It took a bit of time for Doug Holiday to fully grasp the gravity of his diagnosis of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. In fact, he had to be convinced not to help with a catering job for his business, Bigg’s BBQ.

It was Doug Holiday’s grandparents who really lived large, as in Large, their last name. Jim and Virginia owned The Wheel near the Kansas University campus in Lawrence in 1950, so it was natural for Holiday to name his restaurants in a way that would honor them. Of course, Large BBQ just doesn’t have the same ring as the name Holiday finally chose.

It’s Bigg’s, of course: Bigg’s BBQ on Iowa and Massachusetts streets and Burgers by Bigg’s on Sixth Street.

Holiday began his business career in Lawrence in 2000, opening the Hereford House. In 2004, he opened his first restaurant as owner.

In 2013, when Holiday noticed a bump on the back of his head, he thought at first he’d just hit his head while unloading for a catering event. Head and neck surgeon Dr. Robert Dinsdale removed the lump, and he told Holiday it was most likely a lipoma, a mass of harmless fatty tissue. However, just to be sure, Dinsdale sent a sample to the lab. The results of the biopsy were an unwelcome surprise: Holiday was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Doug Holiday owns two Bigg’s BBQ restaurants, as well as Burgers by Bigg’s, all in Lawrence.

Lawrence Memorial Hospital oncologists encouraged the Holidays to get a second opinion on the course of treatment to pursue, and Holiday traveled to Omaha to be examined by a renowned oncologist there. The physician told Holiday it was up to him to choose where to be treated. The treatment he recommended was available at LMH.

And just like that, Holiday’s wife, Shawn, remembers, “The wheels were put in motion.” Holiday really had no clue what he was in for, he says now. He asked if he could proceed with a catering event he had booked in the next few days, one that would feed 600 people.

“I don’t think you understand,” LMH oncologist Dr. Ronald Stephens told him. “We want to start treatment as soon as possible.”

That was June 2013. Holiday replaced the catering job on his calendar with his first chemotherapy treatment. It was an intense routine. He checked in on a Monday for each of the six 96-hour treatments. For each session, the couple’s three sons, Seth, Jacob and Ben, would miss a half day of school to help decorate their dad’s room on the third floor of the hospital, covering every inch of wall space with decorations. One week the chemo room was decked out for a luau. Another, the room had a racing theme. Snack stations were set up for visitors. A smoothie machine stood at the ready for Holiday. One week, Holiday’s dog — disguised as a service animal — made a cameo appearance. Some nights during treatment, Holiday’s wife and the boys would come to the hospital with china, stemware, a tablecloth and a home-cooked meal.

“My hair fell out on my birthday, Aug. 8,” Holiday recalls. A picture taken that day hangs in the entryway of Bigg’s on Iowa and shows a grinning Holiday with his sons, all shaved as bald as their father.

It's easy for Doug Holiday to remember the day in 2013 that his hair fell out during cancer treatment. It was his birthday. A picture taken that day hangs in the entryway of Bigg’s on Iowa Street and shows a grinning Holiday with his sons, all shaved as bald as their dad. From left are Jacob, Seth, Ben and their father.

The treatment was grueling, Holiday explains. “But I knew I just had to deal with it. I knew I had to get better and there was no point in worrying about what I couldn’t control.”

Holiday lost his father in 1999 to stomach cancer. He says he appreciates the experimental treatments in which his dad participated and the treatment advances that have come because he and others were willing to take part in clinical trials.

The first person Holiday called, other than his family, with news of his diagnosis was John Ross. Holiday had gotten to know Ross, who owns Laser Logic, during his Hereford House days. Ross says, “Doug was supportive when I went through my little walk in the park — tongue cancer — in 2008. I told him, ‘If I can beat it, you can beat it.’

“Doug called me a survivor and I told him, ‘No, I’m not a survivor. That implies I am a victim. I am an alumnus,'” Ross continues. “The idea is that this road is long and arduous. But if you look at your goal as becoming an alumnus, it helps your frame of mind.”

Today, Holiday is a proud alumnus of The Oncology Center at LMH, where he finished treatment in November 2013.