James Van Der BeekHe opens up about the symptoms he experienced that made a routine colonoscopy even more crucial – even life-saving – last August, when he was stunned to learn he had colorectal cancer of stage 3.

“It was just a change in bowel habits,” he told PEOPLE for this week’s cover story. “I figured I should probably change my diet a little bit. Maybe I should quit coffee. Maybe I shouldn’t put cream in coffee. And then I finally took that out of the coffee. ‘feed, and it didn’t get any better, and I thought, okay, I better go get that checked out.’

When he showed up for the procedure, he said he wasn’t worried.

“I felt really, really good as I came out of the anesthesia and finally got it done and looked into it,” he says. “And as I emerged from the haze, the gastroenterologist told me – in his most pleasant bedside manner – that he East cancer.”

The 47-year-old actor says he was in shock.

“I’m very healthy,” he says. “I was in incredible cardiovascular shape. I tried to eat healthy as much as I could, based on what I knew at the time. But since then, I’ve learned a lot about what healthy eating actually is .”

Van Der Beek says the next step in his life was his new “full-time job” dealing with cancer: scheduling appointments, dealing with insurance, cataloging results. But he also learned gradually how he could and should change his diet.

“I think the country is starting to connect with our food and recognize how much it is processed and how far it strays from what nature intended,” he says, being mindful of reading the labels and examining what goes into the food. the food he buys at the store.

“I encourage everyone to do the same, because it’s not a fun process,” he says of managing colorectal cancer. “There are a lot of assumptions, I think, that we all grew up with about what’s healthy and what’s not healthy. And I think it would do us good to let go of those assumptions.”

Van Der Beek says he is currently feeling “good”.

“I’m cautiously optimistic,” he says now. “I’m in a healing place, my energy levels are great.”

Her current routine involves avoiding processed foods, gluten and dairy, eating organic vegetables from her garden and exercising regularly. He learned to prioritize his mental health. “Sometimes you have to break down,” he said. “But I have a lot more self-love and self-acceptance now…I had no idea how negative my self-talk was before this.”

As for his future plans? He says he will be there. “But it will be a lighter existence, with a much more immediate joy,” says Van Der Beek. He’s enjoying being back at work, including an appearance in The real full Montya Dec. 9 special on Fox in which celebrities will strip to raise money for cancer testing and research.

In a way, he is happy that he now has the opportunity to change his lifestyle.

“I really don’t feel like this is going to be the end of me,” he says. “I really feel like this is going to be the biggest reorientation of my life, and I’m going to make changes that I never would have made otherwise. That I’m going to come back to in a year or five years, 30 years. from now on and say, “Thank God it happened.”