An engaged couple from Michigan is putting the words “in sickness and in health” to the test after being diagnosed with cancer eight days apart.

Clay Slenk and Mariah Nelesen, who were engaged on the day after Christmas in 2020 and who had planned to tie the knot this summer, have moved up their wedding date to this April.

The couple had just finished sending save-the-dates to their loved ones when they both received life-altering phone calls in January.

Nelesen, 23, shared, “I got a phone call January 11th of this year that I had ovarian cancer. That’s not a call that anyone expects to receive.

Slenk received a similar call just over a week later. “All of a sudden, I got a phone call at like 8 o’clock, and my doctor was like, ‘I want you to go to Spectrum right now. I think you have Leukemia.’ “

A post on the couple’s Caring Bridge page explained that he was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia, which “required immediate treatment and is being followed by a long hospital stay.”

It added that Nelesen was diagnosed with adult granulosa cell tumour ovarian cancer, “a low-grade cancer that requires treatment including both surgery and chemotherapy.”

In an interview with KTLA, Slenk shared, “Why be angry? If I’m angry and frustrated and down and negative, all it’s going to do is make this day that much worse.”

Opening up about their altered wedding plans, Nelesen said their diagnoses helped them focus on what’s truly important.

“I was caught up in planning and excited for all the little details, like the venue we were going to be at and the food that we were going to have,” she said. “(Now), replanning the wedding, I’ve just thrown all of that out the window. It’s going to be a special day no matter what and we’re going to have burgers and brats on the grill, she shared with KTLA.”

“It won’t be easy going forward, but we know that it’ll be more meaningful to go through it together,” Slenk shared, adding that his wedding vows have changed since the news.

He continued, “There’ll be a little more sickness before the health, but that’s alright.”

A GoFundMe for the couple has raised more than $15,000 of its $25,000 goal in an effort to cover medical bills, home payments, the income they’ve lost, and gifts for their wedding and honeymoon.