Jan Elaine Adrian

Janice Elaine Adrian passed away at her home in Sacramento, California, on October 30, 2025, in the company of family and loved ones.

Jan was born on December 8, 1941, in Reedley, California, the only child of Samuel Harry Adrian and Verna Alice (Friesen) Adrian. She graduated from Roosevelt High School in Fresno, and attended Tabor College in Kansas before graduating from Fresno State College. She went on to earn her MSW in Psychiatric Social Work from UCLA in 1966.

In 1972, she married Robert (Bob) Conn, and they had a son, Brian Conn. Although they divorced in 1978, Bob and Jan remained friends throughout their lives. She married Michael Baetge in 1992, and they divorced in 2003.

Jan is widely remembered as a leader in the cancer world for her work educating people on the important role of body, mind, and spirit in cancer and all illness. After working for several years as a psychiatric social worker, in 1978 she co-founded the Center for Health Awareness, offering resources and seminars in personal growth; in 1989, when she was first diagnosed with breast cancer, her background taught her that there was more to healing than chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery. Wanting to help cancer patients and survivors focus on healing the whole person, in 1994 she became the Founder and Executive Director of Healing Journeys, a nonprofit formed to produce the conference Cancer as a Turning Point: From Surviving to Thriving.

These conferences, which brought together cancer patients and anyone else touched by cancer or another life-altering condition, along with physicians, nutritionists, musicians, comedians, dramatists, and patients’ friends and families, were offered free nationwide to over 25,000 participants for 25 years. Jan’s desire was to be an instrument of caring; the thousands of people whose lives she touched will remember her, as she wished, as a true and faithful servant.

In 2023 Jan published her memoir, Coloring Outside the Lines: Surviving and Thriving with Cancer for 30+ years.

Jan is survived by her son, Brian; former sister-in-law and close friend Carolyn Conn Chamberlain, the mother of Jan’s nephews David and Jason Roth; dear friend Kerry Freeman; longtime friend and colleague Georgia Peach; numerous other friends and relatives; and the many spiritual and personal growth communities of which she was a vital member.

A Celebration of Life is planned for 1–3pm PST on January 24, 2026, at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Sacramento. For those who cannot attend, the ceremony will be livestreamed at https://youtube.com/@uusstv?si=OrCskAuuypO7HWqo.