NEED TO KNOW
- A man from British Columbia, Canada, was so determined to find his wife’s wedding rings that he dug around in the trash at a local landfill
- Jeanine Van Ysseldyk lost her wedding rings in a bag of popcorn that was thrown in the trash
- “I know how much he loves me, that he’s willing to go through a rotten, stinky compost pile,” Jeanine said about her husband’s dedication
Steve Van Ysseldyk went above and beyond when his wife Jeanine Van Ysseldyk realized that she had lost her wedding rings in the trash.
The couple, from British Columbia, Canada, was shocked after Jeanine noticed that her rings were missing while they were out to eat, they told CTV.
After some sleuthing, which entailed checking footage from cameras in their yard, they realized that the rings had slid off her fingers the night before while they were picking up spilled popcorn following a visit to the movies.
From there, they were able to determine that the rings had most likely been taken to Mission Sanitary Landfill when the rest of their trash was picked up.
Determined, Steve set out the next morning, on Aug. 15, to begin a search, telling the BBC that he brought a shovel and gloves to protect himself from the trash. He was able to convince landfill contractor Denny Webster to let him dig through the piles.
In fact, Webster was so impressed by Steve that he even helped spread out the trash using an excavator, making the search easier on the husband of 26 years.
“My brain was trying to figure out a way to tell him to go buy his wife new wedding rings,” Webster admitted to CTV.
Luckily, the Van Ysseldyks did not have to head to a jewelry store to replace the treasured jewels; Steve was able to find them after roughly an hour of searching.
Webster noted that the rings were “all slimy with popcorn and butter.” However, they were still intact.
“I was pretty optimistic,” Steve told the BBC, adding, “The wife’s gotta have her rings, right?”
On the flip side, he told the outlet that Jeanine was “very skeptical” about his chances of success.
“And she’s like ‘they’re not gonna let you [into the landfill],’ and I was like, ‘You never know. You gotta try,’ ” he recalled of their conversation. Speaking with CBC News, Steve acknowledged that the odds had been against him, saying that there was a “one in a gazillion” chance that he would be successful.
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Digging around in a dump doesn’t sound pleasant. However, Steve noted that he was grateful for the weather conditions that day. He told the BBC that the mild temperatures and rain helped “keep the stink down.”
After his successful search and rescue mission, Jeanine praised her husband, telling CTV that he “makes sure” that he achieves the goals that he sets for himself.
“He follows through,” she said, adding that the task was also proof of his strong love for her. “I know how much he loves me, that he’s willing to go through a rotten, stinky compost pile.”
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