Nurses help out to grant wedding wish
Thirty-seven years after Paul Martin and Ann Phipps first met in a clubhouse in Sittingbourne, the couple tied the knot at a joyous ceremony at Medway Hospital.
The Martins tied the knot on Tuesday on the Lawrence Ward, where Paul is receiving palliative care.
Just 24 hours after chaplain Lynda Cooke said the wedding could go ahead the nurses did everything they could to make the day a success.
Paul, 60, from Beaconsfield Road, Sittingbourne said: “Our son decided that we have been together long enough and it was about time we got married and with the cancer we decided we should do it now.
“We told the staff we wanted to do it on Friday afternoon and at 3pm yesterday we were told we could do it today.
“The staff here and everyone have done a grand job, we couldn’t have asked for more.
“I asked her out on Boxing Day 1970 at a party at the UKP Clubhouse but I was so drunk I couldn’t remember who I had asked. I had to check with her sister.
“But fortunately I picked the right one.”
Paul and Ann’s grandchildren Lola, nine, Dulcie, six, and Blu- belle, 14 months, were Ann’s bridesmaids and led her and her father down the hospital corridor to the room which had been dressed up for the ceremony.
Stacie Patel, clinical sister for the ward, spent her day off getting everything ready.