Hospital staff in California helped a dying man fulfill his wish of walking his daughter down the aisle by hosting the pushed-up wedding ceremony in the facility’s chapel.
Abraham Arceo was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer a year ago, and his condition worsened in recent weeks to the point his family members were not sure he would make it to the planned date of his daughter Brittny’s marriage to her fiance, Alan Tran, on 28 June.
Workers at Providence St Joseph hospital in Orange pooled their resources to stage the event in their first-floor chapel, close to the 50-year-old father’s room, on Thursday, setting the stage for a tearjerking scene that went viral in circles of the internet dedicated to spotlighting uplifting news stories.
“If he wasn’t here, it would be way worse, so it’s actually really sweet that we’re able to have each other, like have him there, have him be with us,” Tran told Los Angeles news channel ABC7.
Tran said he and his new wife had already exchanged pre-ceremony vows: to take care of each other’s parents.
Family, friends and Arceo’s hospital care team attended the service, at which the patient gathered the strength to guide his daughter to the altar.
“That’s one thing he just wants to make sure, to walk me down and give me away,” Brittny Tran told NBC4.
“It means everything because he’s my best friend and I hate seeing him hurt. And whenever I see him happy, it just makes me happy.”
She told the ABC station that as a girl she had pictured her father making the walk on her wedding day. “I just try to remember what he tells me, to just keep trying and pull through and never give up and no matter what, just try to have fun and continue and be happy because that’s what he would want,” she said.
The bride’s mother, Cecilia, said Brittny had always been “Daddy’s little girl”.
“He told her: ‘No matter what happens, you still get married,’” Cecilia Arceo said. “‘If anything happens to me, I just want you to be happy.’”
