Friends Helping Her Fight

Cancer patients know the truth about cleanliness. It isn’t next to godliness.

It’s much more important than that.

Heather Farr was clean. Clean after the discovery of a lump in her breast at the age of 23. Clean after a mastectomy at the age of 24. Clean after 16 weeks of chemotherapy, clean after seven weeks of radiation treatment, clean to get on with a life that was so swiftly interrupted so harshly before its time--the life of a professional golfer.

Farr was making preparations. She began playing full rounds again last June. She entered a few one-day pro-am events. Along with her sister, companion and caddy, Missy, she was practicing regularly by the fall, lofting drives and dropping putts and gradually restoring the stamina necessary to play 72 LPGA holes in four days.

By November, Farr felt she was getting close. February, 1991, was the launch date for the comeback. Tee-minus four months . . . and counting.

At first, she thought nothing of the dull pain that grabbed her lower back whenever she bent down to pick up a ball or uncocked her backswing. Farr had had back problems all her life. The only difference was that, in the past, the pain had always subsided. This time, it didn’t.

Precautionary X-rays were taken and nothing out of the ordinary was found. “She just thought she pulled a muscle playing golf,” Missy Farr said.

In mid-December, Farr flew from her home in Phoenix to Cedar-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles for her routine monthly check-up. There, she mentioned the nagging back pain to her doctor. Tests were run and on Dec. 22, the results came back.

So what did you get for Christmas? Heather Farr got the jolt of a lifetime for the second time in her lifetime.

The cancer had returned.

Two new tumors had been discovered--one in her spine and one in the back of her skull. It was same cancer as before, just relocated.

“It was very terrifying,” Missy says. “She was just getting on with her life. And the timing, right before Christmas, made it very hard. It was a major setback . . . but she’s trying to deal with it and move on.”

Moving on doesn’t come cheaply, however. Farr’s doctors recommended the same strategies as before--radiation and chemotherapy--plus a new one: a bone-marrow transplant, to be performed at the University of Colorado Hospital in Denver. Cost of the procedure: $200,000, minimum. Cost to be absorbed by insurance: Inconclusive.

Until two weeks ago, Farr’s insurance company was declining to pay for the transplant, describing it as “experimental treatment” not covered by the policy. According to Missy, that has changed--the insurance will cover the transplant, but none of the “incurred expenses,” such as travel to and from Denver and all follow-up treatment necessary after Oct. 1.

Farr’s friends in the LPGA didn’t have time to wait for this proclamation. By January, all they knew was that a large sum of money had to be raised quickly--and if they didn’t raise it, no one else would.

That is why 36 professional golfers will convene at Los Coyotes Country Club in Buena Park this morning to play an 18-hole scramble with teams of amateurs paying $250 per person for the privilege. They are calling it the Heather Farr Cancer Fund Golf Tournament, and it is one of four being staged around the country in hopes of raising $300,000 for Farr’s medical expenses.

Already, a pro-am organized by LPGA member Tracy Kerdyk in Miami brought in $31,000. Still to come are similar events in Phoenix, organized by Alice Ritzman, and in Houston, headed by Kim Bauer and Nancy Lopez. Today’s tournament will feature an auction of clothes and equipment, and officials are predicting they can raise between $50,000 and $60,000 before sundown.

“It’s really been incredible,” says Missy from her hotel room in Los Angeles, where she’s staying while Heather concludes chemotherapy at Cedar-Sinai. “After Heather got sick, we had so many different LPGA players calling, saying they wanted to help out. We didn’t solicit anything. Everyone approached us.”

Today marks one of the most important golf tournaments of Heather Farr’s life, but she won’t be able to attend. During chemotherapy treatment, she is confined to either the hospital or the hotel.

“She hasn’t made any public appearances since beginning treatment,” Missy says. “It’s too hard. She’s losing hair from the chemotherapy, her blood-cell count is so low that she can’t go out, not even for dinner. She can’t go in crowded places, she can’t go in malls. If someone sneezes, her immune system is so low, it can put her in the hospital.”

Missy reports that Heather is doing a lot of sleeping now--”She’s doing good; mostly she’s very tired.” Sleeping and waiting. The bone-marrow transplant is tentatively scheduled for mid-March, just as soon as her blood-cell count climbs back.

The prognosis?

“Very good,” Missy says. “Her doctors are trying for a cure. They say their entire goal is to cure her.”

It is the goal of the entire LPGA, too. With friends like that, who needs insurance companies?