The Romantic.com

On February 25, 2000, my wonderful husband and I were united in marriage.  As you can imagine, I was very much looking forward to this day.  We had the option to have a religious or non-religious ceremony. As we feel we are soul mates, (still so amazed at all the connections we have and continue to discover) we asked for the religious ceremony.  I so wanted to be able to take in every word, I wanted to cry, I wanted to be totally in the moment.

The pastor started the ceremony by reading from the Bible and talking about what a marriage is and is not.  As my fiancé Dwayne and I were standing with the Pastor, at the front of the church, I began to feel extremely warm. Instead of taking in these words, I was thinking about how badly I was sweating, and how much I wanted this to be over with. After about five minutes of the pastor speaking, he asked that Dwayne and I face each other to say our vows.

The Pastor was to read a few lines at a time and Dwayne would repeat the words to me. We were about half way through Dwayne saying his portion, and I was not hearing what they were saying.  As the Pastor was telling Dwayne what to repeat, I mouthed to Dwayne “I’m going to faint.”  He shook my hands and said, “No your not” and then repeated the line he had just been given.  I then fell forward into Dwayne’s arms, he asked for a chair and a moment later my legs buckled and I was out cold on the ground.

While I was out, I thought, am I dead, am I in heaven? Then I saw a bright light and I thought I must be in an operating room or something.  Then as my vision came back around, I saw Dwayne, his dad, my brother-in-law, and the Pastor all standing over me and realized THIS IS MY WEDDING! and I said, “Oh no!” and they all chuckled.

This doesn’t end here.  After a few moments, I said I felt okay to go on.  The Pastor read my vows as I repeated them to Dwayne.  At this point, the chair that I never made it to when I fainted was about 8 feet behind me.  The Pastor asked for the rings and hands my ring to Dwayne and tells him to “repeat after me” before placing the ring on my hand.  Dwayne starts to repeat as I start to sway a little.  Before the ring made it on my hand, I fell straight backwards knees locked, as if I was being baptized.  Thankfully, my father-in-law was able to run up behind me and scoop his arms under mine and gently set me in the chair I missed the first time.

So much for that romantic moment!  And yes, we have it all on video!