The already amazing recovery of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has become even more miraculous.
The congresswoman — shot through the head just over a week ago — is now giving back rubs and neck massages to her astronaut husband, even as she remains in an Arizona intensive-care unit.
Giffords’ hubby, Capt. Mark Kelly, said the affectionate massages are “so typical” of the spunky legislator, who could be released within days from a Tucson hospital to begin rehabilitation at another facility.
GIFFORDS FEARED GUNMAN WOULD ATTACK HER, HUSBAND SAYS: REPORT
“She’s in the ICU. You know, gone through this traumatic injury,” the Navy pilot and space-shuttle commander told ABC News’ Diane Sawyer in an interview being aired today.
“And she spent 10 minutes giving me a neck massage.”
“I keep tellin’ her, I’m like, ‘Gabby, you’re in the ICU. You know, you don’t need . . . to be doin’ this,’ ” Kelly said. “But it’s so typical of her that no matter how bad the situation might be for her, you know, she’s looking out for other people.”
Giffords’ doctors are equally impressed.
“There’s a lot of inference there, but it does imply that she is recognizing him and that she’s interacting in an old, familiar way with him,” Dr. G. Michael Lemole said at a briefing at the University Medical Center.
“Again, all those higher levels of cognitive functioning are at least somehow, somewhat preserved here.”
The 40-year-old Giffords’ condition was upgraded to serious from critical on Sunday.
The Democratic lawmaker’s stunning display of wifely concern is just the latest huge leap in her recovery since she was shot through the brain Jan. 8 at a meet-and-greet she was hosting outside a Tucson supermarket.
Eighteen others were also shot in gunman Jared Lee Loughner’s rampage, six of them fatally. A federal judge and 9-year-old girl were among the dead.
Of his constant bedside vigil, Kelly told ABC, “I just stayed there because it seemed to comfort her. You know, when somebody needs to be doing that for her or needs to be doing something for her, you know, she was doing that for me.”
Kelly had rushed to Giffords’ side from Houston, where he had been training to serve as commander of the space shuttle Endeavour in what could be its final mission for the NASA program.
The astronaut also told ABC he would be open to meeting the parents of the 22-year-old Loughner.
“I’d probably see them,” Kelly said of Randy and Amy Loughner.
“You know, I don’t think it’s their fault. It’s not the parents’ fault,” Kelly said. “I’d like to think I’m a person that’s, you know, somewhat forgiving. And, I mean, they’ve got to be hurting in this situation as much as anybody.
“Gabby has two stepdaughters, and I have children,” Kelly told Sawyer, referring to his kids from a previous marriage. “And they must, I’m sure they love their son. And they must be . . . as distraught over this as all of us are.”
Giffords had surgery Saturday to repair a fracture on the roof of her right eye socket and to insert a breathing tube into her trachea after doctors removed the tube that had run through her mouth.
“Within a few hours of surgery, she was waking up,” said Lemole, a neurosurgeon, adding that, throughout the weekend, Giffords had returned to “that same level of interaction she’s been having with us. That’s all very good.”
It’s unclear whether her vision is intact, but “our suspicion is that she can see something,” he said.
Lemole said Giffords’ next major step will be rehabilitation therapy at another facility.
“It could come in a matter of days or weeks,” Lemole said.
Kelly told ABC, “Gabby’s got a long road ahead of her.
“We know that the recovery from these kinds of injuries isn’t measured in days or weeks. It’s more like weeks and months. And she’s got a long, tough road ahead of her. But, you know, she’s a really, really tough woman.”
Meanwhile, another woman wounded in the massacre is expected to go home tomorrow — but she is tormented by the tragedy and especially the death of the child she brought to the supermarket to meet Giffords.
Susan Hileman, 58, “had her first psychological crash” after seeing a photo of the youngest massacre victim, Christina Taylor Green, Hileman’s husband told The Post.
“It was stuff she saw on TV. It was a picture of Christina’s face,” Bill Hileman said. “That was enough.
“Then [Susan] was getting ready for a shower and got a look [at] herself for the first time in the mirror. She’s purple from the neck down, and it started all over again. She had a very tough hour.
“She cried about Christina and expressed fear and said she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to look at herself again.”
Also yesterday, it was reported that Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer was informed of a state law that says if a public-office holder is unable to “discharge the duties of office for the period of three consecutive months,” that office shall be deemed vacant, and a special election can be called to fill it.
That law could imperil Giffords’ hold on her seat in Congress.
Jay Heiler, an informal adviser to Brewer, told The Washington Post it was “unimaginable” that the governor would call for a such an election.
Also yesterday, Sarah Palin defended her use of the phrase “blood libel,” which aroused controversy last week as she condemned criticism linking her fiery rhetoric to the Arizona shootings.
” ‘Blood libel’ obviously means being falsely accused of having blood on your hands. In this case, that’s exactly what was going on,” Palin told Fox News in her first interview since the controversy erupted over her remarks.