Part 1& Part 2
From Superteen Magazine
Listen In As This Backstreet Boy Tells His Miraculous Story -
In His
Very Own Words!
?My name is Brian Thomas Littrell. I was born February 20th, 1975
in St. Joseph hospital in
Lexington, Kentucky. I was born to Harold Jr. and Jackie Littrell
- I was their second son. I have a
brother 3 years older than me. We grew up fairly middle class.
My dad worked at IBM; later they
were bought out by a company over in Germany. They worked on typewriter
ribbons, computer
ribbons and stuff like that. He worked there ever since high school,
eighteen years old. My
grandfather Harold Littrell, Sr., worked there, so my dad kind
of followed in his footsteps. [Dad]
enlisted in the Navy and was in for 4 years. Right befopre he
left the Navy, he met my mom. My
mom worked at a church, where I grew up actually.
As a young boy, I ate, drank and slept church whether I liked
it or not. I?d rather be playing on
Sundays, but it grew on me and I think it had a lot to do with
the way I live my life now. Ever since
I was little, I was running around singing and being a comedian
and making everybody laugh. My
mom and dad both sing like birds, so they would sing in church
all the time. Ever since
kindergarten, I was always involved in the children?s chorus at
church, and I was always singing
up on stage. Iwwas like 6 or 7 years old when I did my first solo
in front of a congregation at
church. This is a church that has like 4,000 members; it would
only have had about 1,500 at the
services on Sunday morning. But that was a big feat for a 6 or
7 year old! I was very nervous, but I
was hammt! I?m very shy around people that I don?t know, but once
I get to know a certain person,
I can relax and then I turn into a ham. I?m very timid when it
comes to meeting people: I kind of
clam up really easy.
I grew up in a house in Lexington. My brother and I got along
- back then, 3 years was a lot of
difference in our ages. I was born with a heart murmur and I have
a hole in my heart. At the age of
five, I was diagnosed witha disease of the blood and the heart;
they call it a staph infection. I went
through the first five years of my life without anyone knowing
I had this heart murmur. The way it
happened was......
One day when I was five I was riding my Big Wheel down the street
and I hit the curb and kind of
flipped over and skinned my knee. That?s where the infection set
in, [but no one knew at the time].
When I got my Big Wheel home, I got a cookie and a kiss from my
mom and I was fine. Then
about 2 weeks later, I had an accident over at my grandfather?s
house: I slipped and fell on the
concrete and kind of knocked my head really well, so my mom was
worried about me having a
concussion or something. That?s when they took me to the hospital.
During that last 2 weeks, the
[staph] infection had set in. It?s a miracle that I had [a second]
accident, so they could get me to a
hospital [and discover the infection], because other that that
I was a healthy 5 year old by
appearance. I never had any disablitlites; I was always able to
run with the other kids. But that?s
when they hospitalized me for 2 months.
I remember it very well. I used to dream about it, I have a lot
of bad memories about it, because of
how unhealthy I was and how the infection had set into my blood.
I was very weak and very pale. I
just didn?t have any strength. I would have to be pushed around
in a wheelchait. Eventually I was
able to push my little IV and walk up and down the hallways.
This disease that I had is fatal and I had a zero chance of living.
The doctors told my mom and dad
to go ahead and make funeral arrangements, because ?your son is
going to pass on?. And my
mom....I?m the baby of the family, and it was so hard for her
to deal with. Us being big in the
church, she asked for help from the church and from family and
time went on. I was on certain
medication but nothing really could stop the infection. As time
went on, however, the infection
started to disappear and it went away! I thank God for that experience.
I know that it was a miracle.
There?s no medicine that could keep me on this earth.
I?ll never forget something my mom said when I was 10 or 11: ?You
know Brian, when you were
in the hospital I was holding on to you for dear life, because
I wanted to keep you here with me so
bad....you?re my baby and I need you. I finally realized that
God had different means.? [She
realized] that I was a blessing in her life and she had to let
me go, if it was my time. That night
when she made that prayer, she gave me up. she said ?Whatever
happens, happens, if it?s meant to
be.? And from then on I started slowly to get better and recover.
The doctor told my mom and dad that if I did live....I wouldn?t
be able to do anything. Coming
from a protective family, I came out of the hospital on a rampage,
because I was feeling a lot better.
It still took some time to get all of my strength back, doing
everything that I had done in the
past....being little, it didn?t limit me to anything.
My first love in sport was soccer, and soccer deals with a lot
of running. WE lived right behind the
church, in the split level I grew up in. Our church was fairly
large and they had a whole football
field. Every summer they had a little soccer camp for kids my
age or a little bit younger, and I
would always try and get out there and play with them. My mom
and dad were very protective in
letting me do certain extra curricular activities that delt with
a lot of running, though, any
cardiovascular stuff, any stress that your heart goes under. My
heart being weak at the time [my
parents] were very scared. They never let me play soccer, so I
eventually picked up a basketball and
played for the church league with all my high school buddies.
In basketball, you do just as much
running as in soccer, it?s crazy. Ever since then, I really got
into it and I never had any problems. A
couple of years after I got out of the hospital, I was growing,
[and my parents] slowly let me do
what I wanted to do.
Every year since then, I attended the University of Kentucky Medical
Center just one time a year.
I?d go back to the same doctors that I?d grown up with. They were
still there and they would check
my hear and do EKGs and CAT scans. And every year they say that
the hole is getting smaller!
Having that experience made it a closer relationship with my family,
with my brother, with all my
friends at church, the whole church itself, with God. Growing
up with that in mind, I stuck to my
guns when peer pressure came around in middle school to do what
everybody?s doing. Instead of
going out and partying, I was always at a Wednesday night church
service. I?m not saying I was
the best kid in the world, because everybody has flaws. But it
just made me a better person; I was
more proud of what I was doing. And when the singing came along
with it, the older I got, the
more I realized that maybe God had kept me on this earth so that
could use the gift that he have me
to be a singer, to be an entertainer. [Today, I have no physical
limitations]; it?s all in the past. I look
back on the experiences and I?ve learned from the past and I?ve
put it into everyday life. Its just an
experience that you can?t get rid of, that you have to turn around
and use to your benefit....?
THAT'S SHOWBIZ!- In elementary school and middle school (the girls
were) like, 'Oh you sing?
Big whoop.' In church it was, 'Man, you're really good, you have
a really nice voice,' and that
was pretty much it. I would get compliments like that, but it
never really set in. I always knew I
wanted to sing, but I never really took it seriously until my
junior year in high school.
My school had a talent show... This girl and I got up there and
sang a spiritual song in front of the
school - I mean the whole school was there. It was a song called,
'Another Time, Another Place'.
She comes on and sings her first line and then I come into the
song; I get like two or three words
out of my mouth, and right then is when all the girls in the audience,
start to scream! I mean, I was
all deck out in a suit and tie, and there were spotlights, so
I couldn't even see the audience, because
the lights were so bright. I heard the first three words I sang
and then I couldn't even hear myself.
It just blew me away. I was like, 'Oh my Goodness!'
I had just gotten out of my chorus class earlier in the day and
I was a nobody. But yet, when I
stepped up on stage and got behind those lights, it was totally
different. I knew I was just an instant
star. I think that was the point in my life when I knew that if
I could pull something off like that
with my peers, then there definitely had to be people out in the
world who would like it as well.
And from then on, it was such a rush!
ALL ABOUT GIRLS! - I had a lot of girl friends in school. One
of my relationships lasted like
three months and three days in my junior year in high school.
I went out with this girl who went a
different church, and I started going to church with her and getting
involved in her youth group. I'd
liked her since 9th grade and she would never give me the time
of day, and then finally in my junior
year she (noticed me) and I'm like 'I can't believe...' I think
I learned from the experience, I think I
was just infatuated with her, because she was a very pretty girl
and when I found out her inner self
, I wasn't that attracted to her anymore. My friends had been
saying, 'She's so mean, she's not
personable, she doesn't talk.' I was just like, 'I just love her
to death!' Then I finally got my chance
and it just didn't turn out. When I look back on it, it was just
an experience...
LIFE AT HOME! -We always had to take out the trash and run the
dishwasher, because my mom
and dad worked at the time. Growing up, my mom was always involved
with the church. When I
was dealing with the stuff in the hospital (Brian had been hospitalized
with a potentially deadly
infection), we were all surviving off my dad's income. I always
had everything I needed: But when
I was 16, I wanted a car. My brother was 19 and he was driving
a little, old car that he was paying
for because he was working a job. I was like, 'I want to be like
that, have a car, go on dates, do
what I want to do.' And so for a year I was debating with my mom
because she was like, 'You're
not getting a car until you get a job, save some money, put a
nice down payment on it and pay it
off.' So I did it!
That's where Long John Silver's came in, it's a fast food chain.
I worked there for about a year and
a half. I was saving some money, showing some responsibility,
working, keeping up with my
school work and church, trying to manage all of my time; trying
to venture off into adulthood. I
proved that I was reliable and that she cold trust me. I believe
you have to work hard...
LET'S TALK ABOUT KEVIN! - When we would have family outings (Kevin)
would always go
hang out with my brother. It was like my brother and him were
real tight, because they were the
same age. I was the baby in the family...
My brother sings also, but he doesn't really sing the pop, R&B
style we have; he likes Heavy
Mettle, rock n' roll. They would get together and sing and pretend
they were rock stars and my
brother would beat on the drums. My brother never took it seriously
like I didn't really take it
seriously- until I was just thrown into it.
Everyone knows about the day Kevin called me from Orlando for
Backstreet Boys. I was sitting in
my U.S. history class, it was the last class of the day, 6th hour,
and it was April, 1993... So I get
home and right when I walk in the door I'm like, 'Mom, I gotta
tell ya, I gotta tell ya!' and she was
like, 'Yeah, Kevin called about the group and told me all about
it!' and I was like, 'What?!' He had
called both my parents, given them the low down, and I was the
last one to hear about it. I was just
in disbielf! I was like, there's no way! This can't be happening!
My mom's main concern was my
education...
So she got on the phone and talked to Denise, A.J. mom, and Denise
told her about the tutor, home
schooling, how they go about their days getting their studies
done. And if everything worked out,
then I would just fall right in with A.J. and Nick and be tutored
together with them. That was her
main concern, and it was all worked out. To make a long story
short, we talked to management that
night and they said, 'You gotta get down here and audition. We've
head a lot of great things about
you and you gotta give it a shot!' I was on a plane at 6 am the
very next day!
I flew down to Orlando by myself. Kevin and a limo were there
to pick me up at the airport. My
jaw was hitting the floor. I was scared half to death. Here I
was and hours before I was talking to
him on the phone! Now I'm down in Orlando, I'm in a limo...I was
like, 'Wooahh, what have I
gotten myself into? Here I am, from Lexington, a middle class
guy who is growing up and worked
hard and pow, overnight my life had been changed.' Right when
I met management I was like,
'This is for me, I can fit into this, I love this.' It was nothing
like I had expected. I expected it to be
all formal, 'cause I had never auditioned for anything. I didn't
know what it was going to be like.
BACKSTREET BOYS! - I love being in Backstreet Boys! I wouldn't
change a thing in my life! It's
a blessing, I thank god for everything. I think this group has
a lot of potential. I think this group
has longevity. We're for real -what you see is what you get. We're
five solo artists put together and
we love to do what we do.
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