School teacher dies three days after wedding, five weeks after terminal cancer diagnosis

A UK primary school teacher has died from bowel cancer just three days after getting married.

Katie Sutterby, who worked at a primary school in Essex, was just 29 when she passed away from cancer – five weeks after her diagnosis, The Metro reports.

Will Arnold, her husband, decided to propose after she received news of her terminal illness. He had earlier planned to propose to her later in the year.

Mr Arnold, 38, said his wife’s illness was “totally unexpected” and she was a healthy, active person.

He said towards the end of July this year, she started getting indigestion-like symptoms and the couple tried going to a pharmacy.

But the symptoms continued and a doctor ordered a scan for gallstones.

Mr Arnold said the couple “carried on as normal” until Mrs Sutterby began suffering a lot of pain at work one day and needed to go to hospital.

“We were told the next day she had bowel cancer and that it had already spread to her liver,” he said.

“We were just in complete shock but Katie stayed amazingly strong and positive.”

They tried to remain strong and went away for the weekend but a few days later Mrs Sutterby went back to a consultant and was told her condition was terminal.

"They said she probably only had months or a year at the most,” Mr Arnold said.

“We were of course all completely devastated.”

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Mrs Sutterby’s health began to decline quickly. She tried chemotherapy but it made her more ill so the couple decided to stop the treatment.

Mr Arnold said with time against him he had to marry the love of his and organised a wedding in two weeks for August 9.

He described the effort to get the wedding together as “amazing” and said his Mrs Sutterby looked beautiful.

“I didn’t think she was going to have the energy to keep going for as long as she did, but we danced all night and she chatted to everyone,” he said.

“It was a perfect day and she had a great time with all her family and friends.”

Sadly, Mrs Sutterby died in hospital on August 12, but her devastated husband hopes to honour her memory by raising money for bowel cancer patientsby taking part in the Royal Parks Foundation Half Marathon.

“As I write this it still doesn't seem real. Anyone who knows Katie, knows how full of life she was, how fun, how inspiring. For her not to be here anymore is the cruelest waste of the most beautiful life,” Mr Arnold wrote on a crowdfunding page.

“It's not for me to tell anyone how to live their lives, but if anything positive can come out of this unjust tragedy, let it be that all of us live each day to the full, care for each other and appreciate everything and everyone we have around us.

“I can't do anything to make this better, but I can help raise awareness about this indiscriminate disease.”