2018 Southern Bride

For better, for worse
For couple Crystal and Will, they honored this vow even before saying “I do”
In life everyone encounters things that they don’t like or don’t
understand, but it is up to us on how we handle it. Winston
Churchill once said, “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big
difference.” And the love shown by William “Will” Zunino, IV
made a big difference in
Crystal Wisecup’s life.
Crystal was born
and raised in Warner
Robins. She graduated
from Northside High
School, which is where
she also met her future
husband Will Zunino.
The two met in Spanish
class where Crystal said
jokingly that he cheated
off of her work.
“At the time we were
just friends,” Crystal
said. “We didn’t start
dating until about five,
six years after high
school.”
After graduating
high school Crystal got
a degree in education
and began teaching at
Thomson Middle School
in Centerville. One day
not long after starting
at Thomson Middle
she said she saw Will
there, he was working for the Board of Education’s maintenance
department. The two reconnected and set up their first date.
“We were supposed to go to a football game, but he stood me
up,” she said laughing. “But I saw him again at work and we started
dating. Then after a month and a half of dating I was diagnosed
with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma cancer. I had a 13-centimeter
mass between my heart and chest cavity. It was a complete shock
to my family and I because we had no history of this. Actually the
doctors had told me that I had cancer for two to three years without
knowing it.”
Crystal was at Will’s apartment when she was experiencing pain.
She said that whole week she didn’t feel good and on Friday began to
have chest pain after she played basketball with one of her students.
“When I got to his apartment I had trouble eating, but I didn’t
think much of it,” Crystal said. “That night when he came back from
work he said if I couldn’t drink any milk he was going to take me
to the emergency room. I couldn’t, so he took me and that’s when
we found the mass. At the time we didn’t know if it was cancerous
because they transferred me from the Perry Hospital to Navicent.
I spent a week up there because they did several tests and biopsies.
Once those came back
is when they diagnosed
me with stage 2 non-
Hodgkin’s lymphoma.”
The next week Crystal
went to the oncologist’s
office where she was told
she needed six rounds
of chemo. During that
same visit the doctor
told her that she would
lose her hair and that
there is a possibility that
she may not be able to
have children.
“I was so upset and
couldn’t believe this
was happening,” Crystal
said. “But Will takes me
outside, gets me in the
car and the first thing
that comes out of his
mouth is, “Does this
mean I have to shave
my beard”. He made
me laugh and I felt
better. My hair didn’t
start falling out until
the second round of chemo so I just decided that night to go to my
friend’s house to shave it. Well he really surprised me and shaved his
hair too. It really meant so much to me, I mean here we are hadn’t
even been dating this long and he was so phenomenal to do that.”
Crystal completed all of her treatments was in remission in May
2015. But when she first was in the hospital getting diagnosed, she
was pretending to be asleep one night when she overheard Will’s
mother Sylvia Zunino and Will talking about what kind of ring to
get in order to propose to her.
“Something about when you find that special person you just
know, it’s hard to explain,” Crystal said. “I didn’t freak out about him
wanting to propose and we had only been dating a month and a
half. But we did talk about it and I said I didn’t want him to propose
until I got my hair back. So on Christmas day in 2016 is when he
proposed. I was kind of thrown off but he was acting weird that
night. Some friends of ours, his sister, brother-in-law and nephew,
26 Southern Bride
26-27 Zunino story.indd 2 2/14/18 3:40:33 PM