The Bachelorette alum Katie Thurston and comedian Jeff Arcuri have officially tied the knot amid Katie's battle with stage 3 breast cancer.
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Katie and Jeff's parents and the couple's new adopted dog Charlie were in attendance for the intimate wedding ceremony.
After the wedding, the group celebrated with a dinner at Da Andrea in New York.
Katie said she and Jeff will have a bigger wedding, complete with personalized vows, after she beats cancer.
"It was this kind gesture of him saying, truly, in sickness and in health," Katie gushed to the magazine.
"He is proving that he's here to stay. He shows up every day and he does it in ways that just continue to surprise."
Jeff apparently decided that he wanted to be Katie's husband, officially, when she begins her I-Spy breast cancer trial, a personalized treatment based on a patient's tumor, on Thursday, March 27.
"I want to be able to be in the hospital with her and just be like, 'My wife's in there.' There's more power to that," Jeff said. "I don't want to be not with you for any of this."
Two days prior to their backyard wedding, Jeff let it slip that he and Katie were about to exchange vows.
When asked about how Katie's recent cancer diagnosis has affected their relationship, Jeff shared, "You would think it would cause more tribulation or problems between you, but it's bonded us more than anything else, which is why we're moving up the wedding a little bit."
Jeff added, "We're getting married in two days."
Katie then broke down into tears and gushed about how Jeff has been there for her every step of the way.
RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELORETTE' COUPLES NOW(Following Katie's trial, which may involve multiple rounds of chemotherapy, she will undergo surgery.)
"It was so sweet," Katie said of Jeff's desire to become her spouse ahead of treatment.
"Obviously, we were wanting to plan a wedding and there's a lot of emotions that come in with chemo and the impact and the health and we don't know what the next year looks like," Katie explained.
"And one night he said, 'I want to show you that I still love you and that I'm here to stay. I'll get married to you tomorrow.' We flew our parents in from Michigan and Washington State. We got our marriage license and a friend is just going to marry us."
Katie, who competed on Matt James' The Bachelor season before starring on The Bachelorette's seventeenth season, met Jeff on Instagram after sending her friend a video clip of one of Jeff's standup acts exactly one year prior to their wedding.
"If you've ever looked at his page, you just can't help but truly fall in love with him as a person. His personality -- he's so pure and just charming," Katie recalled.
"So on March 22nd of last year, I sent a clip to my girlfriends. I had never talked to him. We had never met. I sent this clip and said, 'Future husband.' At the time, I didn't realize, but I was manifesting my actual future husband, so when we were looking at dates, I was like, 'Wait, it has to be March 22nd.'"
After talking on the phone for three to six hours daily, Katie and Jeff met in person for the first time in Los Angeles in early May 2024. The pair then got engaged three months later in August 2024.
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"Sometimes when you're in a relationship early on, you feel like you're being dishonest or there's a vibe of 10 percent things you don't know about them yet. And I never felt that with her... I've always felt like an open book with you. There's nothing I'd ever hide from you. There's no reason to."
Katie agreed that she and Jeff were "fully ourselves" right from the start of their romance.
"You're the first person to not be upset with my goofiness," Jeff added.
"I'll dance and sing... and she's the only person that's ever been cheering me on for it and then videotaping me and joking with me about it as opposed to being like, 'Oh my God, what are you doing right now?' I just love that too. You make me feel not stupid."
The couple has been able to use their shared humor as a coping mechanism for Katie's ongoing cancer battle.
"He's been great at matching my energy... People say, 'You're so strong.' I might appear that way," Katie noted.
"But I'm also in therapy and some days, I'm very sad. Some days, we're very fun and playful and make very, you know, out-of-pocket jokes. So him just being able to match whatever mood shows up that day [is supporting me]."
Katie added how Jeff has been to "every single appointment" with her thus far.
"He's done every single shot that's involved with IVF," Katie said, referencing how she's taking precaution knowing chemotherapy can impact her reproductive health.
"It does raise the risk of you not being able to conceive. Knowing that we wanted kids in the future, we thought, 'Okay, let's do IVF just to have that option.' We dedicated two weeks before doing anything else breast cancer wise to doing IVF."
Katie went on to share, "[Some] doctors almost frown upon it or they want to put fear in you and say, 'No, you need to take care of this cancer.' So a lot of women don't even realize that you can take 10 days to dedicate time to your reproductive health and your future family plans. We were able to retrieve 17 eggs and of those 17, six became embryos."
Jeff also expressed how he's proud of Katie for sharing her journey with fans so that she can help others going through a similar struggle.
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Katie's The Bachelorette season ended on ABC in August 2021, and then she and Blake -- a Canadian wildlife specialist -- announced their breakup only a couple of months later in October 2021.
Katie then went public with her romance with John Hersey, whom she had eliminated during Week 2 of her The Bachelorette journey, in November 2021. She was accused of moving on from Blake quickly with "a rebound" and emotionally cheating on her ex-fiance.
Katie and John split after less than one year together in June 2022, and Katie expressed on numerous occasions how John had dumped her after she allegedly gave the relationship everything she had.
After ending her relationship with John, Katie made a cameo on Bachelor in Paradise's ninth season in 2023 and found closure with Blake, who remained her friend post-show.
Katie then she decided to pursue a unique opportunity and look for love on FBoy Island.
Katie had a brief public relationship with FBoy Island's Vince Xu, but Katie announced their breakup in December 2023.
Katie then soft launched her relationship with Jeff in January 2024 when she was asked to give dating advice on Instagram, but she didn't reveal she was officially dating Jeff until June of last year.
Katie had announced at the time: "Safe to say he's making it to hometowns next week," which was a nod to her prior The Bachelorette stint in 2021.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski
