My Big Bean

Andy and I first met after literally running into each other at a White House reception honoring the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community in June of 2012. I was fortunate enough to have been invited after coming out publicly as a transgender woman while serving as student body president at American University. Andrew, 26 at the time, had come out as a transgender man several years prior and was now a leading LGBT health policy advocate in Washington, D.C.

I hadn’t given our clumsy “meeting” at the White House much thought until I received a charming and suave Facebook message from that handsome guy two months later. His friends have since told me he spent hours writing and re-writing the short message, in which he asked me out for coffee or drinks. After several online conversations and a few more chance encounters while I interned at the White House, we finally managed to find some time to go out for dinner.

We quickly found that we had far more in common than our transgender history — no doubt an important component of our identities, but still only one part. We both had a passion for law and politics, a love of “trash television” as he would call it, a desire to travel, and an incessant need to be right. We both became involved in politics after an intense interest in film. We both loved Star Wars, although his love dwarfed anything I could muster. And we both had an obnoxious affinity for baby-talk and nicknames; he was the “big bean,” to my “little bean.” I still maintain that I certainly got the better deal: he was generous, loving, smart, funny, and enjoyed the perfect mix of hard work and play (many of the traits I found common in people from his beloved home state of Wisconsin).

In no time, we were attached at the hip. Just a few weeks into our relationship, he accompanied my family and me on a trip to Barbados. I quickly became part of his family and he quickly became part of mine, my new partner and best friend. To top it off, we even ended up becoming colleagues when I joined him to work at the Center for American Progress. We began to talk about our future, believing it stretched far beyond anything we could imagine.

Our relationship took on a whole new dimension when Andrew was diagnosed with oral cancer in September of 2013. It was in his tongue. I thought and hoped the succeeding few months would be the toughest we’d have to endure for quite some time. In October, Andy underwent a twelve-hour surgery to remove part of his tongue and reconstruct it with a graft from his arm. As he relearned how to talk and eat, he had to undergo an intense regimen of radiation and chemotherapy. He could barely breathe without stabbing pain in his mouth.

And then, in April, Andrew was proclaimed “cancer free!” As frightening and as stressful as that experience was, it gave us a bond few couples our age develop so quickly. Though we knew we weren’t totally out of the woods, we began to plan for our lives ahead.

Then, out of nowhere, the world he’d rebuilt after his first diagnosis came crashing down. In July of 2014, Andy developed a mild but persistent cough and chest pain. After several tests and a short hospital stay, the news came back like a gut-punch: Andy’s cancer had returned. This time, it had spread to his lungs.

In the 24 hours after this news hit, Andy asked me, “If it turns out that this is incurable, would you marry me?” Of course I said yes. Andy had always wanted to get married, but prior to this new diagnosis, there was never any rush. He was only 28, and I was just out of college.

When we got the news that the illness was “life shortening,” as doctors say, his soul was understandably crushed. At the time, we were told that with treatment, he would probably have about a year left.

The next two weeks were a blur. Silence, disbelief, crying. Lots and lots of crying. Crying about the fear of death. Crying because he wouldn’t be able to see his family and friends grow up. Crying because, as he said, “he wouldn’t be around to say ‘I love you, bean,’ or ‘I’m proud of you, bean.’” But the crying gave way to determination — determination to live as long as possible, as much as possible — we decided to move forward with a wedding.

Andy was scheduled to start chemotherapy in the next few weeks. Because we thought we were operating with a year left, we tentatively set our wedding for mid-October. Both of us had always wanted a fall wedding; the colors, the temperatures, and, for a D.C. couple, the lack of humidity were exactly what we wanted and needed.