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Young mother of 2 babies succumbs to rare cancer

GeneralYoung mother of 2 babies succumbs to rare cancer
Two young boys are motherless after a rare and dreadful bout of cancer claimed the life of their beloved mother on Saturday, October 2, at the San Ignacio Hospital.
  
Joweth Jones, 23, originally of Georgetown, Stann Creek, was the common-law wife of famous Belizean singer, Garif Valentine, who goes by the popular name Positive Vibes, and mother of his two sons – Jamir, 4, and Garif, Jr., age 1. A grief-stricken Valentine told Amandala that they had been together almost eight years.
  
The post-mortem certified by Dr. Fidel Cuellar said that Jones died from metastasis (or the spread of cancer) to her intestines. She had been diagnosed seven months earlier with a malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor.
  
Joweth was a very quiet person with a very good personality, “uplifting,” recalled Valentine. “She sincerely loved her family.”
  
According to Valentine, doctors suspect that Jones was born with a condition that caused her terminal cancer or made her susceptible to the disease, but she found out too late that she was ill.
  
The doctors advised, he said, that the children be checked as they are growing up, because they may be genetically predisposed to the cancer as well.
  
Jones was an orphan, having been predeceased by both parents – Rosalind Alvarez and Joel Jay Jones. However, Valentine could not tell us what had caused their deaths. (Jones had also lost a daughter, Jamira Valentine.)
  
While the news of her illness had devastated her initially, Jones came to terms with her condition, said Valentine.
  
Asked if she was able to experience any last wishes, Valentine responded: “She wanted to see her son [Jamir] in [preschool] uniform and she got to see that.”
  
Jones had suffered severe pain up until her death on Saturday, October 2. Positive Vibes said that last week he brought the children from San Ignacio to Belize City, where their aunt would take care of them. On his way back to be with Joweth, he received the heartbreaking news that she had already passed.
  
She will be buried in San Ignacio after a funeral at Sacred Heart Church. The body will lie in state at 1:00 p.m. for funeral services at 2:00 p.m.
  
A bus will leave Pound Yard, Belize City, at 11:00 a.m. for people wishing to attend the funeral.
   
Jones is also survived by her sisters: Alpha, Sylvia, Tilan (residing in New York), Mrs. Letty Usher, and Michelle Hendy; brother – Roy Zuniga; aunts: Ancenciona Castillo, Rosita Thompson (residing in Miami) and Bernadine Zuniga; uncle – Aaron Zuniga, Sr.;1 niece, 6 nephews and a host of other relatives and friends.

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