LINDA HARGROVE

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from Linda's Personal Journal..............

THE CHALLENGER AND THE CHALLENGE

     Most people recall what they were doing January 28, 1986. That was the day that the Challenger Space Shuttle blew up seven minutes or so after it was launched, killing the six astronauts and one schoolteacher that were aboard. Millions of people, especially young children watched the horror in real time and those who missed that were able to watch it as many times as they cared to as it was replayed time after time after time.
     I was married, living in Nashville and was at the dentist having my teeth cleaned. Sitting there in the chair listening to the radio station piped into the room, the music was interrupted and the announcer gave the tragic news. For the rest of the day it was all the talk around town and on all the networks.

     As tragic as the Challenger incident was, January 28, 1986 is more memorable to me for another reason. At 3:00 P.M. that afternoon I had an appointment with Dr. John Holyfield to hear the results of some blood tests that I undergone a few days before. My husband, Charlie tricked me into going to the doctor a week earlier because of some digestive problems I was having. I had some routine blood tests done in the doctor’s office, but Dr. Holyfield had called me up the next day asking me to go to Westside Hospital for another test called a bone marrow aspiration. They said they thought I might have mononucleosis and they wanted to check further for that. I went and had the aspiration. It was quite painful and I was quite thankful when it was over, as I don’t do well in a painful setting.
     At 3:00 PM Charlie and I went to Dr. Holyfield's office. The nurses had a TV set up in the waiting room and all the patients were watching the news about the Challenger disaster. About every 10 minutes they would replay the shuttle blowing up again and again and again. Finally the nurse called our name and we went into Dr. Holyfield's office.

     We sat down and Dr. Holyfield began to say how sorry he was that he had to be the one to tell us, but that 4 different pathologists had looked at the results of my bone marrow aspiration and concurred that I had a form of leukemia that was untreatable and incurable. It was called Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL).

     Leukemia!

     I couldn't believe what I was hearing. The doctor went on to say that it was a slow growing type of cancer of the blood. The main symptom I was manifesting at that time was an elevated white blood cell count. My count was 33,000 -- three times the normal count which is between 5,000 and 10,000. I was also having night sweats.. I had been having a hard time getting over colds and infections, which had been occurring more frequently. All of these were basic symptoms of the cancer. Another symptom that I noticed even as much as a year earlier, but paid little attention to, were swollen and sore lymph glands.
     Dr. Holyfield went on to say that he was referring me to another doctor in Nashville who was a hematologist. He said the hematologist would probably just check my blood periodically, as there was really no treatment or cure for this type of cancer. The prognosis was that I probably had 6 to 10 years of life left. Usually, he said, the cancer wasn't what terminated a person’s life; it was the body's inability to fight off infection that would bring on death. Dr. Holyfield also told me that I was a real rarity. Most of the people that got this disease were men in their late 60's or early 70's. It was extremely uncommon for a woman to get this type of cancer, much less a woman my age. He said I was probably one of the youngest cases on record.

     I was 36 years old. I had been married for about 5 years. My husband, Charlie Bartholomew, and I had spent three years (1982-1985) in Monroe, LA helping some friends of ours start a church. After "Tennessee Whiskey" had been a hit in 1984, we moved back to Nashville in September 1985.  We had recently opened an office at 10 Music Circle North right off Music Row to run my publishing and production companies. I had jumped back whole-heartedly into music business after a three year sabbatical, hoping and believing that being sober and "living right" would help me obtain the level of success that had eluded me in the ‘70’s. "Tennessee Whiskey" had been my sign. I had written it with Dean Dillon in January 1980 right after I quit drinking. I thought it was ironic and significant that this love song/drinking song of all the songs that I had written up until that time was the "cream" that rose to the top. (I wanted to write a love song. Dean wanted to write a drinking song. He was drinking. I was not. It was our compromise.)
     Having outgrown the "young country" and the outlaw and rebel tag of the ‘70’s, I figured that I was at the right age and had the right image to try and take another run as an artist. I was writing more consistently. I was producing some great sounds. I felt I had it made: A right relationship with God, a wonderful husband, a beautiful family, creative freedom, financial security, great friends, brothers and sisters in the Lord. I had a mission, a destiny, and a purpose. A dream.

     Charlie and I both were in shock. We couldn't believe our ears. Overtaken by unbelief. It was as we had been shot. As we left the doctor's office I told Charlie, "I just can't believe this. I just can't believe I have leukemia." We began to pray even as we left Dr. Holyfield’s office and continued to do all we knew how to do from a spiritual standpoint. When we got home, Charlie anointed me with oil and prayed for me. I laid on the floor in our living room and cried for about an hour. I wept and prayed. I asked God why, why, why. I begged for mercy. I squalled. I bawled. I sobbed, racked with grief. I fell apart completely.
     After I somewhat regained my composure, I called my friend, Clarice in Monroe. Clarice and her husband, George Fluitt were our friends we had helped start a church. When she answered the phone she immediately asked, "What's wrong?" I broke down again as I began to relate to her the events of the day. She and George both prayed for me and encouraged me in the Lord.

     Worn out from grief and exhausted by all the events of that day, I finally went to sleep. The Challenger had blown up on lift-off that morning, killing its seven travelers, horrifying millions of people around the world. And also on that day all the challenges that I had previously seen lined up before me in order to resurrect my career in the music business were blown away.

      Blown away and leaving me to face a greater challenge – a battle for my very life.

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