On May 14, 2016, two of my best friends got married. I had the extraordinary pleasure of serving as a bridesmaid. I am not only best friends with the bride, C, but also the groom, J; the thing about that is, yes, I met J through C when they started dating, but I consider him one of my closest friends independent of my relationship with her. They are both my best friends in their own right.

J and C two of the best people I’ve ever known. They never leave me out of anything; they always go the extra mile to make sure that I can be a part of everything; that I feel loved, appreciated, cherished. This of course extended to their wedding. When they booked their reception venue they said to me -almost embarrassingly- “Listen, we feel really bad, but the hall isn’t accessible. There’s stairs getting in and there’s no wheelchair bathroom. But you can absolutely bring an attendant and she’ll get a spot at a table, a full meal -the works. When you need to go to the bathroom we’ll just kick everyone out and have someone stand guard and you get the entire run of the bathroom so she can help you. We’re really sorry….”

I told them they had no reason to be so sorry. Fully wheelchair accessible venues can be hard to find; if this place gave them everything they needed and it was what they wanted, they shouldn’t feel bad.

I remember when C first told me she wanted me to be a bridesmaid (well before she even got engaged), I was extremely honoured but I also told her, “I understand if logistically, it just won’t work. It’s okay. Are you sure? I don’t want to make things more complicated for you.”

She waved me off and said, “No. I love you. I want you to be my bridesmaid. Don’t you dare worry about any of that. You don’t complicate anything. I want you beside me. Both J and I do. WE want you with us.” And that was the end of the discussion.

You always hear horror stories about perfectly lovely women becoming bridezillas, all of her closest friends ending up hating her and bridesmaids who hate each other, don’t get along and spend the whole time wanting to kill each other. This was the absolute opposite.

C had four bridesmaids -myself, R, S, and K. I had met S and R several times over the past few years and became friends with them through C. K was the only one I hadn’t met at all prior to C and J getting engaged. The four of us built up an amazing bond. When it came time to plan the bachelorette, the maid of honour, R, made sure that all locations were properly wheelchair accessible. We spent the night at K’s condo and everyone said to me, “Whatever you need, Layla. We’ll help you change if you need us to, we’ll help you in the bathroom if you need it. We’ll even throw you into bed! We got you, girl.”

All of this came naturally; it was organic; these women have all become true friends and all of this was completely natural to them -not because they have all sorts of experience assisting people with disabilities, but because I’m their friend and helping me in whatever way I might need is the farthest thing from an imposition.

I said to them at the end of the weekend, “Things like this can very easily be more of a chore for me than they are fun; they can very easily be more of a chore for everyone else because the help I need -minor though it might be- becomes an annoyance. But you’re all so wonderful and fantastic -you are all amazing and I love you so much. Thank you for making this an amazing weekend not only for C, but for me as well.”

The day before the wedding I got several texts from C, showing me pictures of the steps up to the entrance of the hall, the flight of stairs up to the main level, the washroom stalls and the rather large step up to the head table so that I had the lay of the land before the wedding. The flight of stairs getting up to the main level of the hall was not particularly large in terms of the number of stairs, but it was steep.

C said to me, “All of J’s groomsmen are totally willing, able and happy to help, but J spoke to M specifically about being the one to help you out on the day. M knows the whole score and he’s totally cool. He’s all good. No worries.”

That was surprising. I was touched to learn that J had specifically spoken to the groomsman I was paired with about helping me out and that this person -whom I had yet to say much more than a few sentences to- was happy to help. C and J have my back in a very special way in that sense. They know intuitively how to make sure everything is as inclusive as possible. And M, though I barely knew him yet, automatically became special to me for being happily up for it all.

Which brings me to the pinnacle of this blog -beyond witnessing my best friends get married and having the honour of being included in their wedding party- M.

When you have a disability and you require up-close and personal help, it has the potential to be weird and awkward if you’re relying on people you hardly know. It can be weird for me and weird for them too; if it is, it shows. I have friends with disabilities as well, but I’m way vocal about my love for my able-bodied friends. It isn’t actually a secret that the vast majority of my friends are able-bodied and that I actually prefer it that way. I’m light and petit; I’m lucky that my disability does not cause fragility -having able-bodied friends opens up a host of doors and experiences that would otherwise be closed to me.

I met M at the rehearsal two days before the wedding -we joked and laughed because he wasn’t paying any attention to the instructions. During dinner at the bride’s house, he was in a different room so we actually spoke very little that day.

After the ceremony on the big day, we were loitering at the top of the stairs in the church looking around for the priest with the key to the chair lift. M looked at me and said, “Listen, I don’t want to like, toot my own horn or anything, but I’m pretty strong. I could just carry you, if that’s okay.”

“Absolutely. Go for it,” I smiled.

The very first time he carried me we were heading down the stairs at church and he knocked my feet (very softly) against the banister accidentally. He apologized and I laughed and told him I wasn’t too attached to my feet -I don’t use them for much. My head though, he should be careful with. Both he and one of the other groomsmen burst out laughing. I warned them that I cracked jokes like that regularly; they were making me feel really good about myself -most of my friends never laugh so hard at my one-liners anymore.

I spent a lot of time in M’s arms that day. There are in fact no words for how wonderful, kind and gracious he is. I can’t say I know him well, but when a guy spends a good majority of an afternoon and evening carrying you around, you get to know each other fast. Feeling like I was an imposition to M was impossible, right from minute one -because we were always smiling and laughing. No elevator? No problem. By the time we were sitting at the head table for dinner, I felt like we’d known each other for a few months rather than days.

The same goes for the one carrying my wheelchair and my bouquet -it’s a unique way to get to know people, sure; but I like it that way, especially when I get to know people like these guys. There’s no halfway with needing to be carried and helped -having to trust people you hardly know – it’s either horrible and awful and awkward, or it is a truly great and unsung perk, because once you’ve trusted someone to carry you and your most important physical possession all day long, how much is left to feel awkward about? I mean, really.

How I got to the aforementioned head table might be the one of the lesser obvious highlights of the day for me. The head table was up a step -too big to just tip my chair back and bump it up. I went to C and J and said, “Okay, so I’m thinking about how M and I are supposed to make our entrance through the door at the back and how he can get me up that lip and get around to the other side of the table without holding up the flow of everyone’s entrance. I have an idea but I wanted to run it by you guys first before I tell him -because, you’re the bride and groom and I don’t want to one-up you… What if he just carries me in and that’s our cool entrance?”

They looked at me and went, “Oh my God, please do it! That’s awesome!”

M just smiled. “YES!” he said, “done. Sold.”

Right before the bridal party was announced, M grabbed a friend to take my wheelchair in and set it up at the head table when very few people would notice that I wasn’t in it. When those doors opened and the MC announced our names, M walked into that room carrying  me in his arms and people went nuts. It was amazing. I could not stop smiling. We reached the edge of the dance floor and M said to me, “Do we dip and spin?”

“Um, yes!” I said.

It’s fantastic things like that which would absolutely not have worked if M was uncomfortable, if I was uncomfortable, or if we were even slightly awkward with one another. It would have been stiff and weird and everyone would’ve been able to tell. If we didn’t genuinely like each other and we hadn’t become fast friends, it never would have worked.

The bridesmaids said to me later, “You guys owned that. He had swagger. That was impressive.”

The rule about getting the bride and groom to kiss during dinner was that you had to stand up and sing a song with the word ‘love’ in it. The bridesmaids decided we wanted to belt out “I Will Always Love You.” K was sitting next to me and I asked her if she’d hold my hand and help me keep my balance to I could stand up on my footplate and be up with the rest of them. Of course, she did. When we started singing (very badly), C and J whipped around; they both locked eyes with me very briefly and lit up like a Christmas tree.

And what on earth is a wedding reception without a kick ass dance party? I could double the size of this blog post just talking about the dancing and the number of times one groomsman or another saved me from having an unwanted person trip over me and land in my lap. I danced with the beautiful bride. I danced with the groom. I danced with my amazing sisterhood of bridesmaids. I was spun, pulled, twirled, pushed. I was even swept up out of my chair more than once, by more than one person. I’m spastically disabled and as such, a very bad dancer -but when I’m having a really good time, I don’t give a shit how poorly I move and neither does anyone else.

The only time slow songs were played that were not the standard first dance/father and bride/mother and groom dance, I was at the back of the hall with a friend having a drink. As soon as it started to play, she went, “Oh my God! We have to go find M! He has to help you ditch this chair!”

We were heading towards the dance floor, and he was coming the opposite way. He said, “I was just going to look for you! Wanna dance? Wanna get out of your chair?”

I laughed. “We have the same brain. Yes, please.”

As we danced, he said something that caught me off guard. He said thank you. To me. I asked him why on earth he was thanking me, considering he was the one doing all the lifting and carrying. “You’re an amazing person,” he said simply. “If you weren’t, this might’ve been weird and way less fun… but you’re so lovely!”

I hugged his shoulder and muttered something akin to, “No, no! Thank YOU!” I might have been close to tears -it was a good thing it was dark.

When C first mentioned to me nearly three years ago that I was going to be a bridesmaid when she and J got married, I was humbled and touched, but worried that accommodating for me would cause more complications and stress than she needed.

I’m so glad she waved me off and killed my worries because as it turns out, her and J’s wedding was one of the best days of MY life, too. I cemented amazing friendships with a great group of women and I met a few groomsmen who gave me serious pause, saying to myself “Wait, people this amazing still exist in real life?”

I know C and J’s marriage will last; it’ll be solid and loving for the rest of their days. Their love can warm even the coldest of hearts. I know C and J will be two of my best friends forever -nothing will ever change that.

But I sincerely hope, with all my heart that the friendships that sprung out of the wedding party -whether they’ve been building for the past year with the bridesmaids or are are mere days old as with a few of the groomsmen- I hope those friendships not only stand the test of time, but get stronger with time. I want these friendships to be solid; I want these people to be more than that person I added on Facebook but never talk to, or a person I exchanged numbers with but never call or hear from. I genuinely want these people to be part of my life, more more than just to say “-Oh-I-remember-you,-you-were-in-C-and-J’s-wedding-party-with-me,-right?-How-ARE-you?-God-it’s-been-forever…”.  I’ve met and become close to some very special people that I hope I never lose.