Two-time Emmy and Three-time NAACP Image Award-winning, television Executive Producer Rushion McDonald interviewed Holly Cotton (breast cancer survivor, nurse, author) and Dewayne Charleston (stage 4 prostate cancer survivor).
- Topic: Raising awareness and eliminating disparities in Black men’s health, especially prostate cancer.
2. Holly Cotton’s Story
- Breast cancer survivor and nurse with a master’s degree.
- Author of Strong More Than Muscles.
- Uses her survivorship to inspire others and promote health awareness.
- Advocates for being a “life survivor,” not just a cancer survivor.
3. Rushion McDonald’s Personal Experience
- Thyroid cancer survivor since 2015.
- Shares how the diagnosis changed his perspective on life and purpose.
- Uses his platform to raise awareness and encourage proactive health decisions.
4. Dwayne’s Journey
- Diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer at age 46.
- All 16 biopsy samples came back positive.
- Told by MD Anderson urologist Dr. Lewis Sisler that only prayer could help.
- Fought cancer for 14 years and founded a prostate cancer awareness foundation.
5. Foundation Mission
- Educates Black men on prostate cancer, clinical trials, and health disparities.
- Addresses emotional, sexual, financial, and relational impacts of cancer.
- Aims to break silence and stigma around men’s health issues.
6. Breast Cancer Awareness vs. Prostate Cancer Awareness
- Holly explains the success of “Go Pink” campaigns for breast cancer.
- Dewayne and Holly aim to replicate that success with “Go Blue” for prostate cancer.
- Goal: Encourage men to prioritize their own health and get tested.
7. Community Impact
- Importance of storytelling and visibility at events like HBCU games.
- Emphasis on legacy, education, and proactive health care.
- Holly and Dewayne’s collaboration bridges gender and cancer awareness gaps.
8. Closing
- Rushon thanks guests for their advocacy and friendship.
- Encourages listeners to lead with their gifts and keep winning.
💡 Key Takeaways
- Cancer is not a death sentence—early detection and support can save lives.
- Black men face the highest disparity in prostate cancer diagnoses and deaths.
- Storytelling and visibility are powerful tools for health education.
- Foundations and community events can drive awareness and action.
- Men must prioritize their own health, not just encourage women to get checked.
- Faith, support, and education are critical in the cancer journey.
🗣️ Notable Quotes
“I am a life survivor, not just a cancer survivor.” — Holly Cotton
“God is still in the healing business.” — Dr. Lewis Sisler (quoted by Dewayne)
“Don’t ever wait to that moment to make changes in your life.” — Rushion McDonald
“Tuskegee was not a clinical trial—it was a criminal conspiracy.” — Dewayne
“We want those men to also be worried about their own health and have resources.” — Holly Cotton
“Of all the disparities in cancer, the greatest is in prostate cancer among Black men.” — Dewayne
#SHMS #STRAW #BEST
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
I am Rashan McDonald, a host of weekly Money Making
Conversation Masterclass show. The interviews and information that this show
provides are for everyone. It's time to stop reading other
people's success stories and start living your own. If you
want to be a guest on my show, please visit
our website, money Making Conversations dot com and click to
be a guest button Chris submit and information will come
(00:23):
directly to me. Now, let's get this show started. My
guests on the show today. I got two guests. First
I thought it just had one gas. Then I turned
out I got two guys, which is all good because
for the same cause, they're making history for black men's
health to eliminate the disparities in prostate cancer. Holly and Dwayne,
how y'all doing?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
What's that?
Speaker 3 (00:43):
What's that? Thank you so much for having us?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
And where's Dwayne?
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Good?
Speaker 4 (00:48):
Good?
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Dwayne?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
What's see? I can see Dwayne. I don't know what
energy gonna play off of because you got that that
that that's that low key, uh, you know voice, And
I got the cheerleader over here in Holly. So so
I'm gonna balance a little bit with I got i'mnna
deal with Teddy Pendergrass. I'm gonna deal with the chi leader. Okay,
well'mnna deal with both of y'all. Okay, good Well. First
of all, I want to start Holly's been on the
(01:09):
show before. I'mer a big fan. She's a anybody else
know her background. She's a nurse, a graduate of l
s U University, she was, She's a breast cancer survivor.
I met her at a Black Men's uh Walk Health
Wellness Day walk in Houston, Texas, where I was the ambassador.
That's how we met and we bonded because we're trying
to change people's lives, and that's why I have both
(01:31):
individuals on the show today. Just talk about that. You know,
how do you come up out making these significant changes?
Why is there such an invested interest? I'm gonna start
with you, Holly, Why is there an invested interest? And
give people a little background on where you at as
far as your survival care when it came to breast cancer.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yes, for sure, thank you for that introduction.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Seawan.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Yes, yes we go, we go way back now. We
play cousins forever. But I am in Texas and yes
I do have a master's in nursing, and although that's
one thing that I do just like you, my goal
is to be the change and live the change. So
after my battle with breast cancer and I went through
(02:14):
you know, surgery, I went through recovery, and then I
sort of just found my purpose, which is I wanted
to take my story and instead of burying it and
not talking about it anymore, I wanted to use it
as a story of survivorship and motivate people, inspire people,
and just show people that cancer is not the end
(02:35):
of the world. So I'm connected a few years ago
with Dwayne and he's a prostate cancer He'll tell you
all of his story as well. But for me, I
just I just don't want my story of survivorship just
to be lost on breast cancer. I always say that
I am a life survivor, not just the cancer survivor,
because everyone has something that they have overcome that they
(02:59):
thought was going to kill them. So that's my story
about breast cancer. And then of course, you know, I
wrote my first book Strong More Than Muscles, which talks
about that. And then here we are today and I'm
obviously I'm doing the right thing because I'm aligning with
positive people like you, So I'm on the right path.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Well, I'm gonna tell everybody, you know, it was the
money making conversations, Master Cline. What do we do it
to the medical show?
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Now?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
What is the medical show night? What's going on there? Well,
just tell y'all something.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
In twenty fifteen, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, and
I too, will not dismiss it. I will not bury
it because so many people h when I tell people
have a cancer, they kind of look at me, go,
you got cancer because they have they have a stereotype
of what people have cancer should look like, of what
they should be and what they should be doing.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
You know.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
You know, you know where I'm walking around with my
you know, Taylor's shirts, Taylor clothes. I'm looking good, Dwayne.
You know what I'm saying. You ain't gonna you ain't
gonna find a bad day in ra Sean McDonald's life. Okay,
It's not like I'm trying. It's just my life. And
so I tell people like I wear a bracelet on
my wrist, you know, and I've been wearing it and
gave it to a friend of mine who died from cancer,
(04:08):
you know, And because I don't when people always ask
a nice bracelet, and it immediately gives me an entry
point to tell them why I have it on my wrist,
and I tell them I don't care if it's a
television interview, I won't tell them a panel if they asked,
I'm gonna stop and tell you why this is because
I am a thyroid cancer survivor. And I say that
because it can come back. There's no guarantees. But I'm
(04:31):
ready because I wasn't ready when they first told me, Dwayne,
when they told me I had cancer, Dwaine, I swear
to you, I went deaf. I think I lost my eyesight,
I lost a lot of things. Because would you say
the word cancer somebody, It just changes your life. Now
tell us your story, sir, Well.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
I was diagnosed years ago. I was one of those
guys who never was thought about having cancer. But I
was having some major issues going on in my life,
and so I went in and got to check up,
and I said, well, give me that PSA test. You
know I had heard that I need to get. I
was forty six years old, and so they gave me
the test, and then a couple of days later they
called me and I saw five calls from the same
(05:11):
number right away, and they told me you need to
get over to Indy Anderson right away. So I go
over to MD Anderson and this is a.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Houston, Texas, one of the top cancer hospitalities in the.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
World, if not the top. And doctor Lewis Pisters, who
was the eurologist who would have done surgery on me.
He walked into the room with the results of my
biopsy and he said, well, Dwayne, all sixteen of your
samples came back positive. And he said, I can't cure you,
and nobody Ndianis can't cure you. And I was like,
(05:44):
you know, I was like, you said, Shanna. I was
like whoa. And he said, but you know, Dwayne, there
is good news. And I began to think, what could
that possibly. This was Lewis Pisters who said he wouldn't
do surgery and nobody could cure me. He said, he's
the brother of the current CEO of Infensial but he said,
(06:04):
he said, God is still in the healing business and
if you don't mind, I would like to pray for you.
So this on college, this neurologist got down his knees
in his office. Indianerson and he told me and essentially
let me know that God was my only real hope.
And I took and I took that to heart. But
I knew that it was going to be a battle.
So for fourteen years I fought Stage four. From the
(06:25):
very beginning, I went.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So, let's slow this down, Dwaane, because you've told this
story a lot. And I was like, because it's so incredible,
because a doctor, one of the top doctors in the world.
That's right, his last stage of cure was prayer. That's
where you was at, right, that's where you was.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
At, exactly where, exactly exactly it. And I say his
name just in case anybody thinks I'm embellishing. I say
his name just because I know that's his character. He
gave it over to God, and you know.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
It is the wisdom of that moment which gave you
something to hold on too. Because I'm gonna just tell
you all something. When you are told that you have
cancer and Holly can confess to this, I don't care
see to see see, they gave him the door death
is knocking on the door speech. Okay, they told me
(07:20):
we called it just in time, But it didn't matter
because I heard cancer. I thought about my family. I
thought about what I was, what I had done in
my life. I thought about what I'm gonna do tomorrow.
I thought about everything in a matter of seconds and
(07:40):
a matter of seconds, and I would tell you this,
I would and our our This is the blessing that
came out of my situation, Holly and Dwayne, is that
if I was to die, I was all right because
I had in my life. I felt I've given back
as much as I've received. I felt I've changed people's lives.
(08:03):
I felt I had left my family where they would
have been and are today comfortable. I felt that moving ahead,
I was not going to be sad. I was going
to plan the brighter future. So I say that to
everybody who's listening, don't ever wait to that moment to
make changes in your life, because you can do it
right now. I had just been doing it all my life,
(08:24):
and that moment made me realize to live a better life,
continue to do what you do, just do more of it.
And that's why y'all on this call today, because I
want to do more of it. Okay, this is part
of that more of it, Holly, that's part of the
more of it Dwayne talking about what you guys the idea.
Speaker 5 (08:41):
So I know I'm preaching a little bit, but when
you but you know, people think of cancer as a
death sentence, and when you're around once you get diagnosed,
you are around.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
People that are survivors of cancer or their fighting with
fighting cancer, and you realize how prelevant it is. You're
just like, wow, everybody has a cancer story now, like
you're just You're just you didn't realize everybody was attached
to cancer, and now all of a sudden, everyone has
a cancer, even they're a patient. Somebody in their family
(09:18):
had it. So you start realizing, like, we all got
a cancer story.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Yes, you know. Interesting thing, Dwayne was that in eighteen
ninety and I shared it with a previous interview. I
was at my lung collapsed and then you know, thought
was a numro thorax, which is usually happens as Michael
Jackson his lung collapse. Number of athletes they lunched, and
so I stayed in the hotfield thirty days. When you
stay in the hospital thirty consecutive days, you see death.
(09:45):
You make friends with somebody down the hallway and you
come back they're not there at all, Okay, they're gone.
See death is so unnervouing. And guess what and when
when you realize that person's gone, there's nobody to tell
their story. There's nobody tell their story. And so when
Holly came to me about what you guys wanted to
(10:05):
do or an HBCU game, that's telling the story. That's
establishing a legacy and putting the mouthpiece on it. And
your journey of being diagnosed my friends stage four or
fifteen years ago and today you're still able to tell
this story. Congratulations, you have established a foundation. Tell us
about your foundation.
Speaker 4 (10:26):
Well, I wanted to have a foundation. I spent a
lot of time talking to various brothers that I'm repeating
myself over and over again about you know, the sexual
side effects, the emotionals of fatigue, the clinical trials that
are available, trying to convince brothers that TOOKSKI was not
a clinical trial but a criminal conspiracy, and that we
now have people who are in our families that are
(10:48):
running the clinical trials and just the educational portune. Just
trying to educate brothers, trying to be advocates, because I
know that without the advocates that have been in my life,
I probably wouldn't still be around because they're the ones
who forced you to keep going. And so I wanted
to have a foundation that was really rubberly hits the
road man where we we talk raw. If you go
to my website as RAW, I talk about everything that
(11:09):
people probably think that brother wouldn't talk about publicly because
we've got to desensitize brothers and convinced brothers to start speaking.
So I wanted to do a foundation one that would
highlight prostate cancer and get men to start talking again,
because it's it's it's it's it changes the balance of
(11:29):
economic power. When a man dies man that whole family.
In many cases, stuff is a tremendous financial lawssess. So
you got the emotional laws, the financial laws, You've got
so many different issues, the marriages that are broken up.
I wanted to do a foundation that address relationships, that
address health, and address finances, that address you know, sex,
sexual uh, you know, you know, virility and things like that.
(11:52):
So I just wanted to be able to do something
that was really out of the box of geting.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Okay, when we come back, we're going to find out
how you got connected with Holly cotton, you know, misenergize
the buddy. Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back
for more money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to money
Making Conversations master Class hosted by me Rashaun McDonald. Money
Making Conversation master Class continues online at Moneymaking Conversations dot
(12:19):
com and follow money Making Conversations master Class on Facebook,
X and Instagram.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Dwayne reached out to me as a breast cancer survivor,
and every time it comes around to be October, everything
is go pink, Go pink, Go pink, And so what
he wanted to do was emulate the go pink and
have teams adopt the gold blue, the same thing. And
so I come in and I explain to people that
(12:49):
whenever you're looking at the pink for pink out games,
what it does is it raises awareness. It causes women
to say, hmm, is it time for me to get
a mamma room. I've never had one before, or maybe
I had one. Let me follow up. A lot of
people don't know how to get a mammogram. So whenever
they're at the games and they're getting all this information
(13:09):
and they're seeing the piece, it causes them to follow
up with their primary care physician or seek out the resources.
Sometimes they'll have the van in the front where you
can go and you can get a flordy mammogram on site,
or they have local the things like we're doing the
local RVs and and hospitals and stuff. They set up
(13:30):
all of these things for all of these breast cancer
awareness sites and testing. So what Dwayne and I decided
is that we wanted to make sure that men who
were telling their women, hey, have you got have you
got your mammogram? Have you went in, have you you know?
Are you okay? Is everything good? Are you following up?
We want those men to also be worried about their
(13:52):
own health and have resources. And we know that men
have a lot of the same questions. So I come
in and I explain that, you know, we're not deflecting
any of the attention that breast cancer gets. We want
women to continue to get aware, continue to go get tested,
but we just want to share some of that and
(14:14):
have another program with the blue so that men can say, oh, wait,
what when do I even get tested? Wait, I have
a risk for this. I thought you had to be
old to have this, or I thought you had to
get tested a certain way. I didn't know that there
were different options to find out if I have cancer.
So that's why I'm here as a breast cancer survivor
to come in. That's why I'm so excited to be
(14:37):
a part of it. Like you said, Rashan, I'm the
cheerleader because I'm gonna sell this like we we are
rocking it. We fighting for men. You know, y'all been
fighting for us, and it's like it's time for us
to fight for you as well. So that's where I
come in as a breast cancer go pink survivor.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Right Bigger, Absolutely, Dusty Bigger, you know he had prostate cancer.
It's so many brothers that had it. The main thing
is that of all the disparities in cancer, you know,
we got disparities and all kinds of medicine, but of
all the cancers that there are, the greatest disparity there
is of black men versus all other men is in
(15:14):
prostate cancer, where one out of six of us will
be diagnosed with it. One out of six thirty two
thousand men will die this year loans of prostate cancer,
and a good number of those will be African American.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Men, Dwayne and Holly, thank you for allowing me to
have fun with you guys, but also deliver a very
serious message to the black community, especially the black men
in our community. And you roayin and you're gonna be
a new friend in my life. And Holly, I just
can't get rid of her. But again, you know, I
got six sisters, so I know cousins, not be cousins.
Now you know cousins. I don't know her from left field. Again,
(15:50):
thank you for coming on Money Making Conversations Master Class.
Appreciate both of y'all we talked too. This has been
Money Making Conversation Masterclass with me Rashaan McDonald. Ks to
our guests and our audience. Visit Moneymakingconversations dot com to
listen or register to be a guest on my show.
Keep leading with your gifts, Keep winning,
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
I am Rashan McDonald, a host of weekly Money Making
Conversation Masterclass show. The interviews and information that this show
provides are for everyone. It's time to stop reading other
people's success stories and start living your own. If you
want to be a guest on my show, please visit
our website, money Making Conversations dot com and click to
be a guest button Chris submit and information will come
(00:23):
directly to me. Now, let's get this show started. My
guests on the show today. I got two guests. First
I thought it just had one gas. Then I turned
out I got two guys, which is all good because
for the same cause, they're making history for black men's
health to eliminate the disparities in prostate cancer. Holly and Dwayne,
how y'all doing?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
What's that?
Speaker 3 (00:43):
What's that? Thank you so much for having us?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
And where's Dwayne?
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Good?
Speaker 4 (00:48):
Good?
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Dwayne?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
What's see? I can see Dwayne. I don't know what
energy gonna play off of because you got that that
that that's that low key, uh, you know voice, And
I got the cheerleader over here in Holly. So so
I'm gonna balance a little bit with I got i'mnna
deal with Teddy Pendergrass. I'm gonna deal with the chi leader. Okay,
well'mnna deal with both of y'all. Okay, good Well. First
of all, I want to start Holly's been on the
(01:09):
show before. I'mer a big fan. She's a anybody else
know her background. She's a nurse, a graduate of l
s U University, she was, She's a breast cancer survivor.
I met her at a Black Men's uh Walk Health
Wellness Day walk in Houston, Texas, where I was the ambassador.
That's how we met and we bonded because we're trying
to change people's lives, and that's why I have both
(01:31):
individuals on the show today. Just talk about that. You know,
how do you come up out making these significant changes?
Why is there such an invested interest? I'm gonna start
with you, Holly, Why is there an invested interest? And
give people a little background on where you at as
far as your survival care when it came to breast cancer.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yes, for sure, thank you for that introduction.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Seawan.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Yes, yes we go, we go way back now. We
play cousins forever. But I am in Texas and yes
I do have a master's in nursing, and although that's
one thing that I do just like you, my goal
is to be the change and live the change. So
after my battle with breast cancer and I went through
(02:14):
you know, surgery, I went through recovery, and then I
sort of just found my purpose, which is I wanted
to take my story and instead of burying it and
not talking about it anymore, I wanted to use it
as a story of survivorship and motivate people, inspire people,
and just show people that cancer is not the end
(02:35):
of the world. So I'm connected a few years ago
with Dwayne and he's a prostate cancer He'll tell you
all of his story as well. But for me, I
just I just don't want my story of survivorship just
to be lost on breast cancer. I always say that
I am a life survivor, not just the cancer survivor,
because everyone has something that they have overcome that they
(02:59):
thought was going to kill them. So that's my story
about breast cancer. And then of course, you know, I
wrote my first book Strong More Than Muscles, which talks
about that. And then here we are today and I'm
obviously I'm doing the right thing because I'm aligning with
positive people like you, So I'm on the right path.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Well, I'm gonna tell everybody, you know, it was the
money making conversations, Master Cline. What do we do it
to the medical show?
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Now?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
What is the medical show night? What's going on there? Well,
just tell y'all something.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
In twenty fifteen, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, and
I too, will not dismiss it. I will not bury
it because so many people h when I tell people
have a cancer, they kind of look at me, go,
you got cancer because they have they have a stereotype
of what people have cancer should look like, of what
they should be and what they should be doing.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
You know.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
You know, you know where I'm walking around with my
you know, Taylor's shirts, Taylor clothes. I'm looking good, Dwayne.
You know what I'm saying. You ain't gonna you ain't
gonna find a bad day in ra Sean McDonald's life. Okay,
It's not like I'm trying. It's just my life. And
so I tell people like I wear a bracelet on
my wrist, you know, and I've been wearing it and
gave it to a friend of mine who died from cancer,
(04:08):
you know, And because I don't when people always ask
a nice bracelet, and it immediately gives me an entry
point to tell them why I have it on my wrist,
and I tell them I don't care if it's a
television interview, I won't tell them a panel if they asked,
I'm gonna stop and tell you why this is because
I am a thyroid cancer survivor. And I say that
because it can come back. There's no guarantees. But I'm
(04:31):
ready because I wasn't ready when they first told me, Dwayne,
when they told me I had cancer, Dwaine, I swear
to you, I went deaf. I think I lost my eyesight,
I lost a lot of things. Because would you say
the word cancer somebody, It just changes your life. Now
tell us your story, sir, Well.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
I was diagnosed years ago. I was one of those
guys who never was thought about having cancer. But I
was having some major issues going on in my life,
and so I went in and got to check up,
and I said, well, give me that PSA test. You
know I had heard that I need to get. I
was forty six years old, and so they gave me
the test, and then a couple of days later they
called me and I saw five calls from the same
(05:11):
number right away, and they told me you need to
get over to Indy Anderson right away. So I go
over to MD Anderson and this is a.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Houston, Texas, one of the top cancer hospitalities in the.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
World, if not the top. And doctor Lewis Pisters, who
was the eurologist who would have done surgery on me.
He walked into the room with the results of my
biopsy and he said, well, Dwayne, all sixteen of your
samples came back positive. And he said, I can't cure you,
and nobody Ndianis can't cure you. And I was like,
(05:44):
you know, I was like, you said, Shanna. I was
like whoa. And he said, but you know, Dwayne, there
is good news. And I began to think, what could
that possibly. This was Lewis Pisters who said he wouldn't
do surgery and nobody could cure me. He said, he's
the brother of the current CEO of Infensial but he said,
(06:04):
he said, God is still in the healing business and
if you don't mind, I would like to pray for you.
So this on college, this neurologist got down his knees
in his office. Indianerson and he told me and essentially
let me know that God was my only real hope.
And I took and I took that to heart. But
I knew that it was going to be a battle.
So for fourteen years I fought Stage four. From the
(06:25):
very beginning, I went.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So, let's slow this down, Dwaane, because you've told this
story a lot. And I was like, because it's so incredible,
because a doctor, one of the top doctors in the world.
That's right, his last stage of cure was prayer. That's
where you was at, right, that's where you was.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
At, exactly where, exactly exactly it. And I say his
name just in case anybody thinks I'm embellishing. I say
his name just because I know that's his character. He
gave it over to God, and you know.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
It is the wisdom of that moment which gave you
something to hold on too. Because I'm gonna just tell
you all something. When you are told that you have
cancer and Holly can confess to this, I don't care
see to see see, they gave him the door death
is knocking on the door speech. Okay, they told me
(07:20):
we called it just in time, But it didn't matter
because I heard cancer. I thought about my family. I
thought about what I was, what I had done in
my life. I thought about what I'm gonna do tomorrow.
I thought about everything in a matter of seconds and
(07:40):
a matter of seconds, and I would tell you this,
I would and our our This is the blessing that
came out of my situation, Holly and Dwayne, is that
if I was to die, I was all right because
I had in my life. I felt I've given back
as much as I've received. I felt I've changed people's lives.
(08:03):
I felt I had left my family where they would
have been and are today comfortable. I felt that moving ahead,
I was not going to be sad. I was going
to plan the brighter future. So I say that to
everybody who's listening, don't ever wait to that moment to
make changes in your life, because you can do it
right now. I had just been doing it all my life,
(08:24):
and that moment made me realize to live a better life,
continue to do what you do, just do more of it.
And that's why y'all on this call today, because I
want to do more of it. Okay, this is part
of that more of it, Holly, that's part of the
more of it Dwayne talking about what you guys the idea.
Speaker 5 (08:41):
So I know I'm preaching a little bit, but when
you but you know, people think of cancer as a
death sentence, and when you're around once you get diagnosed,
you are around.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
People that are survivors of cancer or their fighting with
fighting cancer, and you realize how prelevant it is. You're
just like, wow, everybody has a cancer story now, like
you're just You're just you didn't realize everybody was attached
to cancer, and now all of a sudden, everyone has
a cancer, even they're a patient. Somebody in their family
(09:18):
had it. So you start realizing, like, we all got
a cancer story.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Yes, you know. Interesting thing, Dwayne was that in eighteen
ninety and I shared it with a previous interview. I
was at my lung collapsed and then you know, thought
was a numro thorax, which is usually happens as Michael
Jackson his lung collapse. Number of athletes they lunched, and
so I stayed in the hotfield thirty days. When you
stay in the hospital thirty consecutive days, you see death.
(09:45):
You make friends with somebody down the hallway and you
come back they're not there at all, Okay, they're gone.
See death is so unnervouing. And guess what and when
when you realize that person's gone, there's nobody to tell
their story. There's nobody tell their story. And so when
Holly came to me about what you guys wanted to
(10:05):
do or an HBCU game, that's telling the story. That's
establishing a legacy and putting the mouthpiece on it. And
your journey of being diagnosed my friends stage four or
fifteen years ago and today you're still able to tell
this story. Congratulations, you have established a foundation. Tell us
about your foundation.
Speaker 4 (10:26):
Well, I wanted to have a foundation. I spent a
lot of time talking to various brothers that I'm repeating
myself over and over again about you know, the sexual
side effects, the emotionals of fatigue, the clinical trials that
are available, trying to convince brothers that TOOKSKI was not
a clinical trial but a criminal conspiracy, and that we
now have people who are in our families that are
(10:48):
running the clinical trials and just the educational portune. Just
trying to educate brothers, trying to be advocates, because I
know that without the advocates that have been in my life,
I probably wouldn't still be around because they're the ones
who forced you to keep going. And so I wanted
to have a foundation that was really rubberly hits the
road man where we we talk raw. If you go
to my website as RAW, I talk about everything that
(11:09):
people probably think that brother wouldn't talk about publicly because
we've got to desensitize brothers and convinced brothers to start speaking.
So I wanted to do a foundation one that would
highlight prostate cancer and get men to start talking again,
because it's it's it's it's it changes the balance of
(11:29):
economic power. When a man dies man that whole family.
In many cases, stuff is a tremendous financial lawssess. So
you got the emotional laws, the financial laws, You've got
so many different issues, the marriages that are broken up.
I wanted to do a foundation that address relationships, that
address health, and address finances, that address you know, sex,
sexual uh, you know, you know, virility and things like that.
(11:52):
So I just wanted to be able to do something
that was really out of the box of geting.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Okay, when we come back, we're going to find out
how you got connected with Holly cotton, you know, misenergize
the buddy. Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back
for more money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to money
Making Conversations master Class hosted by me Rashaun McDonald. Money
Making Conversation master Class continues online at Moneymaking Conversations dot
(12:19):
com and follow money Making Conversations master Class on Facebook,
X and Instagram.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Dwayne reached out to me as a breast cancer survivor,
and every time it comes around to be October, everything
is go pink, Go pink, Go pink, And so what
he wanted to do was emulate the go pink and
have teams adopt the gold blue, the same thing. And
so I come in and I explain to people that
(12:49):
whenever you're looking at the pink for pink out games,
what it does is it raises awareness. It causes women
to say, hmm, is it time for me to get
a mamma room. I've never had one before, or maybe
I had one. Let me follow up. A lot of
people don't know how to get a mammogram. So whenever
they're at the games and they're getting all this information
(13:09):
and they're seeing the piece, it causes them to follow
up with their primary care physician or seek out the resources.
Sometimes they'll have the van in the front where you
can go and you can get a flordy mammogram on site,
or they have local the things like we're doing the
local RVs and and hospitals and stuff. They set up
(13:30):
all of these things for all of these breast cancer
awareness sites and testing. So what Dwayne and I decided
is that we wanted to make sure that men who
were telling their women, hey, have you got have you
got your mammogram? Have you went in, have you you know?
Are you okay? Is everything good? Are you following up?
We want those men to also be worried about their
(13:52):
own health and have resources. And we know that men
have a lot of the same questions. So I come
in and I explain that, you know, we're not deflecting
any of the attention that breast cancer gets. We want
women to continue to get aware, continue to go get tested,
but we just want to share some of that and
(14:14):
have another program with the blue so that men can say, oh, wait,
what when do I even get tested? Wait, I have
a risk for this. I thought you had to be
old to have this, or I thought you had to
get tested a certain way. I didn't know that there
were different options to find out if I have cancer.
So that's why I'm here as a breast cancer survivor
to come in. That's why I'm so excited to be
(14:37):
a part of it. Like you said, Rashan, I'm the
cheerleader because I'm gonna sell this like we we are
rocking it. We fighting for men. You know, y'all been
fighting for us, and it's like it's time for us
to fight for you as well. So that's where I
come in as a breast cancer go pink survivor.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Right Bigger, Absolutely, Dusty Bigger, you know he had prostate cancer.
It's so many brothers that had it. The main thing
is that of all the disparities in cancer, you know,
we got disparities and all kinds of medicine, but of
all the cancers that there are, the greatest disparity there
is of black men versus all other men is in
(15:14):
prostate cancer, where one out of six of us will
be diagnosed with it. One out of six thirty two
thousand men will die this year loans of prostate cancer,
and a good number of those will be African American.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Men, Dwayne and Holly, thank you for allowing me to
have fun with you guys, but also deliver a very
serious message to the black community, especially the black men
in our community. And you roayin and you're gonna be
a new friend in my life. And Holly, I just
can't get rid of her. But again, you know, I
got six sisters, so I know cousins, not be cousins.
Now you know cousins. I don't know her from left field. Again,
(15:50):
thank you for coming on Money Making Conversations Master Class.
Appreciate both of y'all we talked too. This has been
Money Making Conversation Masterclass with me Rashaan McDonald. Ks to
our guests and our audience. Visit Moneymakingconversations dot com to
listen or register to be a guest on my show.
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