Cancer patient marries longtime partner at hospital

BOSTON -- Camelia Rodriguez fulfilled a dream to be married in a white dress in a ceremony steeped in the traditions of her native Mexico.

She and longtime partner Jorge Estuardo got their wedding on Wednesday with the help of workers at Massachusetts General Hospital, where Rodriguez has spent the past two months with advanced breast cancer.

Three nurses brought the 53-year-old bride in a wheelchair to a family room on the hospital's 22nd floor. Stunning views of the city provided the backdrop to a wedding attended by family, friends, hospital workers and reporters.

Estuardo appeared emotional at times during the ceremony, in which he gave his bride the 13 gold coins traditional in Mexico to indicate his trust and confidence in her and that he will support her. The couple has been together for eight years.

A white rope in a figure eight shape was placed around the necks of the couple to symbolize a love which should bind them together, another Mexican tradition included in the ceremony performed in Spanish by Ricardo Valle, a pastor from Rodriguez's La Luce de Christo church in Chelsea.

Nurses and other hospital workers scrambled to organize the wedding in one day when Rodriguez said she felt well enough. The newlyweds have no plans to get away for a brief honeyoom because Rodriguez "is a little too sick to leave the hospital," MGH spokeswoman Emily Parker said.

A member of the hospital's radiology department volunteered her time to videotape the ceremony for Rodriguez's children in Mexico.

Workers at the department that provides foreign language interpreters worked to include the Mexican traditions, and the hospital's catering unit provided food, refreshments and a wedding cake, Parker said.

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