Euvon Jones:
When I first started feeling bad, I couldn't put my finger on it, but I had pain in my hip. And I didn't understand what that pain was. And I've since heard that people say you can have phantom pain that can move around, but that pain in my hip, I thought it was something orthopedic. And Janet informed me that maybe I need to go and see the orthopedic surgeon who evaluated me, gave me some ibuprofen over the counter, masked the pain, and I felt a little bit better. And so I couldn't put my finger on it.
Janet Jones:
Right. I was more aware of what you were going through than you were aware. I was more aware of what your body was doing than you were aware of your own body. And sometimes it takes two to notice something that's out of order. So I'm just glad we were close enough and not angry at each other enough that I could have let you go through that limp all by yourself, with no help.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah. And I'm glad you did. I'm glad you didn't let me go through that limp because I was definitely limping and I was in denial.
Janet Jones:
And the more it progressed, the more fearful I became that it was something really serious.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah.
Janet Jones:
And then I remember the night that you were preparing to go to work and I was asleep, but you dropped your hairbrush and you turned on the light and you seemed like you were 50 pounds. You looked so small. And I'd never seen you wake up at 3:00 in the morning. I would always be asleep, so I never saw you dress or anything.
But that morning, I sat up and said, "What in the world is going on? You have lost a lot of weight." And then you turned on the big light and you said, "Well, I thought I was trying to diet, but I wasn't trying to diet that much." So it was time for you to go back to the doctor. And thankfully, that's what you did more so in a hurry than you did the first time.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah. That's quite true. I wasn't a doctor focused person. I went 59 years and never went in for my checkups, never got screened, never did all of the rudimentary things that are necessary for at least annual physicals, the whole spiel. And I didn't spend a lot of time on maintenance for myself. I was always focused on making sure our business was going, focusing on the business.
Janet Jones:
Actually, it was his orthopedic surgeon's decision to send him to an oncologist, to send him to an MRI, to get an MRI. And once he received the MRI, the technician noticed something that was alarming. And he told Euvon to take the x-rays back to his doctor, the orthopedic surgeon said, "You need to see an oncologist." And that was the darkest day.
And I'm getting ready to go to my college homecoming reunion gala and I'm dressed. I've got my gown on, my makeup going. And he calls and says, "Can you look up multiple myeloma?" And I'm like, "Why?" And he said, "The doctor said I may have multiple myeloma." And my mind said, "That sounds like a cancer."
And then when he said, "I'm on my way to see an oncologist before I come home." And then I said to myself, "This is cancer." And my mind went all over the place. I took off my dress, wiped off my makeup and I just started crying and I went online and I read up on multiple myeloma and I was absolutely devastated. But when he came home, we act like nothing ever happened.
Euvon Jones:
It's almost like somebody dropped a bomb in the middle of the room and it was so hard to wrap our brains around it. We were both in denial of this cannot be what we think it is. And it's almost like you go into a place of, maybe if I don't talk about it, maybe it doesn't exist.
Janet Jones:
Or maybe they were wrong.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah.
Janet Jones:
The test shows that it's not multiple myeloma, but it is a great possibility of stage 4 metastatic prostate cancer, but we need to confirm with the biopsy. That's when it hit. He has cancer and not only does he have cancer, it has clocked in at stage 4. So then when he says, "Well, how many stages are there?" I'm like, "Sir, you pretty much stop the stage 4." And that reality, we were doing just like this.
Euvon Jones:
It's surreal. It's just surreal.
Janet Jones:
Time stopped.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah. Yeah.
Janet Jones:
Life took a break.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah. People ask you what you feel and you don't feel anything. It's like this big vacuum comes in the midst of your life and it just sucks all the oxygen out of the room, sucks all the feeling out of the room. You can't wrap your brain around it. You don't understand it.
One thing led to another, and as the administrators came in line, they suggested that you go see Dr. Nancy Dawson. And I went in for the biopsy, came back out and she confirmed the stage 4 metastatic prostate cancer, PSA 398.
Janet Jones:
So I felt like this is really bad. If you don't want to tell us, this is really, really bad. But she still gave us the confidence that her personality was such that we felt comfortable enough to stay with her and to let her do her job, as well as understanding too, that she specialized in stage 4.
We knew that she was the one. She was very direct, but she was also comforting and positive that she was going to do what she could to help him have a good quality of life. And that was important to us.
Euvon Jones:
Dr. Dawson explained to us what was available after she gave... She spoke right from the hip. She did not mince her words. She gave the bad news first, and then she gave the good news and the good news that we acclimated towards was a hormone therapy that would work against the things that caused prostate cancer, such as sugar and testosterone.
Janet Jones:
High heat.
Euvon Jones:
Yeah.
Janet Jones:
High heat, cook it, can cause it as well.
Euvon Jones:
And so basically when she put me on that first ADT, androgen deprivation therapy, ADT, it took that PSA and it started to bring it down. And unfortunately, it didn't stay down long, but we kept going with the protocol that I was on. And I also got a shot every three months, which I still get.
And once it got low enough, it started to make a difference. And I could dare say before we went to the next stage of the application of the therapies that we did, my PSA came down from 398 down to two, but then once it hit two, it started rising back up and that scared us.
Janet Jones:
Yeah. But I felt pretty comfortable because it wasn't a chemotherapy or a radiation therapy. It was just hormone. So for me, I felt it sounded easy. It sounded like this is an easy procedure that he can get through. And she informed us that the biggest side effect would be an increased appetite, which it did, but he would also be able to gain some of his weight back. So I was pleased that there was already some type of positivity involved.
Euvon Jones:
The immunotherapy piece came after the first protocol, the drug that I was taking to stop working. And that's when my PSA started to rise. When it started to rise, Dr. Dawson said, "Don't worry, I got a lot of tricks up my sleeve."
And it was good timing because the immunotherapy I went on just got FDA approved after initial clinical trials in 2010. So to make that decision to go on immunotherapy came from Dr. Dawson giving us information, letting us read, understand it, make sense of it.
And I'll be honest with you, because I was not a candidate once again for chemo, radiation or surgery, not just I didn't get it, I wasn't a candidate. I was so far gone. So when she told me of something and Janet and I talked about it, something that can help your blood, restrengthen your body, come back in, refuse and reboot your immune system so you can fight this thing, made all the sense in the world.
Janet Jones:
We have nothing to lose to try this clinical trial. We didn't know a lot about the term clinical trial. We just knew that whenever it was mentioned, it was like a bad word, a bad phrase.
So for us, we just felt like either he's going to live or he's going to not live, which was the diagnosis anyway. So we said, "Let's go for it."
Janet Jones:
This is the memoir that I wrote that talks about our prostate cancer journey.
Euvon Jones:
Yes.
Janet Jones:
And hopefully this book will help someone else-
Euvon Jones:
Yes, hopefully.
Janet Jones:
...who's going through the same thing that my husband went through and that I had to endure.
Euvon Jones:
Had to endure.
Janet Jones:
Very much.
Euvon Jones:
You did endure.
Janet Jones:
Yes, endure the trauma. And one of our wonderful cousins did our photo and one of our neighbors did the whole cover back and forward, a little 20-year-old who helped me to just go through this and do everything he needed to do.
Euvon Jones:
Dr. Dawson.
Janet Jones:
Then Dr. Dawson wrote this excerpt here.
Euvon Jones:
Your notes.
Janet Jones:
And our oncologist wrote the foreword to the book. And I was so appreciative that someone of her standing felt, as quoting her, "I would be honored to write your foreword." And it wasn't something I asked her to do. It was something that she volunteered to do. So we are very, very thankful and grateful for all that she's done not only as far as helping me with this, but helping him live. And so that's been a double blessing for me. And I hope this is a blessing for whoever decides to purchase this book on Amazon and be blessed by it, or at least be helped by it and learn something from it.
The advice I would give to patients and caregivers is to always attack prostate cancer from the position of hope, always understand that you are in a win-win situation. We never lose a battle. We always win. Even when we're not here, the cancer dies, with or without us, the cancer dies.
So we operate and we live with hope and hope makes us proactive. Hope gives us purpose even through the pain and understand that there's a purpose in our pain. It makes us stronger. It helps us persevere and it helps us focus and concentrate on what can be living, living to see another grand baby, living to get married, living to see someone graduate from college or high school. Living is the key. Not waiting to die, but continuing to live.
Euvon Jones:
We're going to celebrate life.
Janet Jones:
Amen.
Euvon Jones:
That's what we're going to do. We're going to celebrate life because life is so good, no matter where you are in that juncture and to help it be good, understand that as much as we have expounded upon the journey, understand it. My testimony is not a life of what to do. It's a life of what not to do.
See the fact that for men, you need to get your checkups. You need to get your blood work. You need to get your physicals. You need to not be so concerned of making money in your careers and your investments and where you're going with those things that drive you because that's what true men do. That's what we do.
But be focused enough that you would get your checkups, and especially black men at 40 years old, start screening for prostate cancer because it is a formidable foe and it can change your life. And it's just by the God's grace that I'm here to say to you that my journey has been different. It didn't have to be that way. It could have been different.
Janet Jones:
Don't focus on when you're going to die. Focus on how you're going to live.
This video was produced with the generous support of Dendreon Pharmaceuticals