A San Diego Love Story

Love Story

Oct 7

On October 12, 2021, Ashley and Billy will stand before family and friends to unite their lives in marriage and open a new chapter in a story that has been dominated by struggle and sickness.

Ashley and Billy first met in 2018 while both volunteering at the Ronald McDonald House. There was an immediate attraction and soon Ashley got up the courage to ask him to go country two-step dancing. They hit it off that night and immediately started dating. Two years later, Billy asked her to be his wife while on an excursion to Catalina Island.

Ashley has struggled with health issues for her entire life. She was born with Cystic Fibrosis and has battled its many complications for years. In addition to the CF, Ashley suffers from Hemachromatosis, a condition that causes the body to absorb too much iron. In her early 20’s, Ashley’s lung quality had diminished to the point where she needed to be on constant oxygen. In 2015, she underwent a complete double lung transplant. She spent a month in the hospital, on and off of a ventilator – and often, clinging to life.

While the surgery was successful, Ashley’s Hemachromatosis has continued to advance, placing her on yet another donor transplant list, this time for a partial liver. Finding a perfect match for a “living liver” transplant is very difficult. As fate would have it, Ashley found her perfect match in Billy and will undergo her transplant this coming spring.

We were thrilled to meet Ashely and Billy at this point in their journey and are so excited to help make their wish for a wedding come true. We wanted to be able to grant this wish for them before the liver transplant so that they can focus on preparing for both of their surgeries and making plans for the recovery that will follow. We teamed up with a new friend, Amanda Crabtree of Spark and Sage Events and can’t wait to watch her team work some magic.