00:00Joan, welcome to Us Weekly. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. I'm so
00:03excited to talk to you. We have a lot to catch up on. Yeah, we do. It's been a
00:06minute. Yeah. But most importantly, you are participating in a walk this weekend
00:09to raise awareness for pancreatic cancer. Please tell me all about the walk and
00:14then we'll get into specifics of your team. I like your team name. We've a lot
00:16to talk about. Tell me about the walk this weekend. So I am so honored that I get to
00:21partner with PANCAN, Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, as the ambassador for
00:26PANCAN, Purple Stride this year, which is the ultimate walk to find a cure for
00:32this pancreatic cancer. And it's taking place in 60 communities across the
00:36United States. And I will be walking in the Purple Stride, Washington, D.C.
00:42which is being held on Freedom Plaza. And that's where my team came from. It's
00:46just a sprain. It's just a sprain. What do the little ones know? How do you guys talk
00:50to him about, you know, your grandpa who is part of your family but not with us
00:54here? Yeah, so two of them are too young. They're under the age of two. But Boomer,
00:58who's my oldest grandson, he actually got to meet his and and we called him Pops.
01:04So it was his granddad's name was Pops. And so he knows Pops and like we talk
01:09about and we know we don't want John's memory to fade away and like it's still
01:12he's still an important person in my life, will always be. And I want his
01:17grandchildren to know that he existed and you know that he was part of our family
01:21and he like I am who I am and you know like their their parents are who they are
01:26because of this man that existed and that like we don't want his memory to
01:30fade. So we talk about him we talk about him often and Boomer definitely knows
01:33him like he met him. You know John passed away when Boomer was about eight
01:36months old but he got to meet him. He's the only grandchild that got to meet him.
01:39So that's kind of a little special for Boomer. Why was this a good time for you
01:42to get involved and walk this year and join a partnership with this charity? You know it
01:47was just all the stars kind of aligned this year. You know we had been talking
01:52my family and I have been talking about how to honor John and we never could come
01:55up with anything that felt right. You know like planting a tree or putting a
01:59name on a bench all those things that people do you know to you know make their
02:03memory be more eternal. Just none of them seemed right for John and then when
02:08Pancreatic, Pancan Network approached me and said you know we heard your story on
02:13the show and you know we'd love for you to you know maybe talk to us about
02:16joining our cause. It was like perfect because it was the exactly what John
02:23would have wanted. So John was a very generous person and very giving and
02:26very philanthropic and I thought this is he would have given to this you know
02:29cause and you know if it can help anybody not have to go through what we
02:34went through it's exactly what John would have wanted. So this feels so right and I
02:37get to talk about it. I'm so lucky that I got to be in this position that I get to
02:41keep talking about him and about why I'm involved because it keeps his memory
02:46alive but it also you know you're not going to recognize that there are so many
02:50people out there that have this cancer or may get this cancer. It's on track to be
02:55the second leading cause of cancer related deaths in the United States and so
02:59this could be a real part of people's lives and I don't think that pancreatic
03:03cancer is like that forefront you know you think about other cancers breast
03:07cancer maybe colon cancer ones that are more prevalent this is moving its way up
03:11in in that in you know on that scale and that's scary. The other thing you
03:15talked about on the show was kind of making sure that your partner
03:18understood the importance of obviously John's role in your family his legacy
03:22like he is always a part of your family. How has that been post show with Chalk
03:26trying to navigate you know just that and everything that encompasses. Well he's
03:31an incredible person and he is so understanding and you know wants me to do
03:36whatever I need to do and and you know is really conscious of my kids that you
03:40know this is a big thing that happened in their life and that they you know
03:43John's legacy is still really important to us and will always be and he is so
03:47kind about it and you know he lost somebody so he relates to this so he had
03:51been engaged for a number of years and he lost Kathy to a brain tumor so he I think
03:56really gets you know the way you know she was a big part of his life and you know
04:00maybe for not as many years but an important person to him so he like he's very
04:04understanding he's perfect like there is I never ever have to worry about you
04:09know it affecting our relationship me spending too much time doing this or
04:13talking about it too much he is amazing about it.
