After Mom Beats 4 Brushes With Death, Daughter Helps Fulfill Her Wish
By throwing her mother and father a church wedding 30 years after they wed in a courthouse, Tonia Watson tells Yahoo Parenting, “I felt like I replaced some of the pain she went through,” enduring three cancer surgeries and a car crash. (Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
After all that Theresa Watson had been through, her daughter Tonia Watson decided that the 59-year-old deserved something special. So she gave her the gift she’d always wanted: a showstopping church “wedding” to renew her vows with her husband of 30 years.
The event, held at Calvary Lighthouse in Lakewood, N.J., on August 22, was a triumphant occasion for the Lakewood breast cancer survivor who had pulled through not just one surgery but three procedures in less than three years. Not to mention a life-threatening car accident one year following her last surgery. “She and my father were so drained,” Tonia tells Yahoo Parenting of the couple, first wed at a city courthouse, who both suffered health problems (her dad suffered from prostate cancer). “And on top of that the car accident? I had to do something.”
STORY: Mom Saves Letter for 20 Years to Give to Daughter on Wedding Day
Prior to the wreck that landed Theresa in the hospital for a month — horrifically a day before Theresa’s sister’s funeral last year — Tonia had started to plan her mom’s wedding. “My mother had one wish on her deathbed,” Tonia recently revealed to the Asbury Park Press, detailing a heart-to-heart she had with her mom before her third surgery. Theresa, she recalled, said, “‘If I make it out of this alive, I want to have a real wedding. That’s my dream.’ [And] I said, ‘Mom, you’re not gonna die. You’re gonna walk down the aisle and be a beautiful bride.’”
STORY: Police Officers Fulfill Dying Mother’s Last Wish for 15-Year-Old Daughter
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
Post-accident, Tonia says, her resolve only increased to give her mom that dream wedding. “I watched her go through three surgeries, I watched cops cut her out of a car while the tires were still smoking,” she told the Asbury Park Press. “I watched her experience each thing that could have killed her.”
To then give her a life-affirming, joyful day “meant everything to me,” Tonia tells Yahoo Parenting. “I got married eight years ago, and she always told me that the day was so beautiful. She’d keep saying, ‘One day, I’ll walk down the aisle.’”
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
Tonia, a court administrator at the South Toms River Municipal Courthouse, helped that day become a reality largely in secret from her mother. “I told her a bit, but she didn’t know the extent to which I was planning,” says Tonia. The devoted daughter held a wedding shower and then organized an elaborate ceremony including 19 bridesmaids and seven flower girls.
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
“We gave gifts and honored her as if it was her first wedding,” she says. “She was so tickled knowing that her dream was coming true.” Same goes for Tonia’s dad, whom she says “cried like a baby,” during the “I do’s.”
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
It was a treat for Tonia too. “The whole thing was an amazing experience,” she says. “I mean, cancer is serious — to watch her lose her hair and her health. It was wonderful to be able to give her something back. I felt like I replaced some of the pain she went through. She says she’s still honeymooning.”
(Photo courtesy of Doug Hood/App.com)
Please follow @YahooParenting on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. Have an interesting story to share about your family? Email us at YParenting (at) Yahoo.com.
