Forty-four years ago, on June 21, 1980, my husband Stu, and I were married in a hospital. Here’s the story of our wedding.

It was the second marriage for both of us and we had planned a lovely wedding on the grounds of the golf course followed by a reception there with close friends and family. The invitations had been sent. Then on Memorial Day in 1980, just a little more than 3 weeks before our planned wedding, my parents were in a car accident. My beloved father was killed, and my mother was airlifted to Nassau County Hospital with a badly broken leg and was in traction. Sadly, she wasn’t mobile enough to attend my father’s funeral.

A few days later, I told my mother we were postponing the wedding, but she wouldn’t hear of it. And I said, “Well I won’t get married without you there and there’s no way you can leave the hospital.”  One of the nurses overheard this conversation and said, “Well, you could get married here in our solarium.” The next thing we knew, the nurses had made all the arrangements including having the solarium painted, which was quite beautiful and on a high floor where you could see the NYC skyline.

So we told friends and family what was going on and that we had canceled our original wedding plans. Only our immediate family could be at the hospital, so we had our kids, my little daughter, who was my bridesmaid, and Stu’s young sons who were his best men, our siblings, and Stu’s parents there for the ceremony.

They wheeled my mother in her hospital bed into the solarium, along with her hospital roommate. And then to our surprise, the solarium soon filled with doctors and nurses. Then Reverend Cam Allen arrived from our local church and performed a beautiful ceremony. My sister played the guitar and sang.

Now that the statute of limitations is over, here’s a side note.  On the morning of our wedding, my daughter woke up with spots on her face.  The children of my dear friend and next neighbor had recently had chicken pox. I called her over to look at my daughter’s face and she said, “I’ll just put makeup on the spots and no one will notice.” Well, my heart dropped every time one of the doctors or nurses came over to her in the solarium to tell her how adorable she looked, that they would spot the spots. And for several days later I feared there would be an outbreak of chicken pox in the hospital. Thankfully, that did not come to fruition.

When our friends found out about our new plans, they all wanted to celebrate with us. By then we had canceled the venue, and we ended up having a casual BBQ in our backyard, and everyone said it was the best wedding reception they ever attended.

We were surrounded by love on all sides through that most difficult time in our lives, and my mother’s incredible courage in her grief to insist we go through with the wedding was an extraordinary gift.  It’s been quite the journey from then to now, and one I am so grateful to be on with my husband by my side.