A Tale of Two Beginnings

When Caroline and Joey said their vows last year, Joey was near death. Two weeks later, a transplant from an anonymous donor changed everything. Cosmopolitan follows the couple as they navigate new challenges and newlywed bliss-and embark on an uncertain future.

- By Elizabeth Kiefer

Caroline

Jordan opened her eyes and stared at the empty side of the bed. It was February 7, 2022-two weeks since she'd rushed her fiancé, Joey Moughan, to the emergency room with a failing heart. Joey's skin had turned gray. He had been fighting for air, his vital organs shutting down. Replaying the scene in her mind, Caroline felt a knot tighten in her throat. She forced herself to take a deep breath.

She got up, made coffee. Fed the pets, a rescue shar-pei named Kangy and their two cats. Pulled on jeans and a T-shirt, a pair of silver glitter Keds-perhaps it would help, to wear something cheerful?-and stepped outside. The Virginia rain frizzed her light-brown hair into a halo.

Half an hour later, she walked through the doors of Sentara Norfolk General Hospital and headed for the advanced heart failure clinic. It had taken her days to accept that Joey was actually a patient in this ward. Maybe they just stuck him here because that's where they had an open bed, she thought when he was first admitted. He can't really be in advanced heart failure. Except he was, due to a medical fluke with no clear-cut explanation.

Not so long ago, Joey was in the Marine Corps, able to run a seven-minute mile. But by the time he proposed to Caroline on a scenic overlook at Lake Tahoe in summer 2021, he was nearly blacking out from the strain of a short hike. His doctors put him on powerful medicine, explaining that it would only help for so long. Joey's heart was pumping blood less and less efficiently. Sooner or later, they said, its function would rapidly spiral out, like falling off a cliff.