Cat Kukla never dreamed of fairytale dresses or castles. She dreamed of Bear.
She met him as a child, at a shelter, and they had been inseparable ever since. When she met Jimmy, he fell in love with the dog too: every weekend, he took Bear to visit her at university. Bear wasn’t a pet. He was part of their story. That’s why Cat had one very clear wish for her wedding: that he be there, in a little red cart.
But Bear, 17, took a turn for the worse a week before the wedding. Kidney disease left him hospitalized at the VCA Veterinary Emergency Service in Middleton, Wisconsin. And Cat couldn’t imagine getting married without him.
““What if we got married at the clinic?”” she asked Jimmy. ““I’d marry you any day, at any time”,” he replied. The veterinary team was moved and helped organize the ceremony in a waiting room, with family and friends present and others connected online. Bear, a little drowsy, was alert in his red cart, as if he knew that moment belonged to him too.
Two days later, he was discharged. The couple, according to the post, got married again a week later, as planned. But the first ““I do”” was the one that included Bear.
