'Fighting until the last minute': Young mother dies one week after getting married in Montreal hospital

Kelly and Daves Lachance were married in a Montreal hospital on Dec. 25, 2021. (Daves Lachance)

A woman who was married in a Montreal hospital room on Christmas Day has died, one week after the intimate and emotional ceremony took place. Kelly Bedard was 24 years old.

Bedard and her groom Daves Lachance were parents to seven children, the youngest, a baby, about seven-months old.

For all those months, since immediately after the birth, Bedard had been undergoing in-patient treatment for an aggressive form of ovarian cancer at the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC).

Lachance was by her side during her final moments on Jan. 1. He said he is still in a state of shock.

“My children are keeping me together. I haven’t accepted it really yet,” Lachance told CTV News during a phone interview after he’d put “his babies to bed.”

“Right now I’m taking advantage of being with my family, my children, but the night comes, you cry,” Lachance said.

What has lifted his spirits though, he said, is that he and Bedard were able to make their relationship official on Christmas Day.

It’s something he said they always wanted and that he “has memories now of my wife, Madame Lachance.”

It was all about “love and a little bit of hope in all of this,” he said.

On the day she died, Lachance posted on his social media in French.

“My wife has left…I love my wife,” he wrote.

Daves and Kelly met five years ago through their mothers, who were friends. "I saw her and I fell in love," said Lachance. (Daves Lachance) 

Lachance explained Bedard “couldn’t go through the last chemotherapy treatment because it was too late. Cancer had taken over and nothing more could be done.”

But that didn’t stop Lachance from doing all he could for Bedard, said the notary who officiated the last-minute hospital wedding, and who got to know the newlyweds during the week that followed the ceremony.

“He was with her day and night in the hospital. When he wasn’t able to stay with her in her room, he slept in his car,” Liat Lev Ary told CTV News in an interview.

Travelling back and forth from their home in Mont Laurier north of Montreal was not an option because of the distance and time involved.

“He was so devoted to her,” Lev Ary said.

“My wife had lots of energy, you couldn’t keep her in one place. She was a mother in love with her children, she loved life,” Lachance said.

As sick as Bedard was, Lev Ary said she got to see those qualities in the young woman for herself when she returned to the hospital the Thursday after the ceremony to help her with more “legal affairs.”

“I told her when I left she was a lioness, a fierce lioness. She was fighting until the last minute. We all knew that. She was fighting so hard to have this chance, to see her children.”

“He’s left with seven young children...so it’s not going to be easy on him,” Lev Ary said.

“He’s not working because he had a work-related accident,” she explained, adding the family will need some support.

A fundraiser has been launched to help Lachance and the children financially as they move forward.

Daves and Kelly are pictured with five of their seven children. (Daves Lachance)

Lev Ary said she won’t ever forget the moment they all shared on Christmas Day.

Right before the big moment, the children were able to see their parents using Facetime.

Nurses who had been caring for Bedard asked her to wait to begin the ceremony until they could get to the room to join them, she said.

“They were hugging, we were crying, they were crying, the nurses were crying. It was so beautiful and unfair. Heart-wrenching and heart-warming at the same time,” Lev Ary recalled.

“She looked beautiful. He kept admiring her…and telling her she looked stunning,” she said of the bride, who had applied some makeup, wore a hospital gown, and carried a bouquet.

Lev Ary added it was her hope that if she could help them get married that day as they wished, “and bring a ray of sunshine, a smile that I can put on her face before she dies, I want to be able to do that.”

“Thank you to everyone for the wave of love,” Lachance said. “We felt it.”