Chase Smith and Sadie Mills were both 18 when they got married. They weren’t even out of school at the time, as they were both seniors. It was a surprise wedding to everyone but one that had a special meaning behind it.
It seems that Chase had been struggling with sarcoma, an aggressive form of cancer. After 6 years of struggling with cancer, he was given a diagnosis that he only had about 3-5 months to live.
That is when Chase and Sadie made the decision to get married. Before saying ‘I do,’ they had been dating for about 5 months.
Sadie said, “Overall, it was the best day of my life. I’ve always wanted an outdoor wedding and the fact that Chase came up with the idea to have the altar right where we went on our first date, where we had our first kiss, that meant a lot to me.”
Before he was given the diagnosis, they had much different plans. They were going to go to college together and continue with their careers of swimming and diving.
They were planning on getting married at some point in the future but the didn’t have an urgent desire to do so. Once he was given the diagnosis, their plans changed.
Chase found out that his cancer was back and there wasn’t anything they could do. He had tumors all over his body and it was unlikely that he would survive. Rather than letting the opportunity pass, the two decided they would be happy together, even if it was only for a short while.
Chase told People, “We definitely were thinking about getting married in the future and we knew we wanted to. A lot of people do say, ‘Oh they’re getting married because he has a potential to pass away soon,’ and that’s not at all why we decided to get married. It was more of just a wake-up call that, ‘Hey, God wants you two together.'”
Sadie added: “What was cool about that was whenever we were first talking about getting married, Chase brought it up and I already knew what he was gonna say. So I interrupted him and said, ‘No, I know the same thing.’ So that was definitely a God thing that the time was right.”
They took a few days to break the news to their parents and start planning. Sadie’s parents were very supportive. She called them the best parents, adding: “For them to be a hundred percent behind me and my choices and my decisions on who I love and who I wanted to marry when I wanted to marry, it couldn’t mean any more to me than what it did.”
In a common wedding tradition, they didn’t see each other on the day of the wedding. When Chase saw her, he was beyond words. “I was so excited to see her ’cause I hadn’t seen her all day. It was the pure reaction of being able to see her… It was like a hit in the chest of emotion.”
They do know that the future may not be easy considering the prognosis but they are willing to face it together.
Update: Unfortunately, Chase died a year later. His wife was by his side, reassuring him that all was going to be ok as he slipped away.
Source: People