Cancer Patient Marries Longtime Love from Hospital Bed
Published at(ORANGE COUNTY, Calif.) — Dennis Lyman, 68, married his longtime sweetheart Barbara Monds in a hospital chapel in Orange County, Calif. on Friday, two weeks after learning his prostate cancer was terminal.
The two have been together for 30 years and had been planning to get married on Monday. But two weeks ago, they learned the cancer was terminal after it spread to his bone, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down.
Not wanting to waste any time, the couple tied the knot Friday from Lyman’s hospital bed with a doctor serenading them on the violin. The staff at St. Joseph Hospital in Orange also pulled together flowers, a wedding cake, and a veil for the bride.
Lyman, who was diagnosed with prostate cancer last December, said it wasn’t quite what he imagined for his wedding ceremony. “We expected to just do it in the room with a small ceremony and keep it simple,” he said.
Monds said they’d been talking about tying the knot for a long time. “We’d been planning and many times he’d say let’s get married now, and we’d go to the court house and I would say Dennis, it’s a Sunday, they’re not open.”
Copyright 2013 ABC News Radio