Testicular Cancer: Talking About Loss, Music and Life from a Stepbrother's Perspective

Will Thompson talks about losing his stepbrother Max Mallory to testicular cancer, the drug-related death of a close friend, and then dealing with life after these losses. An accomplished musician and sound professional, Will talks about the role of music in his life and happiness. 

[00:01:03] Coping with loss. 

[00:05:11] Testicular cancer awareness. 

[00:07:39] Undiagnosed illness and healthcare. 

[00:10:58] Raising awareness for cancer. 

[00:14:40] Testicular cancer awareness. 

[00:18:55] Recording studio venue dream. 

[00:21:28] Learning video editing skills. 

[00:25:46] Favorite song. 

[00:27:53] Creativity and life.

 Enjoy this episode of Don't Give Up on Testicular Cancer from the Max Mallory Foundation. 

Transcript

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Testicular Cancer: Talking about Loss, Music and Life from a Stepbrother’s Perspective 

Don’t Give Up on Testicular Cancer

Season 3, Episode 6

Show Notes -Time Codes

{00:01:03] Coping with loss. 

[00:05:11] Testicular cancer awareness. 

[00:07:39] Undiagnosed illness and healthcare. 

[00:10:58] Raising awareness for cancer. 

[00:14:40] Testicular cancer awareness. 

[00:18:55] Recording studio venue dream. 

[00:21:28] Learning video editing skills. 

[00:25:46] Favorite party song. 

[00:27:53] Creativity and substance use.

Intro

00:00 Welcome to Don't Give Up on Testicular Cancer, a podcast where testicular cancer survivors, caregivers, and others who have navigated the cancer journey share their stories. The podcast comes to you from the Max Mallory Foundation, a nonprofit family foundation focused on educating about testicular cancer in honor and in memory of Max Mallory, who died in 2016 at the young age of 22 from testicular cancer. Had he survived, Max wanted to help young adults with cancer. This podcast helps meet that goal.

00:43 Here now is your host, Joyce Lofstrom, Max's mom, and a young adult cancer survivor. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Hi, this is Joyce. With me today is William Hertzog Thompson Jr., known as Will. Will's my stepson, but Will is also someone who can talk about loss, losing a stepbrother, Max Mallory, losing other friends in the last two years, and just, you know, how that affects you as a family member. Will's also a very accomplished sound production music person and bass guitarist, and we're going to talk about music as well. So Will, glad you're here. Welcome.

WILL THOMPSON 

01:23: Hey, Joyce. Thank you for having me on the podcast. I've never been on a podcast before, but I certainly listen to lots of them. Yes, as you mentioned, I knew Max for too short of a time because I think I entered your guys' life when I was about 20, and Max passed away when I was 26. It was a very, very, very strange time. 

WILL THOMPSON

I've experienced loss and not necessarily even like loss. That's just somebody passing away, but my mother had multiple strokes when I was 19, which precipitated reconnecting with my father, your partner, Bill. And over the past three or four years, I've had some friends that have been caught up in the fentanyl epidemic. One of them, as you know, dying in a hotel room by himself in New Orleans, just devastating. And yeah, so there's been a lot of loss and I've definitely experienced it with you guys quite a bit. I'm an artist. I consider myself an artist. There's a lot of trauma that comes that turns us into artists, and then we turn into artists, and then the artists end up rehashing their own trauma. It's just a tale as old as time, I feel like. So that's kind of like my story and a little bit of my involvement with living with you guys and my experience.

JOYCE LOFSTROM

02:46 Well, I'm glad you can explain that too, because I called you my stepson. You’re my stepson or official stepson, but not by legal definition.

WILL THOMPSON

02:57 Yeah, for the listener, you're not married to my dad, but it's the same. It's like my brother. All of my siblings are half-siblings, but they're my brother and my sister. At the end of the day, in this day and age, even friends, I feel like. My friends raised me. I say that all the time, my friends and their parents. 

So, I had this hodgepodge kind of latchkey upbringing. And so, I've always had that viewpoint about, well, if you come to a certain point in a relationship with somebody, it's like their family. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM  

03:29 I agree. Yeah. My friends have always been my family throughout the years of my life. I still have very close friends from kindergarten up that I rely on and call and hang out with and all of that. So, I think friendships are so vital in life. 

WILL THOMPSON 

03:47 So agreed. Oh, Joyce, I'm looking at, we're in the same, to the listener, we're in the same home right now. We're doing this in Zoom, over Zoom. I'm looking at a Cardinal, a female Cardinal that just was outside of our window. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Oh really? 

WILL THOMPSON

Anyway. Yeah. It's really nice here this time of year in Chicago. But obviously, with respect to the theme of this podcast, or I mean, I know it has evolving themes, but it's, you know, it was obviously, its genesis was in the passing of Max from testicular cancer. 

And you've interviewed so many wonderful young men about, you know, their experience with the disease and cancer in general and loss and all of these things that come with it. I mean, I'm so grateful that, you know, knock on wood that I've never experienced what that's like, like a cancer diagnosis and going through all that stuff. 

I mean, you have so many times as the listener knows, but, you know, I do, you know, there's so much that happens in, you know, in this world with relation to cancer that affects so many people. I mean, it's crazy. I can’t think of another disease that has really become so public and focused on and so much money poured into finding a cure for it because it really is just the scariest thing in the world.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

05:37 It is. And especially testicular cancer for young men because, as you know, I mean, many of the people I've talked to either don't check their testicles or if they find something, they're afraid to say anything, and they let it go too long. It's a really aggressive cancer. I mean, it's deadly if you don't take care of it. Go ahead.

WILL THOMPSON 

05:27 I was just going to say, I was just going to comment, I think, like, in that, I mean, I think we're lucky in, like, the current social climate and you've got the kids. I mean, I'm 33, so I'm a millennial, but you've got these Gen Z kids really just making people feel OK about these sorts of things. And, you know, I feel like if I was probably maybe 10 years younger or something like that, and I was checking and I found a lump or something like that, I'd be much less reluctant to go see a doctor than maybe 10 years ago when I was that age. 

Don't you feel like it's almost like the 60s again, where, like, these kids are like, you need to be open with your sexuality and your body and body positivity and all this stuff? And I think that's really, really important. And I think that's really going to translate to people checking themselves and not being embarrassed to go to their doctors and go to their parents, even, or peers or whatever, and say, like, hey, like I’m concerned about this.

WILL THOMPSON

06:28 Like, what should I do? And I think a lot of it is awareness that testicular cancer even exists because a lot of these young men said, I didn't know. I've never heard of that before. And, yeah, I just thought. That's wild. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

I interviewed somebody last week who said just what you said. He's like 36 now, but he was 24 when he had a lump on his testicle. And he said, you know, I thought I could handle it. But at 24, you can't. You have no idea really, you know. His parents helped him. But he waited three or four months before he went to a doctor. And, you know, it's the same thing. You're embarrassed. You don't want to say anything. He was worried about money with health insurance.

WILL THOMPSON 

07:13 That's the other huge thing is that I have chronic illnesses that you know about, but. I mean, they would be manageable, at least to a degree, if we had some sort of, not to dive into politics too much, but some sort of single-payer health care system. And just like it's almost like you have to be really rich or really poor in order to get health care in this country. And it's really sad because a lot of people, like you just mentioned, will let things go undiagnosed and then they eventually die. 

And that's, you know, it's just not the way our system should work. And another thing is, is like, you know, people are stigmatized for diseases in this country, which is weird to me. I can understand why young men would be again, reluctant to talk about testicular cancer because they're talking about their private parts, so to speak. But, you know, I think it must have been especially really hard in, in like the 80s and 90s with HIV and AIDS too. So, I try to like, because history really repeats itself in that respect. And when these scary things come out and people are starting to die. 

I mean, you can look at COVID. People make irrational decisions, and people start judging people. So, it's totally understandable why you would have young men be like, do I really want to go to the doctor and have them feel my balls? 

I get it too, especially, especially if you're under the age of 18 or you're not comfortable with your body yet. It's not even a sexually related thing. It's just that like, once, once you are post-pubescent and are doing things, you have an active sexual life or whatever, you know, you're more comfortable with your body and kind of like. Talking to the doctor about certain things. I think men need to take a cue from women in that respect because men, there is this, you know, give me just a second. I'm going to let our dog out because.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

09:12 No, it's okay. Yes. We have a wonderful, Will has his Golden Retriever, Strider. He's a great dog.

WILL THOMPSON 

This is my golden retriever. Yes. Yes. He likes to be around.

JOYCE LOFSTROM

I was just going to say he likes to be around everybody. So that's all. Go ahead.

.

WILL THOMPSON 

09:27 He also likes to have the option as to whether he wants to, you know, at will go in and out of a room. So, or outside of the house. It's typical dog behavior. They're like, no, I want the door open. It's like, no, you choose. 

No, but I just, the point, to finish the point I was making is that I think men, women, women are forced to take a, or at least how to put this politically correct, vagina-having people, I guess. 

So, you know, people who identify as women, people who don't necessarily have identify as women, but have a vagina, blah, blah, are forced to acknowledge these health issues, you know, from the age of 13 or younger or whatever. And so, as a result, I, you know, and I've listened to doctors on podcasts and stuff that says, it's just the male brain does not mature as quickly as the female brain. 

I'm not knocking my gender or whatever, but, or sex, but it, but you know, at the end of the day, I think an 18-year-old young woman would be much more proactive about seeing a lump on her chest than maybe a man would a lump on his testicles. 

And that's just my opinion because I think you get your period when you're 13. It's like, you've got to deal with these things. You've got to go see an OBGYN, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Men just ride things out until the wheels fall off. I've noticed a lot. And it's a stereotype, but a lot of the time it's true. And that's, I think what, you know, part of bringing awareness to testicular cancer is, you know, it's, it's important.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

11:11 Well, you know, you hit on a couple of important points, and one is women, you know, checking for lumps in their breasts, which really did not come to fruition until Susan Komen's foundation started because women didn't do it. You know, they really had the money, and they were able to set up that foundation and publicize what to do and why you should do it because of the death of, it was Susan, I think. 

WILL THOMPSON

It was Susan G. Komen, I think. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Right. And her sister started before. How long? It's been, like I said, they had the money to get the word out and publicize it. But yeah, I'm sure you've heard it on NPR. They have a big like walk every year for breast cancer. Like I think it's a couple of days. They raised a lot of money, and women started to speak out about breast cancer. When that started. And I'd have to look it up. I can't remember what year it started, but, you know, then Betty Ford came out. She had breast cancer and talked about it and then famous, you know, people started to talk about it. 

And so that's what we're trying to get done with testicular cancer, even though there are, I mean, Lance Armstrong, no matter what you think about him, he's someone who had a very advanced form of testicular cancer and survived.

WILL THOMPSON

12:28 I mean, it's too bad that all that other stuff happened because he was such a beacon. And he still can be, I guess, you know, Livestrong Foundation still exists without him, from what I understand. It does. So, you know, and it's and that's great. I think people are too uncomfortable with their bodies and it's a stigma that's just been forever perpetuated by whatever you want to call it. Not even necessarily like, like religion, but modesty. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

12:57 Yeah. 

WILL THOMPSON

Part of it's religion, I think too, but we won't get into that right now.

13:00 I mean, I don't want to trash anybody's religion. I don't want to make it seem like, but there is like, you know, when you are preaching the tenets of like a certain faith system or belief or whatever, and it becomes a foundation of a, you know, a country, whether, you know, whether we're a secular country or not. I mean, it's a lot of our laws and stuff are based heavily on biblical stuff and religious stuff. So, it's, you know, it's going to, it's going to seep into those sorts of things. But yeah, that’s a tangent.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

13:32 Well, I remember you told me you asked a friend of yours who's a physician about, you know, a young man comes in or a teenager because some teenagers have also gotten testicular cancer. And like, do you, as a doctor, check that patient's testicles? And didn't she say that that's just a normal thing that's part of an exam now?

WILL THOMPSON 

13:55 What I understand, I mean, I never didn't have a check. Although I thought it takes two seconds, although I did think it was weird. I did see last time I saw my PCP, she was like, do you do you want me to check? And I'm like, that's a little lazy.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

14:13 Yeah, it is.

WILL THOMPSON

It's just, yeah, I'm going to do it. But I'm not going to knock my PCP. I think she understands that. You know what it is? She understands that I, what I've, what this family has been through. She knows that I check, and I know. 

So, there's that I should also mention that for my generation, an amazing, amazing, amazing thing happened when well, it wasn't amazing that this happened, but an amazing thing came out of the comedian actor, Tom Green, getting testicular cancer in, I think, 1999, 2000 or something like that. And that was right after he had that. Totally off-the-wall show where he would prank his parents. 

And it was part of that whole MTV jackass generation thing that, you know, my peers and I grew up with, but I believe Tom Green did this amazing thing where he set up a thing with MTV. And he aired his entire testicular cancer, like testicle removal surgery. And they just they just aired it like live. And so, he's always been a proponent of that. And as somebody who's so funny and so, you know, who's been like kind of a defining, whatever, a public figure in terms of entertainment in my generation, I think it was important for him to do that, especially in the early 2000s. I mean, that was like 22 years ago when he did this.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

13:44 So I'll have to watch that. I don't think I was aware of that.

WILL THOMPSON

I knew he had. I mean, I don't know how fun it is to watch the surgery itself, but there's probably content around it. I can't recall, but it you should. Yes, it's definitely worth looking into. And he talks about it on other podcasts and stuff. So, but that was groundbreaking.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

16:05 I think it is. No, it is. I mean, there's a guy in the UK and of course, I can't remember his name, but he's in some kind of soap opera and he and his brother had testicular cancer. He didn't. But he went on TV and live and had a doctor there who showed men, you know, with the cameras on, and they showed that the doctor showed how to examine your testicles, and they did it on TV in Britain, which I thought was wonderful to be able to do that. 

So that's the kind of stuff you have to get out there to, you know, raise awareness, I think. But you talked about Tom Green. I think that's a good transition to it. I want to talk a little bit about music and just kind of what you're doing because I think it's important. 

Well, people just know more about what we're talking about and beyond testicular cancer. So, talk about your music, your band, and your sound experience, and all of that.

WILL THOMPSON 

17:07 Sure. Yeah, it goes. It's a long story. I mean, it goes back a long. I started writing and performing music when I was well. Again, I'm 33 now and we had our, and it wasn't just like putting around in the garage. Like we started taking it seriously because we wanted to. We were part of this kind of like pop-punk movement that was or influence that was sort of started with bands like Green Day and Blink 182. 

And so, you know, and then eventually we got into deeper punk stuff. But that's kind of what opened it up. To us and I found a couple of friends who miraculously, it took me two years to find a drummer now. It was miraculous that in my middle school, I could find three guys to kind of like. Figure out how to do this thing with. And so, as a result, we were playing shows when we were 14 and then all the way through 16, and then I hadn't been in a band in a long time until recently. 

But in the meantime, I am very much into audio production, and I've been fortunate enough to have some six degrees of set, like, you know, like a couple of degrees of separation away from very people who are who are both making a living doing music and have a level of fame and just those behind the scenes who are incredibly talented, like my recording and writing partner, Max Steger, who now lives in L.A. And straight up just makes a living recording bands. And that's kind of my dream is to work in the entertainment field. 

Somehow, I've recently come up with sort of an idea because I like creating things. I just am not the best at monetizing them. So, it's I've come up with this idea where I kind of want to have like a recording studio venue, sort of like bar restaurant or it's like bar sandwich shop kind of thing. And this is just my pipe dream or whatever. This is my dream, I guess, now, because it's a lot more realistic than becoming a rock star. 

But to the listeners, like I spent quite a bit of time in commercial real estate, and I understand construction and stuff like that. So, I'd like to take my talents and kind of and just, you know, figure out a way to combine them all. But unfortunately, I'm 33 and I need to get my act together with respect to just, you know, keeping a regular paycheck coming in while I'm able to do that kind of thing. 

But yeah, so I mean, I'm a guitar player. I'm an audio engineer. I helped set up this podcast today because I think we were having some trouble with the interview interface, but it's something I love doing. I got gratification out of accomplishing that. So we could have this conversation. So, it's just something I love doing. And if you can make money doing something you love, then that's great. But, you know, I'm not at that point quite yet.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

You'll get there. But I think Yeah, go ahead.

.

WILL THOMPSON 

19:55 I was just going to say, but I mean, I do have friends that inspire me. That I was admittedly jealous of before, but they're making, I mean, one of my friends has, I think, half a million followers on Instagram. And before Blink 182, the band I mentioned, went and played Coachella this weekend, Mark Hoppus, who's the bass player and one of the singers of Blink 182. He's ultimately my hero in music. Why I started playing. He was direct messaging my friend Pete, he was saying, he was like, I'm listening to your album right now, getting pumped to play Coachella. And I was just like, I couldn't help but be jealous. You know what I mean? 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Yeah, I do. 

WILL THOMPSON

But it also motivated me to work that much harder. So, you know, I thank my lucky stars that I don't have to be dealing with, you know, some horrifying disease so that I can do that. And it's really humbling to have this conversation.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

20:54 Well, I think your point about the podcast, you did help me figure out how to set up all of this on Zoom and the audio because I have done a couple that have bad sound because I couldn't figure it out. And so that's a real talent to be able to do that because that's such, everybody's doing recordings now, whether it's for work like this, like a Zoom kind of thing. And the sound is the foundation of that.

WILL THOMPSON 

21:22 So it's all well. And the thing I really need to get into is video editing because that's really what it's about now. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Yes, it is. 

WILL THOMPSON

Video people are doing video podcasts, and they're doing live switching on the like, you know, switching between cameras like they do on TV. And that's really something I want to learn. But yeah, no, it's a good skill to have, but it's all autodidactical. I mean, although I did go to, you know, a semester of recording school, and I learned quite a bit, everything I've learned is really from experience. I've had no formal training or education. 

And, you know, it's I think people if you want to learn how to do something, the resources are at your fingertips now. And it's amazing because when I was starting off, it was kind of like, how do I get into a studio so I can watch what this person is doing to figure this out and so on and so on? I mean, it was, you know, all apprenticeship learning. Like everything has been for thousands of years. And along with this. And now I can take my phone out of my pocket and, you know, it's whatever. Like, don't quote me on the figure, but what is it like? Six hundred times more powerful than the computer that we put people on the moon with. 

I was just given the Internet and, you know, a key to my house when I was little because I grew up with a single mom who worked. And, you know, doing those sorts of things. First, that ingratiated me like into the counterculture of punk rock because it was like, you know, a single kid of a doer's parents, which is kind of that archetype. But like latchkey kid, whatever. But I was also forced really forced to figure out how to do anything that I wanted to make happen. 

Also, my brother, you know, would give me pirated discs for Photoshop and stuff like that back way, way, way long time ago, like 22 years ago. So, I was able to learn how to use those things from an early age. And it just came out of necessity for the music stuff. And so, because of that, it's forced into, you know, and now it's called content creation. And now it's called, you know, there's all these buzzwords around kind of what I was doing when I was 12, and there were different names for it. So, yeah, that's kind of like how I'm going to music. I just want to make it work. It's my purpose, I think. So that's you know, I think we all need purpose.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

23:51 Yes, we do. We do. So, well. I know you've done a lot, so we'll have to keep that and have you back to tell us what's happening with it.

WILL THOMPSON 

Yeah, this is fun. I've never, as I said before you hit record, like I've never recorded a podcast before, but I mean, I'm going to be listening to one after we get off. I like I listen to podcasts all the time. I love being on the mic. I love performing. I think it's fun. I would start one of my own if I had something I thought, you know, I could talk about, but yeah, so appreciate you having me on.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

24:26 Oh, no, I mean, I wanted to just because of your connection to Max and to me. 

WILL THOMPSON

And, you know, but one of the greatest people ever to live. Yeah, it was. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

He was a great, great young man. So, my last question, well, is what song when you hear it, you have to sing along to it?

WILL THOMPSON 

24:41 Oh, I mean, there are so many. Probably, the first thing that comes to mind. I'm just going to give it because it's a silly answer, but it's Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus. You were, I bet you weren't expecting…you thought 

JOYCE LOFSTOM

24:56 I was going to say some Beatles song or Led Zeppelin. 

WILL THOMPSON 

That's more like I'm like in a zone, and I'm just listening. I listen to albums all the way through. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

They're hard to sing along to, though, I think, Led Zeppelin. 

WILL THOMPSON

So, yeah, I mean, he sings crazy. And, you know, when it is one of those that Led Zeppelin is one of those bands where you kind of like if you're with friends, and you're in a loud environment, you can belt it out, and it's fun and stuff like that. But if I'm if I'm in the car and a song comes out on the radio and I like I'm not going to flip the station, it's going to be some pop hit from when I was probably 18. you know, because I stopped paying attention, which I really should have my finger on the pulse of if I'm if I want to do music for a living. 

But yeah, so I'm going to call it Miley's Party in the USA. That's my number one.

25:50 Is that a question you ask people? 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Yeah, I do. I do. 

WILL THOMPSON

Oh, that's great. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

And my answer is always the Beatles or Motown. I love Motown. 

WILL THOMPSON

What song? 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Oh, gosh, any of them. But I said Twist and Shout for the last podcast. I like all that early stuff, like I Want to Hold Your Hand.

WILL THOMPSON 

26:08 Yeah, I think it's funny when people are like people. People don't know that Twist and Shout isn't a Beatles song.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

I know it isn't. 

WILL THOMPSON

Yeah, it's somebody else's. It's so funny. Yeah, because it's like because they just like defined it, Kansas City. That's another one, it's not their song. They didn't write it.

JOYCE LOFSTROM

But because I'm from Kansas City, I like that song, too.

WILL THOMPSON 

26:27 But yeah, of course. Also, it was there was this weird thing in the and I think people are doing it more now, but like, when I was growing up, if you wanted to do a cover of a song and like put it on an album, it would be like uncouth if the song wasn't like a certain number of years old, and you didn't do it in your own kind of spin now or like back in the what I've noticed in like the 50s, the 60s and even like the 70s. 

There were people where a song would come out from the original songwriters and then an even better version of that song would be covered by someone a couple of months later. You know what I mean? 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

I know. Yeah. 

WILL THOMPSON

Like how that Joe Cocker version of I Get by with a Little Help from My Friends. I mean, that song had come out like a year prior. And then that version was huge at Woodstock. Big Beatles fan, too, as you know.

JOYCE LOFSTROM  

27:29 Oh, yes, I do. So, we'll have to do another podcast and talk about artists and music

.

WILL THOMPSON

So, yeah, it's fun, as you know, I love podcasts. We can tie it into helping people deal with cancer, you know, if you have a good song in your head or whatever.

WILL THOMPSON 

27:44 So, yeah, I mean, it's also if you have any sort of hobby and you're grieving from anything or even yourself or the prospect of your future or whatever, dive into it and forget about everything else for a second. That's my advice to anyone. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

Yeah, that's good. That's a good way. 

WILL THOMPSON

Don't turn to drugs or alcohol because it's too easy. I mean, that's another conversation. But if you have a predisposition to that, don't let it be your that's my word to anyone is, don't let it be your crutch. And don't think that if you are creative and you are a regular substance user, don't think that you're going to lose your ability to create if you stop doing those things, because it’s not true.

JOYCE LOFSTROM 

28:29 I agree. It's not true. 

WILL THOMPSON

So that's my message to the world. 

JOYCE LOFSTROM

OK, that's a good way to end. So, thanks for being with me today and getting the podcast set up.

CLOSING

28:56 Thank you for listening to this episode of Don't Give Up on Testicular Cancer. If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe to our program on your favorite podcast directory.

You can also visit the Max Mallory Foundation at www.MaxMalloryFoundation.com/ podcast to listen to previous podcast episodes or donate to the foundation. Join us again next time for another episode of Don't Give Up on Testicular Cancer.


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