We cried our hearts out for the couple struggling to keep their love together in the heartbreaking book, The Fault In Our Stars. And the love story of 26-year-old Katie Prager and her 25-year-old husband Dalton Prager will make you cry even harder. Suffering from cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder that damages the lungs, they met when they were teenagers and fought against all odds to be together.
With both of them struggle with their illness, their love story is coming to a tragic end. Unfortunately, the time has come for them to bid each other goodbye.
As Katie takes her last breaths at home, her husband Dalton is fighting to recover from pneumonia to be with his wife in her last moments.
The couple had met online and began talking more when Katie learned about Dalton’s condition and sent him a message saying ‘If you ever need a friend to talk to, you can reach out to me.’ That one comforting message from Katie lead to the two spending more time talking to each other and eventually falling in love.
Being together wasn’t easy as doctors had warned them against meeting because there was a high risk that Katie could contract the contagious Burkiholderia cepacia bacteria from Dalton. But nothing could stop the star-crossed lovers from uniting. Uninhibited by what it might cost, the two embarked on the journey of love and got married in 2009. In an interview to CNN, Katie said:
“I told Dalton I’d rather be happy — like really, really happy — for five years of my life and die sooner than be mediocre happy and live for 20 years.”
In 2014, the couple got hospitalized together, hoping to receive a lung transplant. They wanted to travel all the 50 states of the Unites States and even dreamed to co-author a book on their life. But things fell apart sooner than they had imagined. Katie’s lung transplant didn’t turn out as expected and her condition began to deteriorate.
After years of struggling with the disease and putting up a fight to be with Dalton, Katie finally resigned to her fate as the doctors said there was nothing that they could do. Her husband, on the other hand, is fighting pneumonia in the hospital and dreading every second that he’s spending away from his wife. Right now, the only thing that the couple wishes for is to be together.
“If we only get to spend a day and a night together, we’ll be happy with that”, said Katie.
