Movember 2024 Kickoff: In Memory of Stu
Let's do it for the boy(s and men)!
This is my 8th year in fundraising for Movember, and unlikely to be my last.
But let me get right to the point:
Movember 2024 Fundraiser
Here are the places you can donate to the Movember Foundation, which supports men’s health, specifically focusing on prostate cancer, testicular cancer, and men’s mental health:
Mary Pat Campbell’s MoSpace – a place to donate at Movember itself
My Movember Facebook fundraiser – my officially linked fundraiser, if this works better for you
And here’s a QR code if that works better for you:
My continuing story with Movember
For those new to STUMP, Stu was my husband (and I’m the MP portion).
In prior years, that “was” had been “is”.
Stuart and I were married in 2000. A nutshell of our marriage can be read here:
In 2017, Stu was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. It wasn’t curable, but it was treatable. The survival statistics aren’t great for that diagnosis, when that’s your first diagnosis. However, the survival statistics are a lot better than they used to be.
Not that long ago, the one-year survival statistics for advanced prostate cancer (or metastatic prostate cancer, or stage 4) was 50%, and the 5-year survival statistics were 2%.
Last year, I wrote the following:
I started my own fundraising in 2017, and as you can see from above, I’ve been pretty active since then. Stu had his own course of cancer treatments, and his cancer had been pretty under control until recently… it’s active again. One of these days, probably either his treatment or the cancer will kill him. We’re trying to push that as far out as possible.
The cancer killed him on September 30, 2024.
He survived beyond 7 years past his diagnosis, which was pretty good, but this last year was pretty fraught.
The last few months involved a week in the hospital, lots of trips to the cancer center including having to go to Manhattan for specialty treatment, fluid drained from his lungs, blood clots proliferating in his lungs, and eight blood transfusions. (please donate blood! Plasma! Platelets!) When we went to the cancer care center, he needed a wheelchair, because he couldn’t walk for long periods without getting winded. He had trouble breathing.
Stu was at home when he died, and it looked like he simply stopped breathing, after falling asleep watching TV.
I had started fundraising for Movember due to Stu. Before 2017, I donated to my many male friends’ fundraisers. Now that Stu has died, I plan to continue fundraising for Movember.
Movember Foundation and Men’s Health
Movember Foundation is a men’s health charity that focuses on prostate cancer, testicular cancer, and men’s mental health, worldwide.
Movember supports research and activities for men to improve health outcomes.
For both prostate and testicular cancer, the main activity is to promote early detection, the best way to survive these cancers in the first place.
While Stu’s cancer wasn’t detected until late, his was also unusually aggressive. Most men who are diagnosed with prostate cancer will find it early, when it is treatable, and the survivorship for early-stage prostate cancer is extremely high.
(Distant = advanced or metastatic cancer — the cancer has spread far away from the originating site. )
Upcoming Movember Content
In prior years, I have shown the horrible mortality trends for men in the U.S.:
I will update on these, and of course, so some deeper dives on prostate cancer trends:
But I also have a particular interest in suicide prevention, and will look at that as well:
These will be upcoming features throughout the month (but not the only content during the month, so worry not).