‘Are we still getting married?,’ she looked at me in tears. She wanted to protect me.’: Man loses wife to stage 4 cancer months after wedding, ‘I have a huge hole in my heart’

‘We made it!,’ I kept telling her.

Our dance was ‘Perfect’ by Ed Sheeran which perfectly described the day.

After the wedding, we continued on with the trial for about 3 more months when a new tumor was discovered in her spleen. This unfortunately meant it was not working properly and we were unable to continue the trial. I think I walked around the parking lot for an hour cursing nonstop after this news. It was a crushing blow after how well things had been going, and we were becoming more and more hopeful for a future together up to this point. We made the decision that we would try and do whatever it took to qualify for another clinical trial, and the clinic was supporting us 100%.

Laurin did a few rounds of triple dose chemotherapy to try and see if we could qualify for another trial, but sadly we were not able to get everything under control. Right before her 30^th birthday, we decided to give up all treatment and enjoy the time we had left. We were preparing for a 2-week road trip, I had a conference in Oklahoma that I was not planning on going to, but Laurin told me she wanted to spend time with her Aunt in Florida for a few days. So she drove down to see her aunt while I went to my conference. I flew in late Saturday night and woke up Sunday morning to a call from Laurin.