‘We’ve maintained a veil of discretion,’ the former first lady writes in her new memoir.

Jill Biden says she and Joe are ‘old-fashioned,’ don’t talk about ‘personal health’ with each other

'We've maintained a veil of discretion,' the former first lady writes in her new memoir.

By Leigh Blickley

June 2, 2026 10:52 a.m. ET

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Joe Biden and Jill Biden in the White House in 2024. Credit:

Jabin Botsford/Getty

- Jill Biden writes in her new memoir, *View From the East Wing*, that she and Joe Biden are "old-fashioned."

- She claims they don't share details of their personal health with each other.

- Jill also says she saw signs of Joe's health struggles while in office, but was "shocked" by his prostate cancer diagnosis.

Jill Biden had an inkling her husband, former president Joe Biden, was facing a health battle during his time in office — but assumptions were really all she had when it came to his personal health.

In her new memoir, *View From the East Wing* — published Tuesday — Jill, 74, shared that she and Joe, 83, have an "old-fashioned" approach to marital conversation, particularly around each other's health.

"While it surely sounds old-fashioned that I spoke to the doctors [about his prostate] rather than to Joe directly, it’s always been the nature of our relationship that we’ve maintained a veil of discretion around personal health," she wrote in the book, according to CNN. "When I went through menopause, I never spoke about it with him, even though I experienced two years of horrible insomnia."

Jill admitted that before Joe was diagnosed with an aggressive form of metastatic prostate cancer in May 2025, she noticed signs that he was unwell while serving his presidential term.

"In the year before we left the White House, Joe began waking up repeatedly at night. This symptom, I knew, was common in men his age,” Jill claimed, noting that she alerted his doctor: "'Joe was up seven times last night.… I’m worried about him.'"

Jill Biden's 'View From the East Wing'.

Simon and Schuster

The former first lady said she was "stunned" to eventually learn his diagnosis but felt that, while president, he was "definitely aging" yet "very much up to the job."

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She quickly turned her shock into support as her husband underwent radiation and continues hormone therapy, which, she said, causes side effects including "fatigue and moodiness." He also underwent skin cancer surgery in September 2025.

During an interview with *Today* on Monday, Jill gave an update on the former president's health, saying, "The fact that [the cancer] metastasized to his bones, that makes it a whole different story."

"I think Joe will live with cancer [for] the rest of his life," she told host Craig Melvin.

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As for Joe's decision to ultimately drop out of the presidential race 107 days before the 2024 election, Jill reiterated to Melvin that, although her husband was aging, he completed his job with full gusto every day while in office. The June 2024 debate with President Donald Trump, she insisted — during which Joe's cognitive ability came into question — changed everything.

"The doctors did assure us he was healthy," Jill said on *Today*. "And I saw him doing the job every single day. Every single day, he got up, he went into the office, he did the job, he passed bipartisan legislation. I saw him work hours into the night. Yes, did I see him slowing down a little bit when he got tired? Did he stutter a little bit at night? Yeah, sure, but he was still doing the job, and he was doing a good job."

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