I met with this really great couple yesterday…

Their story is absolutely amazing! We started a “Photography for Charity” program this past year, hoping to be able to help couples who have been through a lot together and would otherwise not be able to afford our services the chance to have fantastic wedding images. The program has taken off and our 2nd winner for 2006 is Kelly & Scott. Here’s their story:

” Like most women growing up, I always drempt of meeting my knight and shining armor, having a wonderful wedding and living happily ever after.

When I was ten years old, fate threw me a curve ball and life handed out the unexpected. The diagnosis was cystic fibrosis, a lung disease that makes every organ suseptible to bacteria and one would do all it could to shorten my life and rob me of my dreams. I remember feeling as a child that I would never accomplish the dreams I had set for my life which included a wedding of my dreams. I often thought, ‘who would ever fall in love with me or take a chance at loving me knowing that I may not be the woman they eventually grow old with?’

Back in February of 2005 I met my wonderful husband to be through Match.com. We shared in a common christian faith that immediately drew us to want to get to know one another more. Living only 15 minutes away, within the next few weeks we would meet for church services together and dinner afterwards and then found over time we were falling in love. I knew that my illness was fatal, often wondered if I was being fair to Scott knowing that in time my illness could possibly lead him to a broken heart in the end. In August my illness fell to a point where I could no longer breathe on my own without coughing and gasping for air. I was admited to home health care and the pain of telling Scott that my illness was taking a turn for the worst was something I feared. I sat him down and told him my fears, of falling in love and leaving him prematurely. He listened and held me, telling me that even if we had just five moments of wonderful it would last him a lifetime if it meant that he had my complete love for just that moment.

Throughout that long home health care experience Scott made the long commute from working in Chicago to my home to hook me up to my IV’s, pray with me, and give me the nightly aerosal treaments and therapy my body needs to survive. He is my heart, my best friend, my hope, my smile.

For so long my dream has been to have a Sunday wedding with close friends and family by our side but to give Scott a vision of me in a beautiful dress, a day to capture moments that may one day be stolen from us from the illness that is out to claim my life. Because of the costs of my medications and the finances that go into starting a new life in a new home and keeping me healthy I am unable to pay the high costs of photo journalism that I have always dreamed of.

My wedding day dream is simple…to capture my day, hopefully sickness free and to give my family and friends, but most importantly Scott a day like none other, where it can be captured in a way only the uniqueness of photojournalism can bring. I am praying so hard that my dream on Sunday, May 28, 2006 of marrying my best friend, the one who has stood by my side through thick and thin and with whom I dream of one day to grow old with can be captured through your camera. The wedding will be simple, a church full of church family & friends.

I would love so much to go to a park afterwards for pictures and also some at the beach where we go to get away and just be together.

If you choose to select us you will witness not only our dream becoming a reality but also that of a community who has embraced us and who has stood by our side through sickness and health and with whom God has been the core of in our courtship.

I know you are very busy but I pray somehow you can help me with what little I have. Thank you so much!

Kelly & Scott”

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