The tragic death of his teenage son isn't the first time John Travolta has been touched by heartbreak.
In 1977 a teary-eyed Travolta accepted an Emmy for his first love, actress Diana Hyland, who died just six months earlier. In his acceptance speech, Travolta honored the lost star, saying, "Wherever you are, Diana, you did it baby, alright."
The couple's love affair began on the set of the 1976 TV movie, The Boy in the Plastic Bubble.
Hyland played Travolta's mother. She was 40, 18-years-older than her 22-year-old co-star.
In Travolta's words, they were "genuinely, completely in love."
Actor Dick Van Patten, who starred with Hyland in the TV show, Eight is Enough, before her death in 1977 after filming just four episodes, witnessed the love affair.
"It was terrific. It was really perfect...they were definitely going to get married. They were madly in love with each other," he says.
But the life Travolta and Hyland planned together was shattered when she was diagnosed with incurable breast cancer.
Travolta was filming Saturday Night Fever, the movie that made him a screen icon, but rushed to Hyland's side as her condition worsened. She died in his arms, just nine months after their whirlwind romance began.
"The priest stood there with us, and John Travolta was telling her how much he loved her, but there was no response. John said to the priest...'I don't think she hears me.' And he said, 'They do hear you. They don't respond but they do hear you,'" continued Van Patten.
Travolta rarely speaks about the tragedy, but opened up on Bravo's Inside the Actor's Studio.
"My girlfriend had just died and I was very sad over that. I was still a bit overwhelmed by everything and I dealt with it the best I could. It took about five years to calm down," said the star.
Now, he faces another unbearable loss, the death of his son.