by Dr. Philip L. Levin
What would you do with your life if you were given a second chance? Barbara Allen faced that question, lying on her death bed from metastatic ovarian cancer —the chemotherapy having devastated her. It was the spring of 2014, and she hadn’t eaten a bite of food in 17 days.
Unable to even sip fluids, bald, and seemingly facing certain death, she had a dream. She was sitting on the white lines of a blacktop highway when a voice asked her, “Which way do you wish to go?” Allen replied that she wanted to live.
“Very well,” it responded. “Then you have work to do!”
Allen was born in the thick forested hills of the North Carolina Appalachian Mountains. The love of the area stayed in her soul, calling her back every summer to a small cabin she had in Boone, a place with a running creek and a swimming hole. “Gorgeous and peaceful,” she says.
Her father, an executive with Bristol-Meyers Squibb, moved the family a few times for business. Allen ended up at Memphis State for college where she met her future husband, David. David moved the family to what turned out to be their permanent home to pursue his dream of being an automobile dealer. The couple later acquired Allen Toyota and Allen Hyundai.
Life flowed smoothly for the Allens, who had three children. After the young ones were tucked away in college, Allen took up professional photography. “As a child, I had a Brownie camera, and I liked taking people’s pictures. In 2004, my husband gave me a Nikon for Christmas, and I started taking pictures of everything I could find: landscapes, portraits, macro. I found I had an affinity for portraits and secured a job with a local magazine for 10 years. Yet, when on my own, my favorite portraits came from the faces of the homeless.” Her poignant pictures of the homeless won many first place awards at art shows.
In 2013 the Allens’ cherished life began to crumble, first with David’s death from medical complications, and then, later that year, with Barbara’s cancer diagnosis. After that darkest nadir, when the Holy Spirit came to her in a dream, she woke up the next morning with seven bags of medicine running into her veins. The sunshine was streaming in the window, and somehow, she knew she was going to live. In her time of need, God sent her human messengers to teach her about natural ways of healing: diet, spiritualism, and natural medicines, and over the next few months she thrived, with medically tested undetectable cancer levels.
I knew my life had been saved for a mission.
“I knew my life had been saved for a mission,” said Allen. By May 2015, she’d started the Coast Cancer Prevention & Support Group, an organization growing stronger each day. “My heart is for helping individuals who want to be healed in a more natural way. Those who want to go the medical route, I refer to an oncologist. For others, I develop a natural alternative protocol. Many have healed themselves through holistic means.”
Life is good for Barbara now. She still lives in the home where she nursed her husband during his last few months, with her beloved dog, Bandit. There she entertains and cooks. “I don’t call myself a gourmet, but the meals I make are mostly organic and healthy.” To keep herself in shape, she practices taekwondo, in which she’s earned a black belt.
She’s been active in the community, serving on the boards of the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum, Republican Executive Committee, Advocates for Freedom, Chairman of the Board of Youth for Christ, and was on several past advisory boards including Peoples Bank and South Mississippi Humane Society, where her dog, Bandit, was the 2017 mascot.
Her love of their automobile dealerships prompted her interest in exotic cars. You can spot her cruising the streets in her white Porsche Turbo S, her shining Lexus LC500, or her practical Hyundai Santa Fe. As she drives along those black topped highways, she remembers the time she chose to live, and values every day she has been given, giving back to those in need.