year-old has since spoken out about his diagnosis and having to tell his wife, Sunrise Coigney.

Earlier this week, in Monday's (22 January) episode of Smartless podcast, Ruffalo sat down with Jason Bateman, Sean Haynes and Will Arnett to open up about the diagnosis and how it impacted him and his family.

In the podcast episode, Ruffalo explains he was diagnosed with the brain tumor after the 'success of You Can Count on Me', and after having a dream which 'wasn't like any other dream' he'd 'ever had'.

"It was just like, 'You have a brain tumor.' It wasn't even a voice. It was just pure knowledge, 'You have a brain tumor, and you have to deal with it immediately,'" the actor says.

The 'sense of doom' the dream instilled in him led to the actor going to see a doctor who booked in him for a scan.

Ruffalo explains he could 'hear' the nurse and doctor talking in another room and the nurse looked 'kinda like a zombie' when she informed him of the 'golf ball sized' mass they discovered.

Ruffalo was diagnosed with a benign brain tumor over 20 years ago.

Getty Images/ Tiziana Fabi/ AFP

Thankfully, the tumor was benign and Ruffalo was told it was operable. However, it didn't take away from the risks of the surgery and Ruffalo's dread to tell his wife the news.

"I couldn't tell Sunny. She had the birth plan, she did the yoga, she had the doula," he says.

The actor ultimately held off telling his wife until after she'd given birth to their first born, Keen, the actor noting he only told her the night before his appointment to 'meet the neurologist'.

"When I told Sunny about it, first she thought I was joking. And then she just burst into tears and said, 'I always knew you were gonna die young,'" he recalls.

Ruffalo now has three children.

Getty Images/ Gilbert Carrasquillo/ FilmMagic

Ruffalo was told the surgery carried a 70 percent chance of him losing his hearing in his left ear, and 20 percent chance of 'nicking' the nerve in the left side of his face and 'killing it'.

When the actor woke up from the operation, the left side of his face was 'totally paralysed', and while the movement in his face has since recovered, he has been left 'completely deaf in one ear'.

However, Ruffalo resolves his hearing being 'taken' is something he can live with, given he was able to 'keep the face' and 'be [a] father to [his] kids'.