Alex Trebek’s Wife Talks About His Cancer Diagnosis, ‘The Bottom Dropped Out Of My World’

Alex Trebek has been very open about his struggles as he continues to battle Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer, but now, his wife, Jean Currivan Trebek, is speaking out about how the diagnosis has changed their lives.

In an essay in July for Guideposts, Jean wrote about how the diagnosis came to me, admitting she started to see signs and encouraged her husband to get tests after a 2018 family trip to Israel. However, they quickly went on to learn that her husband’s paler complexion and stomach pains at the time were from the cancer, and he had a tumor that had spread to his stomach.

“It felt as if the bottom dropped out of my world. Again. Ale has been everything to me,” she wrote. “I met him when I was 21, a challenging period in my life. His friendship—we were friends for a long time before becoming a couple—changed my life.”

She also admitted that as he went through chemo treatments, she would often wonder how much time she was going to actually have left with her husband, but that they’re still going strong and his commitment to still working on “Jeopardy!” has been a great way to keep his energy and spirits alive.

“More than a year and a half later, we’re still at it, every day a gift,” she wrote. “Some days it’s a struggle for Alex to get out of bed. But he’s never missed taping a show. That passion for his work—it's a kind of calling. He truly looks forward to getting to the studio at 5:45 a.m.--so he can do several episodes in a single day. It rejuvenates him.”

She also revealed how it changed things for her as a person, because while she has self-pitying moments where she wonders why the diagnosis happened to her husband, but that she also channels that feeling into more positive things that she does for other important people in their lives.

“Truth to tell, some days I feel really sad and angry. Then I’ll say, ‘That’s enough, Jean.’ I’ll try to do something for someone else to pull myself out of it,” she said. “Not just for Alex but for one of our friends. Sending a reassuring e-mail, calling someone, sharing a cup of tea. Opening myself up. Accepting what’s happening.”