This is the group who gathered to attend the wedding of Tom King and Alexandria Dolezal, held in the chapel at Elmhurst Hospital. Congratulations to the happy couple!
After health scare, couple decides to wed RIGHT NOW!
By Dee Longfellow
For The Elmhurst Independent
“I’d asked her before to marry me,” said Tom King, the groom in a last-minute impromptu wedding hat took place on Saturday, June 10 in the chapel of Elmhurst Hospital. “She just always put it off.”
His lady-friend-now-wife Alexandria Dolezal, who goes by Alex, changed her mind after Tom suffered a recent heart attack. The episode gave Alex a bit of a shake-up so Tom insisted they get married immediately — which they did in a few days.
The story begins…
The story actually begins on Wednesday, June 7 when Tom was feeling uncomfortable and decided to go to the hospital.
“I wasn’t feeling well, it began to feel like there were two elephants sitting on my chest,” Tom recalled. “It wasn’t until I got to the emergency room that I actually had a heart attack. They ended up doing CPR and had to ‘zap’ me a couple of times with the defibrillator.”
Tom ended up in surgery, where doctors installed a stent. After that, he just needed a few days to convalesce and then was to be released to go home.
Time to make a decision
“Alex and I have been together for five years,” he said. “I had asked her to marry me before, but that was always the end of the conversation right there. This incident was something that I guess made her realize what was going on, so she said, ‘sure.’ And I said, well, then let’s do it right here.”
So it was decided — a wedding in the Elmhurst Memorial Hospital Pastoral Chapel. Tom’s doctor was neurologist Dr. Donald Lussky who said he had no objections.
Bride’s chaplain sister happens to be in town
As it turns out, Alex has a sister named Carol who happens to be a chaplain. Carol’s daughter, Alex’s niece, is a student at Northwestern University and Carol happened to be in town to help her move out of the dorm room.
Alex and Carol and others from the hospital spent Thursday and Friday planning the entire wedding to take place in the chapel the following morning. Carol even pulled together a wedding dress for Alex.
If you know Elmhurst Hospital, they don’t just stand aside, they get involved. This time was no different. The Elmhurst Hospital Pastoral Care stepped in to help and took care of a wedding cake and flowers. They also arranged for coffee to be served after the ceremony with the cake.
The hospital staff took Tom down to the chapel that morning, still hooked up to his heart monitor.
“Two nurses came along and stayed through the ceremony to make sure nothing bad happened,” Tom said.
After all that, Tom was discharged on Monday, June 12 and went home to further recover — from his health issues AND the wedding!
