My name is Janet Jones. I am Euvon Jones' wife. We met when he was in a band, and I was in an acapella group. I went to Morgan State University, majoring in English literature.
I was also in the choir in the band, and in the choir, there were three of us who decided to form an acapella group. Sometimes we sang at different events, we would need a keyboard player. There was a gentleman in the choir who also played keyboard, so he would go around with us.
Ironically, he was also a band member with my husband. And one day they were writing songs and they needed some background vocals. Our friend asked my group to come and do the background vocals for their music, which we did.
And that's where I met my husband. He was a bass player. He was tall, dark, and handsome. And I immediately fell in a like kind of relationship with him. But the relationship evolved into a romantic aspect. And three years later, we got married. We moved to California and we became Christians at that point. We started doing praise and worship in our church. So, we left the secular music and we transferred into Christian music.
We relocated back to Baltimore, Maryland, settled in Prince George's County, had a pretty good life. We were just constantly traveling, constantly settling here and there. He was working in the sheet metal industry while I took care of the children.
Our children were involved in a lot of athletics. They were involved in the arts. So I did a lot of carpooling, a lot of going to games, a lot of going to recitals. And it was a busy life. So, I didn't have time to establish a career outside of the home. But he spent a lot of time outside of the home.
So, we made an agreement. He brings home the bacon. I fry. And that was our life.
One day, Euvon was preparing to go to work and I noticed that he was limping a little. It was a very slight, almost unnoticeable limp. It alarmed me a little, but because he was not alarmed, nor did he take notice of it, I played it off.
And months went by and that limp got stronger and stronger and more noticeable. So, I suggested to him, because I had an orthopedic surgeon because I had arthritis in my knees, I suggested to him that he see my orthopedic surgeon. And it took a while to convince him to do that, but when he finally did, the orthopedic surgeon originally diagnosed him with hip arthritis and he gave him some ibuprofen, which he took.
And once that prescription wore off, before he could renew the prescription, I asked him to just hold off and see how he felt and see if it had helped his hip. Well, in a couple of weeks, the pain was excruciating. He could just not move.
And we took a vacation. We decided to take a vacation because it was still hard for him to go back to the doctor. And that's when he got into a pool, because he started feeling a little better, but enough to get into the pool and had this little contest with this nine-year-old kid, which I thought, okay, you're 59, he's nine. That doesn't make a lot of sense, but he did it anyway.
And when we got home, he was in so much pain. I felt sorry for him. So I said, "You have got to go back to the doctor and get that prescription." We went to the doctor and they sent him for an MRI and that day he was going to get the MRI on the way home from work.
I, on the other hand, was preparing to go to my college gala because it was homecoming weekend. And I was getting all dolled up to go to this gala where he was going to the MRI and because he was on his own a lot, he was very independent. He called me from the MRI, and he asked me to look up multiple myeloma.
Multiple myeloma, my brain said cancer. And I could not get myself together. And I said, "Do you know what multiple myeloma is? " He said, "Well, I think it may be some kind of illness, but I have to see this oncologist." I'm like, "Oncologist? Okay."
And so when he hung up, I could not get myself together. I knew then that the gala was off. I needed to look up multiple myeloma, and in the process, I was just in tears. I could not believe that this strong husband had cancer. And so we went to this small clinic, the oncologist ran some tests and she confirmed, "Good news: It's not multiple myeloma, bad news: It is stage 4 prostate cancer."
I lost my breath. I felt like we had gotten shot because now we're Christians. We love the Lord. How in the world did you let us miss stages 1, 2, and 3? We clocked in at stage 4.
And she wanted to do a biopsy and it was in a small office. So, we needed to caucus. We needed to gather our thoughts. We needed to come to terms with, this is cancer. This is stage 4. She wants to do a biopsy in this office.
No, this hospital that you work with is your client. It needs to become your caregiver. So, we let her know we're going to get another opinion. So, we went to Dr. Dawson's office and she did the biopsy, and confirmed that it was stage 4 that had metastasized to his lymph nodes and his bones.
I choked. How long does he have? She would not give us a timetable. And because she didn't, what she did inform us was he's not going to live long, so we're not going to do chemo, radiation, or surgery. It will destroy his quality of life.
She did a digital, a rectal. I left the room while she did the rectal. But 30 seconds later, I came back in the office, and she let me know and let us know that his prostate was so bad she wasn't even going to remove it. No cutting. She said, "Any cut will destroy him." And so that's when she recommended the hormone therapy.
I, on the other hand, did not have time to figure out how long he had. I had to figure out how he would live. And so I began to research prostate cancer and cancer in general and what caused prostate cancer. That was my therapy.
That kept me from going into a deep depression because I could see him losing weight. I could see him not eating. He had a hearty appetite and it was gone. There was nothing that I could fix for him or prepare for him that satisfied him.
He had no appetite and he chalked it up to, "I need to diet. I need to lose weight." "Well, you've lost 50 pounds, so I think that's enough." So I researched everything I could to find out how to help him while he was still living.
And I came alongside with Dr. Dawson. Everything I wanted to do, I checked with her and she gave me the okay. So, I changed our diet. I went to farmer's markets and to all organic places, got organic foods. And I looked up in research foods that didn't have to be organic, those that needed to be. And we came down to a very, very strict diet, which almost caused us to have a fist fight spiritually because, "I want my steak, I want my potato, and I want a salad."
And I said, "Okay, once in a while, grass fed organic, doesn't taste like the good stuff," but that was the deal. And so we finally, I got him involved in helping prepare the meals. Just you add things that you like, getting some herbs and spices. So, he started accompanying me to farmer's markets and different places where we could come alongside of each other and get him involved. And that helped him understand the importance of changing diets.
I also changed our environment, our home environment. We picked up, I went on my knees and tore up the carpets and he was able to, while he was doing the hormone therapy, while he was doing the hormone therapy, he would also on his days off start laying down the flooring. So, that kept him involved in the process. And we were hoping that it would give him some quality of life.
So, I also got rid of all of our cleaning products, hygiene products, replaced it with my own products. I mixed vodka with white vinegar and a little bit of soap. That became our go to for our dishes, for our countertops, floors, everything. I changed, we got biodegradable clothes detergent, organic soaps. I made our own deodorant. I made our toothpaste. Everything was organic or natural.
And so today, the only thing we use is olive oil, coconut oil, shea butter, cocoa butter - that's our go to regimen. I looked up every ingredient that was on our food labels, everything. I researched everything.
And I started chronicling it. I started writing things down because I realized in the process during my research that few men could even pronounce their own organ. They would call it a prostrate. And I'm like, okay, so now we're going to go prostrate for the prostate.
So, I'm educating other men and researching different foods. I looked up even seafood, the mercury levels in seafood, what was good, what was bad, ocean farming, meats, grass-fed, vegetables, berries, fruits, what had to be organic, what didn't have to be, but it kept me busy and it kept me informed. And it was a part of what I felt was an emotional healing process.
And so we got used to that kind of living and I chronicled it because in the back of my mind, I still believed he didn't have a long life, and I believe we were going to have some very high medical bills. So I thought, I'll write this book, I'll put on a nice short skirt, and I'll go to barbershops. And I'll tell all the guys, "My husband's got stage 4 prostate cancer, and I need you guys to buy this book so I could help my husband with these medical bills."
But God took it in another direction. The research, the book, someone heard about the book and said, "Let's go do a book signing." And I'm like, "A book signing, no barbershop?" And they said, "Let's do a book signing."
And so, I decided to do the book signing. Then we decided to take it to a church and then we decided let's just go to some churches and talk about prostate cancer, because we realized in the process that men just don't deal with prostate cancer. Women, it's all over the world. Breast cancer month is October. Men didn't know that prostate cancer month in September.
So, we just said, "Let's just go out and talk about it." Forget about the medical bills because in the process, our medical bills weren't coming in because we had such great insurance that we didn't know we had because nobody was getting a checkup. So, we didn't realize that our insurance was taking care of a lot of our medical bills. So, we were free to just go out and give away the books and those who could afford it, purchase a book. If you couldn't, you had someone who had prostate cancer.
And there were so many women whose husbands or fathers had prostate cancer and wouldn't talk about it. They would sneak around and say, "Can you put the book in a bag? And I'll just read it on my own."
I have an uncle who had prostate cancer. He went five years to radiation without telling his wife or children. He drove himself to get radiation treatments. And when Euvon was diagnosed, we decided we were going to talk about it. Women talk about breast cancer, you're going to talk about your prostate cancer, which we did. And that's when my uncle said, "Well, you know I have prostate cancer." Really? He's had it for years.
And he finally told his wife, she was distraught because he was going out every week to get a radiation treatment. And once Euvon told him, he began to talk about it. And he passed away three years later from prostate cancer. He refused to take some of the medications, some of the hormone therapy that Euvon was taking. He refused the Lupron shot and his body wore down because of that. But he was in his 80s, and he felt he had lived a good life and he was ready.
But we realized too that because men don't talk about it, they don't want to get checkups. And so I've been telling these men, a rectal checkup is 60 seconds. A woman's checkup is 20 minutes with a team with construction tools with one leg on the East Coast, the other leg's on the West Coast, and you got these construction crews snipping away at your little cervix. And it's a 20-minute job. Go ahead and get your 60 seconds because it's worth your life.
You can build bridges, you can build buildings, but you don't want to get a rectal? For me, it's almost laughable, but it's sad because we need our men. We need our men to be strong, to be healthy, to do their job because we have our jobs to do.
And I'm proud to say that I don't mind being a caregiver. I was put here to take care of my children, my community, my husband. I had to take care of my dad when he was sick. So, my job was as a caregiver, and it kept me hopeful. It kept me focused, and it kept me determined to come to a positive conclusion.
My biggest support of Euvon while he was getting treatments was really just being on the home front because he was still able to go to work. He was still able to work full-time. A lot of his treatments he would have before he went to work. Even with the immunotherapy, when we were introduced to the immunotherapy, it was because the hormone therapy stopped working.
And so his oncologist offered this clinical trial and because we had nothing to lose, we said okay. And with the clinical trial, he was still able to get the infusion, to get the extraction from his blood cells and go to work. So, I'd be on the home front preparing meals for him because he would come home hungry. The hormone therapy really elevated his appetite. So, he had a ferocious appetite. So, I was preparing his meals, still looking after children, looking after grandchildren. And so I really didn't have a lot of input with the hormone therapy after the initial process. He was still able to do it on his own.
And it helped me understand that I didn't understand what was going on, because he wasn't supposed to be here, but he's still here and he's still working and he's still feeling good. And so I didn't feel that I needed to coddle him. I just needed him to be himself, and I needed to be prepared when the time came that he couldn't be himself. That has yet to come. So, I'm thankful for that.
I have gotten involved with some support groups and I encourage any caregiver to get involved in some support groups. Take time for yourself. If you don't take care of yourself, you're not going to be able to take care of your spouse, your loved one.
So the main goal, take care of yourself first because you're going to need the strength. Everybody's different. Everybody's story's different. Some men are in more of a desperate state than my husband was. So, you really have to strengthen yourself, be prepared, take time for yourself, do what you can afford to do.
Even if it's just reading a book, writing, go back to some of your old hobbies, take up something that's going to satisfy you, find out what your loved one wants to do or what they love to do, and combine the two. Even if it's a short walk, go to a movie, watch comedies. Comedies are the ticket. My husband and I, we're like, we watch them. We turn on comedies and we can just laugh.
And a lot of times we go dancing. Even when he wasn't feeling good, we could stay in this living room and turn on some music and just dance. Even just for as long as we can, even if it was just five minutes.
And he had digestive issues. And so I started giving him red wine, and it helped with his digestive issues along with peppermint tea and some other teas. But now, we could enjoy a glass of wine together and we could dance and watch comedies and eat little small snacks. And that was our time together.
And so I've always encouraged caregivers, take that time, but also communicate with your loved one so that they don't go to a place where you can't find them. Communication is key and being patient is key and understanding your loved one.
My husband and I both are the kind of people who will speak and talk at the same time. So, I didn't have a problem with him getting him to communicate. I didn't have that issue, but some people, some women have an issue with their loved one talking.
So, you have to find ways to encourage him to talk about how he's feeling physically so that you can help him, how he's feeling emotionally so that you can understand, how he's feeling spiritually so you know how to pray or meditate. Because this is a family effort for healing. It's a family effort.
It's not an individual disease. It impacts your entire household and it can impact your whole community, your extended family, your neighbors, your friendship, your circle, your tribe. It's all impacted. And so communication is key.
Hope is key. And when you get involved in some of your personal lives, some of the things that you've enjoyed from the beginning when you were young, I took up sewing again. Euvon bought me a violin. I used to play. I was playing it in my heart, and he got me this keyboard. I play it in my mind.
But I look at it and I'm saying, "I have hope that I'm going to hit those keys one day." And I have hope that I'm going to play that violin again one day, but I have hope and that is the key. Do the things that are going to give you guys some hope. Even in the midst of darkness, you have to see some light, even if you can't see it, you have to see it.
The purpose of the book, which I decided to turn into a memoir called The Trial of Stage IV Prostate Cancer, the purpose of the book was to inform families of what prostate cancer looks like, because there's so many books out there about breast cancer and different illnesses and different mental issues, physical issues, and there was very little about prostate cancer. So, I wanted to not only to help us financially, but I also wanted to help families emotionally discover what that looks like, what their options can be. We don't always need to rush to being cut. There are other things that we can do.
The most important thing also is to find a good hospital, find a good doctor. And if you're not satisfied, run for the hills. Find out if your doctor knows about immunotherapy, clinical trials. And that was one of the main purposes of the trial, because the trial was not only an emotional trial, we were involved in a clinical trial.
And they were involved in a trial of just pursuing hope in the midst of the storm. And so it just made me pour out our life as raw as I could to help people understand that it's okay to talk about prostate cancer. It's okay to understand that you can survive prostate cancer. It's okay that it doesn't take your manhood. It's okay to understand that you're still you.
There are options that are not in the book that I'm going to be continuing to write about, specifically about the intimacy that is still available, that with all these new information that's out there now for men that they're afraid to investigate and find out about that's available for them. Because there are some young men who are dealing with prostate cancer, they're old men, but the young men is harder because they're threatened, their spouses are threatened.
And what happens with our intimacy? There's hope in that as well, but you've got to study and that's what the book is also about. Studying, being informed, lack of knowledge is a key to a short life. So, if you want to pursue a positive outcome, even if it's in a life-death situation, it can still be a win-win situation.
The thing about this book is that we bore our hearts out. We laid a lot on the line about the before, the during, and the somewhat after. And a lot of people that we have talked to who have read the book have just really been appreciative of the honesty of us bearing our heart out and not sugarcoating the severity of the issue of prostate cancer, what can happen in the process, what that process looks like.
What has resonated too is the fact that it has given them hope, especially the women, that they can encourage their husbands or their fathers or their brother, read this book and see what this man has gone through and try it. And so that's been the most important thing, just how people have felt when they've read it. It's got some quirkiness in it, but it's also got some rawness to it.
And it also has some of the importance of what it takes to get the treatment that you have to get, however painful, however excruciating. This book showed our tears, it showed our joy, it showed some of our wartime fairs against each other, but it also showed us coming together because we knew that if we can fight this hard at each other, what a team we could make fighting together for this very formidable foe.