Today I get to introduce you to my friend Doug DeFouw, and his story of faith through prostate cancer is one of the most honest conversations I have had on this podcast. Doug did not clean it up for us. He told me about the anger, the isolation, and the years he spent trying to carry all of it by himself.
EPISODE NOTES
Doug was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2012. However, the diagnosis was not the first hard thing to land on him — and that is what makes his story matter so much for anyone listening right now.
THE YEAR EVERYTHING CAME AT ONCE
https://neveralonefaithovercancer.com/facing-cancer-alone/
The year before his own diagnosis, Doug lost his wife. She had been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma at just eighteen years old, and in the end it was the treatment itself that took her life. Doug was 48. He had three kids who had just lost their mom.
Then, within a year, he was diagnosed with cancer himself.
He did not move toward God after that. As a matter of fact, he moved away. There was anger, and there were questions he could not answer. Meanwhile, he did what so many of us do when the worst thing happens — he closed the doors and decided to handle it alone.
Doug had surgery. Additionally, doctors removed twelve lymph nodes to be certain the cancer had not spread. Afterward, they found cancer cells on the opposite side of the prostate, so nobody could tell him whether they had gotten it all. What followed was eight years of waiting and testing.
FINDING FAITH THROUGH PROSTATE CANCER THE SECOND TIME AROUND
In that stretch, two things changed. Doug remarried, and his wife had a strong faith. Moreover, she asked him for one thing — to give church another try. They started attending Timberlake Church in Redmond, and Doug found a home there.
Then the numbers started going up.
At eight years, just two years short of the ten-year mark where doctors tell you that you are likely out of the woods, his PSA began climbing. Because the prostate had already been removed, there was only one explanation. The cancer had been there the whole time.
That second diagnosis hit him harder than the first. Nevertheless, this time he did something different. He reached out and asked his church for prayer.
THE GROUP WHOSE FAITH GOT STRONGER
The church connected Doug with a cancer support group, and what he found there is the part of his story I keep coming back to.
He met people who were battling cancer, some of them for years. Yet their faith was not shrinking as things got harder — it was growing. Every new diagnosis, every new side effect, and their trust in God went up, not down.
Doug said it amazed him. In his words, he watched how easy it would have been for them to point a finger and ask why God was doing this. Instead, they prayed harder.
That was what pulled him back.
I asked him why he thought that happened. His answer was simple and, I think, exactly right. We spend our lives solving our own problems, but cancer is not one you can solve. Consequently, those people had come to a place where they knew they could not do it alone — and they had made peace with either outcome. If they came out ahead, wonderful. If they did not, they would be with the Lord.
THE MOMENT HE SURRENDERED
For Doug, the surrender came during radiation. Sixteen weeks of treatment, every single day at eleven o'clock in downtown Seattle.
He finally said, it is in your hands, God. There is nothing I can do. I can physically show up for the treatment, but I cannot do anything else — so I am giving it to you.
And here is what he told me came next: peace. He stopped carrying the anguish and the worry, because as Jesus said, in Matthew 6:27, worrying will not buy you another day.
"Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?" — Matthew 6:27
Doug is also honest that surrender is not a one-time achievement. He surrendered his cancer. Still, he admits he does not always surrender the rest of his life, and he thinks that struggle is true for all of us if we are honest.
"I CAN'T EXPLAIN IT"
After radiation, his numbers went up. A PET scan showed nothing. His care was handed to a new oncologist, who kept testing — and over three months, the numbers came down. Eventually they returned to zero, and by God's grace that is where they have stayed.
Doug sat with that oncologist, who looked at the results and said he could not explain it. Doug offered that maybe God stepped in. The doctor told him that was as good an explanation as he could give.
Doug will tell you plainly that he is not out of the woods. Even so, he is at peace.
YOU ARE NEVER ALONE
If you are walking through cancer right now and you have been trying to do it by yourself, I hope Doug's story reaches you. Because he tried that. Furthermore, he will tell you it was the hardest way through.
This is Part One of Doug's story. In our next episode, Part Two, I turn the conversation around and ask him what he would say to you.
No matter what you are facing on your journey with cancer or in life, remember: you are NEVER ALONE. Jesus and the Holy Spirit are always with you and ready to help. All you have to do is ask, give it all to Jesus, and let Him go to work.
May God bless you — and thank you for listening.