Gabby and Mark Bonded by Dedication and Love

In the Tucson elementary school of little over achiever named Gabby Giffords. Months to sing and her dad is -- Tucson businessman. Her older sister now a teacher. Her mother Gloria an artist world... See More

In the Tucson elementary school of little over achiever named Gabby Giffords. Months to sing and her dad is -- Tucson businessman. Her older sister now a teacher. Her mother Gloria an artist world traveler says the youngest member -- the family has always been unstoppable. She's funny. Just intelligent. -- she's got a great personality. Brilliant student Giffords won the prestigious Fulbright scholarship after school and then headed to New York for a glamorous new job. When her dad called and said he needed her back home. -- tire business was in trouble is -- without Catholic -- the business was founded by her grandfather a Jewish immigrant to Arizona. After three years she sells the business to Goodyear interns -- the life she's always wanted. Public service knock on doors -- gonna turn out of voters even though her district spans from high tech Tucson -- hard -- tombstone she went every single election she ever enters. But she's 33 and married and I'm wondering if she'll ever meet a man who shares her sense of adventure and determined optimism. At a conference of young leaders she -- mark Kelly test pilot from New Jersey 39 combat missions in Iraq. Not only was he chosen to be an astronaut he has an identical twin brother. The only siblings. Ever to fly in space. He's divorced. Abby takes out a group photo of his NASA class to seek a first impression from his future mother in law. Shouldn't that she says picking out -- an -- people want looking for. Panel. -- -- six foot tall could cut belonged. You know. Air force academy fatwa council's components that she's usually just told us -- him she says it's just what did she think he with a glamorous. Men. Initially no no. Well. OK all right you know what -- you. And he said there appeared in the us that it was kind like meet the parents yes. Of the free spirit his military January into a -- -- -- people. She stood for kept. And those two cultures will merge in 2007. A blissful crazy quilt of a marriage ceremony. Her free spirited family. His two daughters from his previous marriage he's Catholic she has a mariachi band playing -- on the -- The football and it's all that often she is beautiful and I'm looking in her minds. And it just starts to arrange. A kind of missed that lasted exactly the length of their -- -- it to stop. It's just it was this incredible. And talk about long distance marriages. He circling the globe 200 miles up 171500. Miles per hour. Okay. Promoting -- then what they think the -- Particularly good play good music. On earth she is making her mark in congress and racing through 750. Events each year. On the phone every night. They dream of a life together and we now know from the -- something else was interrupted by that bullet on January -- -- has. Two step daughters Claudia and Claire. But she wanted it she want us to have a to have a child lover her own. -- now she is forty years old they start in vitro. She is eager to get pregnant but the lives they live mean she has to postpone the appointments snow storms could hit back and get there and then she -- been pregnant. January 14 if everything went right. And then January -- They had hoped to call her parents with happy news. Instead. January -- a different call and I told my he -- he's been chopped. -- I think -- shop I think me. Gloria ray street to the Tucson hospital. Center Cox. And then I heard something. I heard. He still and know that caught. It's this -- came over and I'm not hospitalized. -- never happened to -- before until a husband and his mother in law Foreman indomitable alliance of optimism. Gloria singing songs to her daughter like the one from ending can be sang an elementary school. We are back now on those videos. It is twenty days after the shooting dedicated therapists have her sitting up -- -- wheelchair she still has a trait to assist her breathing. They start hoping her we will hire her brain with the basics. Side. Take a deep -- Martin's side. How to not. It. How to -- a -- for a -- Live together. Okay thank. And a half mile relay data but that's okay. At this point it's still not clear how much the bullets -- or damaged key areas in the left side of the brain involving language. The one called -- -- controls the ability to understand and grasp language the other called broke up controlled the ability to speak. And if there has been damage and her brain recreate what the bulletins destroyed. Houston neurosurgeon doctor Dong -- We know that happens the ability for. Different parts of the brain can take on the functions of the injured are. 28 days after the bulletin her brain and answer electrifying news Gabrielle Giffords. Says her first words. -- eat and eat. CE. What was the first word she says she actually said the word what. Which we think is a question but the way she said it wasn't like a question she said it over and over can't she just -- what. What what what it was like -- brain. Booted up right at that point and then another word you know breakfast showed up but it was O -- and a banana for like. A week straight and she finally said toast like -- like something I'd like some toast. But she is still the kind of fall trying to fight her way to the surface. Kelley writes it's as -- for hurricane has blown away words. They -- just out of reach. On the tape you can see what it takes to reclaim them phrase by phrase. Working hour after hour each day five weeks after she shot she's trying to find the word. Chair. And it's. It's since spoon from chair -- were for a while cheeseburger for lamb. Yes. And chicken -- for a lot of things. Are. And it's just a word funding issue which is a very common staying. With people that have a brain injury that affects their speech. And one of the reasons they decided to let the world see the tapes to show what's possible with determination. And the kind of therapy that can pull you through. Working harder than she ever has -- war. Often her mom loyally over her shoulder. Fog in -- real different brain begins to lift. Doctors say it's time to tell her in a limited way and she's in the hospital. There -- nice Kelly says only that someone shot her later she says shocked shocked scared. No one mentions that there were others who died. Oblivion can be a kind of mercy reality. Leaves you feeling buried alive. Kelley writes in the book about the day he rushed to hold her. Tears running down her face she was hyperventilating. Absolutely panicked. I saw how scared she was I got scared to. One point she said to you I've been beaten. I've been beaten so I would say Gabby you have not been beaten you've just been beat up. And you're gonna get through this and you're gonna recover and you're gonna come back stronger than ever and. -- -- From there. The struggling congresswoman knows the feeling of anguish. Just not the word. -- And right now that is. All quiet. For extraordinary therapist is NG gluten. Together they find the familiar childhood refrain. And at the end perfect harmony it's. It's. Back.