Not Uncle Joey! Full House star Dave Coulier had some sad news to announce to fans. He confirmed that doctors diagnosed him with Stage 3 non-Hodgkin lymphoma. It's a type of blood cancer.
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Coulier told TODAY that he first started noticing symptoms about a month ago. He was under the weather and also found a golf-ball sized lump in his groin.
"It swelled up immediately," Coulier said. "I thought, 'Wow, I'm either really sick, or my body's really reacting to something.'" He immediately booked a doctor's appointment. While tests came back normal, doctors were worried about why it grew so fast. .
"(My doctors) said, 'Hey, we wish we had better news, but you have non-Hodgkin lymphoma, B-cell lymphoma,'" Coulier recalls. "It was a shock."
"The first thing I said to them was, 'Wait a minute — cancer?'" he Coulier. "(I was) feeling like I got punched in the stomach because it never happens to you. You always hear about it happening to someone else."
Dave Coulier Talks Cancer Battle
The actor is still trying to maintain the humor in his life. "My joke is that in four short weeks I've gone from a Virgo to a Cancer," he says. "I've tried to retain a sense of reality but also a sense of humor about it."
In fact, his wife inititally thought he was joking when he first told her about it. She didn't believe him at first, thinking it was some clever ruse.
"I was just contemplating, 'How do I tell her?'" he says. "When I told her, of course, she thought I was joking."
However, she quickly realized he was telling the truth and has been a rock for the actor through this battle. Doctors took bone marrow samples to determine the stage of cancer he had.
"I told Melissa I don't know why, but I (am) OK with whatever the news (is) going to be no matter how devastating. ... I can't explain where that came from," he says. "I've had an incredible life. I've had the most amazing people in my life. This has been an extraordinary journey, and I'm OK if this is the end of the journey."
Still, Coulier plans to fight the cancer with everything that he has.
"You hear chemo, and it scares the daylights out of you," he says. "The first round was pretty intense because you don't know what to expect. You don't know how you're going to feel. Is this going to hit me immediately? Is it going to be devastating? Am I going to walk out of here?"
Currently, he's going through six rounds of chemo. In 2025, he hopes the treatment will make the cancer go into total remission.
"It's been a bit of a roller coaster. There (are) days where I feel unbelievable," he says. "Then there's other days where ... I'm just going to lay down and let this be what it's going to be."
