When Adam Carnes and his partner, Salem, began thinking about marriage, they imagined taking their time planning a wedding with family and friends. Instead, the couple said "I do" inside a meditation room at Tufts Medical Center just hours before Adam underwent a life-saving heart transplant.
"We already knew we wanted to get married, but we hadn't made any plans yet," Adam said.
Living with heart failure for decades
Adam, 44, had been living with heart failure since his 20s. Earlier this year, his condition worsened significantly, leaving him too sick to return home without a transplant.
"He was completely out of breath," Salem said. "I knew something was really wrong."
As Adam's symptoms progressed, his care team at Tufts Medical Center determined that a heart transplant offered the best path forward. For many patients, the wait for a donor heart can take months or even years. Adam's match came far sooner than expected.
"They said, 'We have good news and bad news,'" Adam recalled. "The good news is we've accepted a heart for you. The bad news is your surgery is tomorrow morning - the same time as your wedding."
A wedding at Tufts Medical Center
Rather than postpone the ceremony, Adam and Salem decided to move forward with both milestones together. Within hours, members of the Tufts Medical Center team came together to help create a wedding celebration inside the hospital. Staff gathered decorations, arranged for a barber and transformed the meditation room into an intimate ceremony space.
One nurse, Cameron Upham, RN, who is ordained, officiated the wedding while her fiancé, an experienced wedding photographer, captured the day.
"When I saw it all set up, I thought, 'Wow, this is amazing,'" Adam said. "They really made it personal."
Friends and family rushed to Boston to attend the ceremony.
"Our friends were changing in the parking garage trying to make it in time," Adam said.
For the care team, helping make the wedding possible was about supporting Adam and Salem through a life-changing moment with compassion and humanity.
"It's the yin and the yang of this," Upham said. "There's immeasurable grief, but also this incredible gift - a second chance at life."
A second chance after heart transplant surgery
The next morning, Adam underwent a successful heart transplant at Tufts Medical Center.
Now recovering at home with Salem by his side, Adam says he already feels a difference physically and emotionally as he begins this next chapter of his life. His story is also a reminder of the lifesaving impact of organ donation and the many people involved in transplant care - from donors and families to nurses, physicians and support staff.
For Adam and Salem, what began as an unexpected change in plans became a day they will never forget: a wedding, a successful transplant and the start of a new future together.
Learn more about New England's #1 heart transplant program.
