Big Love

Sneak in under there now.

The Lusted family from Rhos-on-Sea, North Wales.

Can you see there?

Dave, Dawn and their two sons, James and Philip.

There's a little one over there.

Phil is 32 and James is 29.

Do you want to get on my shoulders?

And both brothers have a rare form of dwarfism

called diastrophic dysplasia.

You've had too much pizza!

Although they are both of average height themselves,

Phil and James's parents, Dave and Dawn, are both carriers of the gene.

But they were completely unaware of this

until their first child, Phil, was born.

Phil stands at three foot tall and James at three foot seven inches.

And they've both faced many challenges.

They have battled serious physical difficulties

that could have left them unable to walk.

They have struggled to be accepted

and have endured a lifetime of people staring at them.

But most of all,

they have always worried that they may never find love.

They were wrong. James is marrying his girlfriend Chloe...

I love it that Chloe's accepted me for who I am.

..and Phil is in a relationship with Kathleen, who he met online.

-Hi.

-Hi.

What's up?

Two small men who have found their big love story.

Do you remember when we came down here and you put your feet in?

With James and Chloe's wedding just months away,

they visit the local beauty spot

that was the scene of their engagement.

Little pysgod!

Watch your head.

Well, we're in Llyn Geirionydd. What a beautiful place it is.

It's very special to us, because it's where we got engaged.

So, yeah, that's why it's special to me.

And to us, yeah.

We came for a date night, as we call it,

we like to have one of those at least once a week.

Jay was particularly quiet on the way up to the lake

and that's never like him. We got to the jetty,

I sat down, we started chatting,

and before you know it,

he was behind me, tapped me on the shoulder,

and said, "What would you do if I asked you to marry me?"

Turned around and there he was, on one knee.

I said yes, by the way!

When we got up here I was nervous,

you know, I was, nervous, you know.

I couldn't get the ring out of my pocket at first.

I was a bit panicky. So I was trying to change the subject, saying,

"Look at that fish over there in the lake," and there was nothing to be seen.

Anyway, I eventually got the ring out of my pocket and then the deed took place.

When James and Phil's parents, Dawn and Dave, fell in love and married,

they were keen to start planning a family.

But they had no idea at the time

that they were both carrying the dwarfism gene.

I'd seen people on telly as dwarves

but never thought we as a family would have dwarves.

And as I say, it did come quite as a shock, but I also remember saying,

if... I would sell the house to put...

if it was going to make a difference to Phil,

to put him right. But that wasn't the option.

Phil was never going to be...

not ever any amount of money would change the way Phil was.

Um, but that's what was going through my mind, you know,

which probably would go through any parent's mind.

But as the time went on, we've got to get used to this now.

I've got to do the best as a dad.

Which was hard.

Ready?

When planning their second child,

they knew they had a one in four chance of having another baby

with the same condition. But they went ahead regardless.

It's just one of those things.

It's a chance in a million,

for two people with the same gene to get together,

and there was a one in four chance of it happening.

So we thought that was quite a good chance,

we'd got three chances of another child being OK.

Then we'll test it.

Tell me when it's switched on and I'll press test.

We decided we'd go for having another baby and...

..Phil was about three, and I got pregnant and...

..we were hoping that everything would be all right this time.

So I went for my scan and the lady was giving me the scan,

and she was taking a long time.

And I knew that there was something wrong and she wasn't saying.

And she went off to get her supervisor.

And he came and then they were measuring again.

And he said, "Sorry to say, but your baby has got short limbs."

Well, it just broke my heart.

I remember getting back into my clothes and getting upset,

like I am now, thinking about it.

Ready?

MOTOR WHIRS

It's just bringing it all back.

Glass of champagne now?

Once I got that out of my system -

I was really upset at the time - I was fine then,

because I knew what was coming.

Phil has been married once before.

Things didn't work out that time,

but it was a good relationship while it lasted.

I met my ex-wife online.

And we talked for, I think, about six months, regularly.

And then I decided to take a trip to meet her, because she's from Canada.

And I think we officially started dating

after I'd been there, you know.

And we were together for three years.

And then we got married and we were married for three years,

and then things got tough, and then I came back here.

Past experience hasn't put Phil off looking for love again.

I've met somebody online, who is from Seattle.

Been talking to her for a few months now.

And we're very close, friendship.

She found me through an article that was written about my tattoos.

And I think she added me to Facebook

and we started talking that way.

We just got talking more regularly,

non-stop, basically!

DOG BARKS

And after months of talking,

Phil is taking the plunge and going out to Seattle to meet Kathleen for

the first time.

I'm out there for... for a month, four weeks.

We have lots of stuff planned.

She has lots of surprises for me, apparently, taking me places, which,

I don't know what they are, but I'm excited about.

I think everybody wants to be loved and be with somebody.

So that's how I feel too, you know.

Chloe is heading off to her wedding make-up trial.

-Hi!

-Hello, how are you?

She's used to people's curiosity about their relationship with James,

or Jay, as he is also known.

-Pop yourself down for me.

-Thank you.

OK, so give me a rough idea of what you want.

Um, natural skin tone, natural lip, bold eyes.

So was it love at first sight?

Um, no!

To be honest, because of who Jay is and his condition,

I never really thought about him in that kind of way.

But after we'd met up a couple of times,

and we kept things on the down-low throughout the summer, one day,

me and my sister and my mum went shopping in Llandudno,

and we bumped into Jay on the off-chance.

And you know when you see someone,

you get that feeling in your stomach...

Um, kind of, it was then

that I thought, "Oh, wow, OK, I kind of like him."

Oh!

Yeah. And I never go shy, never.

But I mean,

-I was lost for words, I guess you could say.

-Oh!

Chloe's hen weekend,

and family and friends gather for a game of It's A Knockout.

It's all smiles now, but Sarah, Chloe's mum,

did have her doubts when James first came on the scene.

Um, my feelings when Chloe said about Jay,

she'd mentioned him before she even said she was going out with him,

just test the waters, because she knows what I'm like,

and then she told me she was going out with him,

and, no, I wasn't happy.

Purely because to me, it was like,

Chloe, you know, he is a dwarf,

you're not suited, and everything else.

But then, as I got to know him,

it's just sort of... You look at Jay and you just see Jay,

you don't see anything else.

And it wasn't just with him being a dwarf.

I suppose I'm like that with any of my daughters.

But that just made it a little bit more harder.

CHEERING

The guys are just going to have a go themselves.

Society may judge James as being different,

but to his mates on his stag weekend,

he's just one of the lads.

This is so politically incorrect right now!

Right a bit. Left.

-James! Left!

-Right a bit!

-He's the captain of the ship.

-Aye.

Today marks, actually, the four-year anniversary

of the day that I carried the Olympic torch for London 2012.

It was an incredible day.

Not just for the reason of carrying the Olympic torch,

but it was also the day that I met Chloe properly.

I'd seen her around and, you know, said hello,

but I wasn't officially introduced to her through... until that day,

and that's why we're here this weekend, you know.

I'm on a stag do because I'm getting married to her.

And she's my world, and I'm so excited.

With the wedding day looming, it's all hands on deck

as family and friends help out with the preparations.

Brother Phil is on invites and seating plan duties.

You may kiss the bride.

The first marital kiss has been rehearsed

and the bride and groom are out shopping.

What do you think, Mum?

Chloe has found her perfect dress...

That looks very pretty.

..while James needs a more specialist approach.

So he's off to see his grandma - or nain, in Welsh.

OK, Nain?

Yeah, OK.

-Yeah.

-There we are.

-Sleeves.

-Wow, this is big.

Well, you can work your magic on it.

I'll have to!

The support of their grandparents

has been invaluable for James and Phil,

as they had to spend long periods of time in hospital having various

complex treatments when they were very young.

I had a cleft palate that needed to be fixed,

I had various wires coming out of my mouth

for a couple of months.

It didn't look very nice, but it had to be done.

Operations on my back, my spine.

-There we go.

-There we are, James.

-Cutting the fibre.

-I'll do the operation now!

Among the conditions that needed to be corrected were Phil and James's

inward-turning feet, which would make walking almost impossible.

Phil and I have had club feet, and when we were born, we were put...

our feet into casts to straighten them out,

but my feet didn't always stay.

So as I was growing, they kept turning in, further in.

So my club feet were coming back.

And my knees weren't doing good, so they weren't aligned correctly.

Therefore my feet were changing, so I'd walk on the balls of my feet

and not flat, hence I have wedges on my shoes.

How's that?

Do you want it a bit longer than that?

In order to give James the best chance of being able to walk,

he needed to have his legs straightened,

which meant wearing metal frames bolted into his bones.

Dad Dave had the traumatic job

of regularly turning the screws in his legs

until the bones were gradually pushed into a better position.

When one of the boys was in hospital,

the other one would be staying at my mum's,

because Dave was working.

It was hard, because I was a long way from home and on my own,

and having to watch the boys suffering.

Dave would come every weekend, wouldn't you? But it was hard.

-OK?

-Yeah, I like the buttons.

-Yeah, they're nice.

And when I had my frames,

I was so upset one day,

Mum didn't know what to do and Mum was upset as well.

And I thought, "Oh, if Mum can't help me, who can?"

You know. Because as a child, Mum and Dad can do anything

and do anything for you.

And that was just... It really broke my heart.

That Mum and Dad had been through so much, you know, for us.

Well, I need to see it myself now,

so you'll have to take a photo of me, because I want to see it on.

Let me get my phone. Don't press it hard,

otherwise we'll have a million photos!

-OK?

-OK.

-Yeah.

I think so. Try it.

James and Chloe won't be moving into their new home

until after the wedding -

they are Christians and want to wait.

You know, you need to get the bits out.

-I know.

-So we're having no sex before marriage.

So I can't wait for the wedding night!

Because we've had a long engagement!

You being funny?

-Great chopping, this!

-I know!

The wedding is supposed to finish about half 12, they say, but,

ten o'clock, let's go!

So, no, yeah, we're really excited about that.

Phil and Kathleen met online through a mutual love of tattoos.

And after chatting for several months,

a nervous Phil flew out to meet her for the first time.

Since then he's been travelling back and forth between Wales and Seattle

and their relationship has gone from strength to strength.

She's enjoying her first visit to Wales

and the couple are now engaged.

Right now, we're at 199 days until the wedding.

-Oh, my God!

-Days?

-Yeah.

Like James, Phil is marrying an average-height girl.

And although the height difference isn't causing them a problem,

the geographical distance is a challenge, as Phil is still living mainly in

North Wales, while Kathleen is happily settled in Seattle.

There's a caterpillar!

Phil will relocate to Seattle after the wedding,

but until then they must endure long periods apart, which is never easy.

I think with Skype and Facetime,

we do really well without each other when we're not together, you know, physically.

2017 has been a blessing, because technology is in everything.

We never stop talking and Phil's a night owl,

so he ends up on my same schedule.

And we're both working and that helps with things, doesn't it?

And we're very supportive of each other when we are apart, you know.

And I think that's helped me, personally, a lot.

When they are finally able to live together,

Phil will then be stepdad to Kathleen's two-year-old daughter Zelda,

who he dotes on and talks to regularly on Skype.

They talk every night.

Every single night.

Every time she sees me on Facetime, she gets excited.

It really touches me, you know.

And it means so much to me, you know, that she trusts me to be

her future dad, if you like, pretty much.

I'm so lucky.

I love you.

Want some?

They are used to people staring at them,

but some people's questions can be intrusive and rather persistent.

Especially around matters of a personal nature.

Well, they kept digging and digging,

trying to get something that was different or interesting...

-Sexual questions...

-Unusual, yeah.

And I just, I was kind of... I mean, I get it,

I'll answer someone's question, no problem, because at the end of it,

it was just, I don't know what you want to hear, because...

..there's nothing unusual or different or anything.

Would you like a strawberry, dear?

SHE LAUGHS

Yes, my love.

I don't understand. Why would they ask anyone that,

let alone someone because they think they are different?

Why would that give them licence to ask that?

Put it in your face.

Although daughter Zelda keeps them both busy,

they haven't ruled out providing her with a sibling one day.

We've discussed it together, you know.

And we also discussed things like what if it's a dwarf, you know.

And we'll just treat the baby just like any baby, you know.

-That's right.

-It wouldn't come as a shock to us if it was.

-Yeah.

Strawberries! Bringing 'em.

You're going to pull me down!

It's the morning of James and Chloe's wedding

and both bride and groom are

ready to commit their lives to each other, for better or for worse.

What time are you actually getting married?

12.

OK, so Jay put a status saying, "Today I'm getting married

"to my beautiful Chloe.

"I'm so excited to spend the rest of my life with her."

#WeddingBells, #JayWedsChloe.

That's nice.

So how are you feeling, Dave?

Yeah, really good, thanks.

Really good. Looking forward to the day.

Looking forward to see James and Chloe getting married,

and moving on in their own lives.

-Um...

-And getting the house back to yourself!

The house back to myself, yeah!

Do you want your bacon butty, James?

Dave and Dawn have had to face many more challenges

than your average couple.

And the pressure of bringing up Phil and James proved such

a strain at times that the marriage almost hit crisis point for Dave.

When I look back on things we've had to deal with, stress,

trying to get things for Philip and James,

at one point in my life, there was a point where...

..where I could turn around and say, and be quite honest about it,

I could have walked away.

'Give our love to Chloe.'

Everything we were trying to do for Philip and James,

and to help ourselves,

we felt everything was being thrown back at us, because we always felt

that, as much as we were fighting for things,

people weren't seeing the problem we had as a family.

-Thank you very much.

-OK.

'So those were hard times.

'But you had to keep working at it to get through that and

'keep going, you know.

'We've been able to be there

'for each other through the difficult times,

'and I think that has bonded us more.'

I tell myself I'm not going to cry, so I'm going to try to keep to that.

I think I'm just going to be overwhelmed with happiness.

I've bet with him that he's going to cry.

He says he's not going to cry. I'm sure he's going to cry.

It wouldn't be Jay if he does not cry.

'I think more than anything, he's just going to be excited.

'He won't be able to stand still.'

-That's yours.

-Thank you.

-I'm ready!

-Oh!

Very smart. Ah, you look wonderful.

Your tie just needs...

Oh, Nain's here.

Yeah.

Um... I think it's just hit me.

Having a little bit of a moment here.

I didn't think I would get that emotional so soon.

-Oh.

-Want to sit down?

-Give us a kiss.

-See you later.

-Yeah, see you later.

See you later.

I can't wait, yeah.

Here we go.

Yeah.

It's a really big day, isn't it, James?

It's a massive day. And it's just so...

How am I going to get through this speech? I don't know.

But, yeah. I just can't believe I'm getting married.

It's something that...

I never really thought I would marry, you know, and...

..I love it that Chloe has accepted me for who I am.

And, er... Yeah.

Yeah.

CHURCH BELL RINGS

Would you please stand?

-DAWN:

-'I know people say that it's only a piece of paper,

'but I don't think so.

'Marriage is a sacred thing.

'And in that case, I don't believe it is just a piece of paper.

'It's the way I was brought up, and the same for you, really.

'So I suppose it's... it's just the way that we've brought them up.'

Told you you'd cry!

You look incredible.

I, James...

I, James...

..take you, Chloe...

..take you, Chloe...

-..to be my wife.

-..to be my wife.

-I, Chloe...

-I, Chloe...

..take you, James...

-..take you, James...

-..to be my husband.

..to be my husband.

To have and to hold...

To have and to hold...

..from this day forward...

..from this day forward...

..for better, for worse...

-..for better, for worse...

-..as long as we both shall live.

..as long as we both shall live.

Chloe, I give you this ring...

Chloe, I give you this ring...

-..as a sign of my love...

-..as a sign of my love...

-..and faithfulness.

-..and faithfulness.

With my body I honour you...

With my body I honour you...

..within the love of God...

..within the love of God...

..Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

..Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In the presence of God,

and before this congregation,

I proclaim that they are therefore husband and wife.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Chloe and I's relationship is ever growing stronger.

# Heart beats fast

# Colours and promises... #

We're quite positive people,

we're enthusiastic and we're passionate about life.

We like to face challenges together

and we like to work as a team, and we love each other.

# Afraid to fall but watching you stand alone... #

Mum's always said, your dad and I have always done is,

we've never gone to sleep unhappy with each other.

We've wanted to sort it out, and you should never let the sun go down

on anger and you should get it out

before you go to sleep and wake up the next day, it's a new day.

# I have died every day, waiting for you... #

That's something that they've always done

and they've always talked, they've always been honest,

and they've always supported each other,

even though they've not agreed sometimes.

And I think that's what love is.

His parents' love for each other has been an inspiration for James

as he and Chloe face the future together,

and whatever that future may hold.

We just love each other more and more, as time goes on.

It's funny, so funny, when you get together, you always get,

"When are you going to get engaged?"

And then, "When are you going to get married?"

And then, "When are you going to have a baby?"

-And we're at that step now.

-When are you going to stop?

Yeah. So, yes, you know, we're thinking of the next step, family,

children, and we've always dreamt that we wanted a family

and children in the future and stuff.

And, you know, even if we do have a baby,

whether it's a dwarf or not, we'll still love it just the same.

And whatever life has in store for James and Chloe

and for Phil and Kathleen...

Hi.

-Hi.

-What's up?

..they believe that their love for each other will see them through.

I love you.

Bye.

# All along I believed I would find you

# Time has brought your heart to me

# I have loved you for a thousand years... #