Arthur & Jan Putt Testimonial | Mesothelioma Hope

What we do every night is sit together and watch TV. Then at 7, we have our ice cream bar. My name is Jan Putt, and I’m married to Art, who was diagnosed with mesothelioma in April of 2018. Originally, the doctor said he would have possibly 6 months to a year, and that was four years ago. So, I love it—I still have him. I feel sorry for someone who loses a loved one and doesn’t have that time to say what they think or how they feel. We do it every day, and it’s been that way even before this happened.

We did everything together: remodeling our homes and things like that, like his woodworking. We used to go out for long drives, just enjoying the scenery. We’d be gone for four or five hours, but we never got tired of being together. His very early symptoms were just a light, hacky cough, and I couldn’t get him to see the doctor until it got worse. One day, he decided he should go see someone. They did an x-ray and thought he had pneumonia, but the radiologist wasn’t satisfied and wanted more tests. They did some scans, and that was the first time they said he had mesothelioma.

It was kind of good to know there was no cure for it, in a way. From that point on, I was able to make the best out of life. We just stayed positive. I felt lucky to have time to spend quality moments with him, to say what I wanted to say, instead of him being gone suddenly. We cherish every day.

I really wasn’t much of a mechanic at first. I got a job at a service station, where we did a lot of brakes. That was probably our second-busiest task besides tune-ups. We did it the old-fashioned way, and there was dust everywhere. We filed a mesothelioma lawsuit because we had family members who encouraged us to do it. Our daughter in Indiana knew someone who had worked with Simmons Hanly Conroy and had a very good experience.