Dog the Bounty Hunter’s Wife Beth Reveals How Cancer Diagnosis Has Changed Her

After being diagnosed with throat cancer in August, Dog the Bounty Hunter‘s Wife Beth Chapman said her mindset changed dramatically.

Dog and Beth chronicled her surgery to remove a massive tumor from her throat Monday in the Dog & Beth: Fight of Their Lives special.

“We just share everything with our fans. And this wasn’t something that you could keep secret. It wasn’t going to be an easy battle by any means,” Beth explained to Fox News. “And so, after doing a lot of research about it, I just felt that being open and honest with our fans, who’ve been so loyal to us for so many years, was the best thing to do.”

She continued: “There are literally hundreds of fans that contact me on a day-to-day basis that say, ‘I watch you every day while I’m doing my radiation.’ ‘I’m watching you every day while I do chemo.’ And those words just didn’t resonate as they should have, or as they do now.”

Beth said maintaining a positive attitude throughout her treatment has been the key to keeping herself going.

“You can’t let it overtake your brain,” she said. “You can’t become desperate and alone. You’ve gotta fight your way through it, maintain a positive attitude and surround yourself with people who are going to help you get through it.”

Immediately following her diagnosis, however, Beth said her mind was in a dark place. But putting faith in her loved ones carried her through.

“Listen, the first week all you think about is death,” she said. “You think of how long do you have, what can you accomplish in that short time, you WebMD it, you contact Dr. Google – and all of those places are the wrong places to seek information, honestly. It took quite a quite a few people. Friends, my husband, who is amazingly positive all the time. And he doesn’t utter negative words.”

She continued: “So after the first week, my mind shifted from death to life. And how I was going to survive, how I was going to make it… I was going to need love and encouragement.”