When you look at Karen Jensen鈥檚 wedding photos, what you see is fairly common: a woman embraces her father, who sits beside her in a wheelchair; an altar is draped in white cloth; blooming carnations and daisies鈥攁ll white鈥攕it before a chapel window.
It鈥檚 what you don鈥檛 see, though, that made Karen and Brad Jensen鈥檚 ceremony so unusual.
Just out of the frame was a social worker who helped Karen arrange the whole ceremony a week before it was originally planned. On the other side of her dad, dutifully out of the camera鈥檚 sight, stood a nurse monitoring his IV. And just beyond the chapel doors were the halls of a hospital.
Karen had a lifelong dream of her dad walking her down the aisle. She was 25, living in Phoenix, about to graduate with a master鈥檚 in social work, and about to marry her high school sweetheart. A few weeks before the wedding, her father, who had lymphoma, was emergently admitted to the hospital. She and her fianc茅 made plans to move up their wedding date.
"My mom put me in touch with the floor鈥檚 social worker," Karen says. "She helped us figure it out. Could he leave his room? Would we have to get married in his hospital room?"
Karen and Brad prepared for a different wedding鈥攊n an ICU room, with a bishop and only their parents. But the day before the in-room ceremony, her father鈥檚 care team allowed him to go to the hospital chapel. The family could, they said, have the service there.
"We were able to get our people together," Karen said. "My maid of honor, our wedding party鈥攁ll of that." Karen was thrilled. The only thing they couldn鈥檛 arrange in time were the flowers. No matter: a ceremony in a chapel, not in a hospital room.
When Karen opened the doors to the chapel the next day, she was shocked. "The social worker had worked with the chaplain. They were able to get flowers and decorate. It was very emotional. It was an unbelievable touch."
Much of her father鈥檚 care team had come to the ceremony. His nurses, nursing assistants, and social workers from around the hospital were there. Staff members were crowding outside the chapel itself.
"I thought it was pretty amazing that people were willing to share in that special moment for us," Karen says. She laments their absence from the photos now, but she knows they were just trying to be polite.
Her father insisted Karen and her husband have a reception a week or so later. So many people were coming from out of town, he said. He wanted other family to have the chance to celebrate. About a week after the reception, he passed away in the hospital.
"We were lucky," Karen says. "My mom and dad got to walk me down the aisle. Having my dad in the wheelchair, being monitored the whole time, was just so thoughtful."
Later that same month, Karen decided make a shift in her field. She had planned to use her master鈥檚 degree to go into child protection.
"After this experience, I knew I wanted to be in medical social work. It was so profound to me that these social workers were able to take this challenging time in our lives and intersperse it with some joy," Karen says.
Now, 20 years later, she finds herself at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) as a social worker.
"Life goes on even if you鈥檙e sick," Karen says. "So you still have to find the joy in those things鈥攖hose everyday life things."
She looks for ways to administer doses of joy to her patients at HCI.
"I encourage patients to reach out to their care teams if there鈥檚 something they want that鈥檚 important to them. Talk to us. You鈥檇 be surprised at what can be done鈥攅specially when you have this kind of caring team and people who are willing to go that extra mile."
If it weren鈥檛 for that social worker, Karen would have had a very different wedding.
"Everybody thought it was going to be this terrible, sad occasion. It really wasn鈥檛," Karen says. "There were tears, but they weren鈥檛 from sadness. They were wedding tears."
Due to increased precautions surrounding COVID-19, Huntsman Cancer Institute is upholding its commitment to keeping you and others safe. All support groups will be on hold until April 30. Patients, families, and caregivers are still welcome to contact Patient and Family Support at 801-213-5699.