THE TIME BARGAIN — POST 6 OF 6

Editor’s Note: This post documents events from June 2, 2025 — one year ago. I’m writing from the other side of treatment, but as any survivor knows, “the other side” doesn’t mean finished. It means still fighting, still watching, still trusting. — Scott

I walked in that Monday morning thinking I was going to get a tooth pulled.

Eat some soup for a few days. Let it heal. Go on about life.

That was the plan.

This dentist appointment stopped being routine quickly.

I walked out with a biopsy scheduled for Wednesday and the word cancer rattling around in my head.

That was not the plan.

I want to be honest with you about something first.

I’d been living in denial for the better part of a month before I ever walked through that door. Something had been going on with my tongue since the end of April, maybe the first of May. And I had an excuse for every single day of it.

It’s a tongue bite. It’s a tooth rubbing against it. I hit a nerve. It’ll heal up. It always heals up.

Twenty-five years ago I dealt with Bell’s palsy and it did a number on my tongue back then. So I told myself this was the same thing. History repeating itself. Nothing to see here.

That’s what I told myself, anyway.

Here’s something I didn’t know then but I know now. There’s what’s called the 14-day rule. If something in your mouth — a sore, a spot, anything that doesn’t look right — hasn’t healed on its own within two weeks, you need to get to a doctor. That’s the rule. Two weeks and you go.

I had never heard of it. Didn’t think to look it up. And the denial made sure I never got around to it. I’d been sitting on this thing for four to six weeks before I ever walked through that dentist’s door. If you’re reading this and something in the back of your mind is telling you something isn’t right — don’t wait. Two weeks. That’s the rule. Go.

I try to schedule my appointments on Monday mornings because I run linehaul — I don’t have to go to sleep until the afternoon, so it works out. Barb was at work. I went alone.

When I walked in it was about as ordinary as ordinary gets. Vinyl chairs. TV on in the corner — some news channel or infomercial nobody’s actually watching, just background noise. First thing in the morning, so it wasn’t busy. A few patients. Nothing that stood out. Nothing that said, hey, pay attention, this one’s gonna be different.

I filled out my paperwork. They called me back.

They put me in one of the private rooms in the back — no door, but tucked away. I’d been there before and usually they put you in the more open area. I didn’t think much of it. If anything I thought, oh good, a little more privacy. That works.

I sat down in the chair. Told the assistant what was going on. Ran through my whole delusional theory — the Bell’s palsy, the tongue bite, the tooth, the nerve. She listened, nodded, and said okay, let’s take a look so she could brief the dentist.

And that’s when everything changed.

“She took one look. And all I heard was ‘Oh my.’ Then she walked out of the room.”

It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t loud. It was just two quiet words and then she was gone.

And I’m sitting there in that vinyl chair, under those big overhead lights, staring at the ceiling going —

What in the Sam Hill just happened?

Two minutes. That’s how long I sat there by myself. Longest two minutes I’ve had in a while.

She came back with the dentist. Fastest I’ve ever seen a doctor appear. Two minutes flat. I’ve waited longer for a table at Cracker Barrel.

The dentist had her mask on, but I could see her eyes. She said okay, let’s take a look. Put the light on. Reached in with her little mirror.

For the second time, I heard it.

“Oh my.”

Same two words. But this time I could see her eyes above that mask. And what I saw there wasn’t casual. It wasn’t routine. It was concern.

She pulled back and said, “This isn’t a tongue bite.”

Then her and the assistant walked out again.

So there I am. Alone. Again. In the chair. Under the lights. Staring at the ceiling of a dentist office I came to on a Monday morning to get a tooth pulled.

What the Hell Is Going On?

She wasn’t gone long. Couple of minutes at most. But I’ll tell you — those minutes felt like an eternity.

When she came back in, she got right to it. She said, “I’m going to be upfront and honest with you.”

She said that’s not a tongue bite. She said she believed it was cancerous. And then she told me she had already made me an appointment — Wednesday — with Dr. Timothy McConnell, a highly recommended oral surgeon right there in Knoxville. He was going to fast track me in for a biopsy.

And here’s why the urgency. If it came back cancerous, there was one of the top head, neck, and throat surgeons in the entire country practicing at UT Medical Center. But he wasn’t going to be there much longer. He was moving on. So Dr. McConnell had to move fast to get the biopsy done so they could get me in front of this doctor before that window closed.

I’m processing all of this. Cancer. Fast track. Best in the country. Wednesday.

And then she said one more thing.

“By the way — Dr. McConnell does not accept your insurance.”

I’ll be honest with you. My head stopped.

In the middle of a potential cancer diagnosis, with urgency flying at me from every direction — that’s when my brain locked onto the insurance problem.

“Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit.”

You just handed me a wall. A financial wall. And I’ve always believed the same thing: when there’s a wall in front of you, you find a way over it, around it, or straight through it.

Was I gonna sit there and say hold on, let me find a doctor in my network? With this kind of urgency? With that word already in the air?

No. I was not.

I said let’s go. Let’s get it set up.

And that was the appointment.

Two walls in one morning. A diagnosis I wasn’t ready to hear, and a price tag on top of it. I didn’t know it yet, but that was just a preview of how this whole fight was gonna go — one wall after another, and every single time, you’ve got to find the switch in your head, flip it, and go over, around, or straight through.

I walked out of that office and there was no stopping at the front desk. No charge. No small talk. Just me and my spinning head headed for the door.

I got in the Jeep. And I remember — I glanced off to my right, through the trees, and I could see the Smoky Mountains sitting out there in the distance. Clear morning. Absolutely beautiful.

East Tennessee in June. You couldn’t paint it any prettier.

I called Barb.

I said, “You are not gonna believe this.”

I walked her through the whole thing — the assistant, the two ‘oh my’s, the dentist’s eyes, Dr. McConnell, the fast track, the insurance wall, all of it. And I told her the word they used.

She was dumbfounded. Almost speechless. Because neither one of us woke up that morning expecting to hear that word. Not even close.

And here’s the thing you have to understand about that word for us. Ten years before this, we watched my wife Barb’s dad fight cancer for five years. A long, brutal battle. So when that word lands in your direction, your brain doesn’t go to some abstract fear. It goes straight to what you’ve already seen up close. That’s why Barb went quiet. That’s why I went quiet. We both knew what that word could mean.

And I think that’s a big part of why my brain flipped the switch so fast on the drive home. Because I’d seen what it looks like when you go to the dark place. And I wasn’t going there. Not yet. Maybe not ever if I could help it.

We talked for a little while. She had to get back to work. Simple as that. “I’ll see you in a little bit, Baby.” And I headed home.

And on that drive home, I’ll tell you exactly what happened in my head.

Nothing.

Not one dark thought. Not one spiral. My brain just flipped the switch the way it always does —

It’ll be benign. We’ve got this. Just another day.

Call it denial. Call it a defense mechanism. Call it whatever you want. That’s just how I’m wired. I don’t stay in the dark.

Here’s something I’ve thought about a lot since all of this.

We moved to East Tennessee about five years ago. Came for the mountains, the pace of life, the beauty of this place. Barb and I just fell in love with it out here.

What we didn’t know — what we couldn’t have known — is that we were also moving ourselves right into the middle of some of the best head, neck, and throat care in the entire country. World-class surgeons. UT Medical Center. Right there.

Hindsight is twenty-twenty, they say.

But I’ve got another word for it.

Providence.

God didn’t move us here for the view. He moved us here because He already knew what was coming. He positioned us — before we even knew we needed positioning — right in the middle of the people who could fight this thing alongside us. So I could get back to Barb. Back to my girls. Back to six grandkids who still need their Papa standing.

Nobody Fights Alone

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” — Philippians 4:13

This is Part 6 of The Time Bargain — an ongoing series documenting my journey through an oral cancer diagnosis: the appointments, the decisions, the curveballs, and how faith, family, and a whole lot of stubbornness carried us through. Follow along.