Cancer and Clinical Services Patient Stories

In October 2009, Joan Shoults’ 27-year-old son, Chris, was diagnosed with stage IV Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Tragically, he passed away 11 months later.

“Needless to say,” Joan shared, “his death was a devastating loss to all of his family and friends, and we miss him terribly. I think about Chris every day and remember what a beautiful and wonderful person he was.”

Five years later during a routine checkup, Joan herself received some shocking news: her own blood work indicated that she either had lymphoma or leukemia.

“We were referred to The James,” Joan said, “because of the very rare nature of my disease, which is known as peripheral T-cell lymphocytic leukemia.

“As you can understand,” she continued, “having blood cancer hit our family again was overwhelming. I immediately questioned the reasons for both of these diseases and why they had twice entered our lives. There truly are no answers to those questions.”

Joan’s personalized treatment plan included immunotherapy three days a week at The James. And to her surprise, “there were nurses and assistants I remembered from Chris’s treatment, and they also remembered me, which just shows the true compassion that is The James.”

After immunotherapy was complete and Joan was in remission, she received a bone marrow transplant.

“The first time I met with my transplant doctor, we immediately hit it off,” Joan said. “It is simply incredible how people who were total strangers now become some of your best friends.”

And while Joan has been in contact with her donor, they’ve not yet met. “I would love to meet him at some point,” she said. “I can never fully express my gratitude for his gift of life to me.”

Joan is also grateful for the expert care she received throughout her treatments. “We are so fortunate to have a facility where patients obviously come first,” she said. “As a caregiver and a patient, seeing things from both sides of the bed is surreal and certainly not what anyone would expect to happen. But I will be eternally grateful to The James and to everyone with whom I come into contact there. And most importantly, for such busy people who just take the time — taking the time to listen to me talk about Chris, taking the time to hold my hand and encourage me through the entire ordeal.”

Joan is now three years past her bone marrow transplant and is still in remission.

I look forward to the future, but obviously, this illness and experience will always be on my mind. And I will never recover from the loss of my son.”

Joan encourages everyone to sign up with Be the Match for a bone marrow donation.