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Today Show

December 14, 2010 by · Comments Off on Today Show 

Today Show, It was a hot summer night in July 2002 when Menifee elementary school teacher Gabrielle Smith and Director of International Sales District Peter Tehrani first meeting. Smith was with friends enjoying a night when Tehrani was presented. Her strong British accent was music to the ears of Smith and she was hooked. Although both were already married with children, they are not afraid to fall in love again.

Less than a year of meeting they exchanged vows, have combined their families and moved to Murrieta to live happily ever after.

On July 3, 2009, Tehrani path of happiness after all became chaotic, robust and almost impossible to navigate. The couple sat sipping coffee in their kitchen, cooking breakfast when Peter complained he did not feel well. He felt dizzy and said that the room was spinning. He went to bed. Even if Pierre was healthy, avid runner who has eaten well and not smoking, Gabrielle thought he was having a heart attack. She called an ambulance and rushed him to Inland Valley Hospital.

The Tehran was in the ER for six hours while the state-Pierre worsened and he could not breathe. Peter suffered a stroke. A blocked artery in his neck cut blood flow to the brain. He was taken to hospital in Loma Linda. He could not breathe by himself, and his body went into a condition called locked-in syndrome. Locked-in syndrome is a neurological disorder characterized by complete paralysis of voluntary muscles in all parts of the body, except for those that controls eye movement. It is usually a complication of a stroke in the base of the pons in the brainstem. Doctors said that if Peter Gabriel had survived, it was how he spent the rest of his life imprisoned in a body he could not move.

While Gabrielle about to make her husband’s rights last reading of the doctors asked if resuscitation has been an option if the state of Peter is weakened. Gabrielle said her quality of life was dark, so she asked Peter what he wanted. With only his eyes, Peter said he wanted to live.

“That’s Peter. He is a motivator, always lively, goal oriented. He does not leave, “said Gabrielle.

Four weeks later, Peter began to show his doctors that he could beat their chances. He started moving his head and thumb, and he was weaned from the ventilator. In October 2009, he moved his hands.

Peter spent seven months in three different hospitals. He did not let the doctors and therapists tell him what he can or can not do. He showed them what he could do.

“By the grace of God and the determination he is home,” said Gabrielle. “The race seriously damaged his motor skills,
But the rest of his brain is fully intact. ”

Still unable to walk or talk, Peter can move much of his right and slowly gaining momentum and feeling on his left side.

Gabrielle was so proud of her husband’s struggle to recover and beat the odds, she wrote to the producers of the Today morning show on NBC for a chance to win a trip to New York and Kathie Lee Gifford write a song about her husbands story.

November 29 producers called Gabrielle and announced live on television, she won. The producers flew to New York to Tehran this evening.

It was the first trip the couple since the stroke. They stayed in a hotel overlooking the Rockefeller Center. They saw the lighting of the Rockefeller Christmas tree, shopping, people watched and enjoyed the holidays.

Thursday, Tehran went to NBC Studios for their meeting with Gifford and actor Justin Long – a fill in co-host Hoda Kotb.

Gifford and David Friedman wrote a song for Gabrielle entitled “Happily Ever After”. Broadway performer John Treacy Egan has sung.

“The song was great,” said Gabrielle. “It was written as if it was the voice of John’s to say thank you.”

An excerpt from the song said: “Sometimes I dream about everything we planned and cannot help but long for the fairyland, but then you touch me with so much love I could cry and it I know I’m still your man.”

Peter, who can now use an alphabet table to talk, said: “The song captured how I feel fine.”

Gabrielle said when she and Peter married; they married without condition, for better or for worse. Peter nodded; they decided that was what marriage was about.

It is not difficult to see the love of Tehran have for each other. Peters love can be seen through his eyes. They are still in many respects the same torque as before the stroke. They tease, laugh, bicker and from time to time.

“I am the disorder according to Peter,” said Gabrielle. “If he sees socks on the floor, I pick them,”

The couple has an amazing ability to communicate that goes beyond words. New goal is to wean Peter the feeding tube and eat and drink in January. In summer 2011 Peter wants to sit in the hot sun by the pool with his wife and children and sipping a Corona.

“We are on a different path now. It can not be happy whenever we initially expected, but it’s always a good way, “said Gabrielle.

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