Nicole June Reporting
njune@clarksvillenow.com
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – Clarksville resident Lauren Maxton has faced it all: from motherhood, a husband in Special Forces, surviving cancer, and even fighting for the ultimate prize in the wilderness of Tasmania.
Lauren recently participated in a new show on TNT called ’72 Hours’, in which teams of three compete for a shot at $100,000. During each episode, three teams are left to their own devices in a remote location with only a GPS and a liter of water for survival. The teams must complete challenges to earn GPS coordinates to help them move on to the next level.
In August of 2012, Lauren saw an online audition listing for the show, and she instantly told her husband, Steven, to try out. Steven is a member of the Air Force, and the couple and their five-year-old son have been stationed at Fort Campbell since 2009. Lauren assumed he would make the perfect candidate.
The producers of the show agreed, until a fateful Skype interview in California, when Lauren’s personal story was revealed. Lauren is a cancer survivor, and by the time of the competition she had been free of chemotherapy treatments for a mere eleven months. She won the coveted spot over her husband, but he wasn’t jealous.
“At first he was a little bummed out, but then he realized how amazing it could be for me to get to do something like that,” Lauren said. “When I was sick, I dreamed of a day where I could get to travel and do stuff like that again and live life by the seat of my pants. He knew it was something that would bring me back to me.”
Lauren traveled to Tasmania right as her husband was deploying to Afghanistan, leaving her son in the care of her mother-in-law to begin her adventure. The island is located off the coast of Australia, and Lauren said the conditions were far from ideal, with frigid temperatures, freezing rain, and dangerous bush country, which meant lots of scrapes and cuts.
The most surprising part of the experience for her however, was the bond she built with her teammates. She said the two were constantly looking out for her, and they still keep in touch. “It’s such camaraderie, probably very similar to what service members experience when they’re outside the wire,” she said.
Lauren couldn’t divulge any specifics, but she said the team gave it their all. “We did some ballsy stunts on this episode, you’ll see. We dared to do what nobody else would do because it was so cold out,” she said.
Overall, she hopes her friends, family, and the community will be proud of her efforts. “I went out there, I gave it my go, and I’m excited to share my experience with people. It was just like me coming back to life again. It was an emotional experience.”
Lauren’s episode of ’72 Hours’ airs Friday, June 28 at 9:15 p.m. on TNT.