Jill Biden opens up about hidden toll of caring for husband Joe through stage 4 cancer battle
Former First Lady Dr. Jill Biden has spoken candidly about the emotional and physical toll of caring for her husband, former President Joe Biden, as he battles stage 4 prostate cancer.
Speaking to PEOPLE from the couple’s lake house in Wilmington, Delaware, on November 5, Dr. Biden, 75, reflected on how their post-White House life shifted overnight after the 83-year-old former commander-in-chief announced in May 2025—just 118 days after leaving office—that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer that had metastasized to his bones.
“Having been through a lot of highs and lows in our marriage, I think we are stronger than ever before,” Dr. Biden said, admitting: “I didn’t think that was possible.”
Calling the diagnosis a 'complete surprise,' Dr. Biden revealed the couple had mapped out a very different retirement filled with international travel—including a trip to Italy—before reality set in during a quiet moment at a nail salon while flipping through a travel magazine.
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“All of a sudden it struck me, like, ‘Wait a minute, this isn’t our life now,’” she recalled. “Just putting the magazine down, [I] just had to kind of take a minute and realize with Joe having stage 4 prostate cancer that’s metastasized, that because of that metastasis, he will always have cancer. And it changes your life, it changes your perspective about life. So now we’re on a new journey.”
Alongside teaching literature part-time at a nearby women’s prison and receiving caregiving assistance, Dr. Biden explained that her daily routine revolves around monitoring every detail of her husband's health—a reality that has connected her with some of the estimated 63 million family caregivers across the United States.
“So many people have reached out to me, and in turn, I have reached out to them, because I have seen how hard it is, how really emotionally hard it is, physically hard to go through each day,” she shared. “My days are making sure he eats right. Does he exercise? Is he taking the right medicine? Did I talk to the doctor? I mean, that’s layered on top of family life or all the other things that any spouse or other member of the family does.”
Dr. Biden credited their children and grandchildren for keeping their spirits lifted, describing a busy household where grandkids regularly drop by to check in on "Pop" and stay the night.
Ahead of the couple’s 50th wedding anniversary next June, the former president praised his wife’s strength and partnership: “I knew from the beginning what she was. Jill is, first of all, bright as hell. Secondly, I think she’s the most beautiful woman in the world, which every husband probably thinks, but I believe it. And we have a real partnership.”
Having completed radiation therapy and now undergoing hormone treatment, Biden—who addresses his diagnosis in his upcoming presidential memoir, Promise Me, America, out November 17—insisted he is determined to "fight like hell."
“I’m not saying I’ll live forever,” he told the publication. “But the point is that I have all my faculties, I have access to all the things I had before and I feel good.”
He also forcefully rejected claims from critics who speculated he concealed his illness while in the Oval Office.
“A lot of people do that. They hide bad news from the public if they’re elected officials,” Biden said. “I didn’t do that. We let the public know when I found out, when I knew what was going on. I think it’s important for a national leader, as president, to let people know they go through some of the very same things that a lot of American people are going through ... I wasn’t hiding it at all.”
Defending his initial decision to run for re-election in 2024 before stepping aside following his June debate against President Donald Trump, Biden acknowledged voters' concerns about his age while maintaining his experience was an asset: “People say I was deluding myself that I could do the job [of president] at my age. My answer to that is: I was doing the job.”
Phoebe Tonks
