0:00:01.000,0:00:03.000 Francesca Fedeli: Ciao. 0:00:03.000,0:00:06.000 So he's Mario. He's our son. 0:00:06.000,0:00:09.000 He was born two and a half years ago, 0:00:09.000,0:00:13.000 and I had a pretty tough pregnancy 0:00:13.000,0:00:17.000 because I had to stay still in a bed for, like, eight months. 0:00:17.000,0:00:20.000 But in the end everything seemed to be under control. 0:00:20.000,0:00:23.000 So he got the right weight at birth. 0:00:23.000,0:00:25.000 He got the right Apgar index. 0:00:25.000,0:00:28.000 So we were pretty reassured by this. 0:00:28.000,0:00:35.000 But at the end, 10 days later after he was born, 0:00:35.000,0:00:37.000 we discovered that he had a stroke. 0:00:37.000,0:00:39.000 As you might know, 0:00:39.000,0:00:42.000 a stroke is a brain injury. 0:00:42.000,0:00:44.000 A perinatal stroke could be something 0:00:44.000,0:00:48.000 that can happen during the nine months of pregnancy 0:00:48.000,0:00:51.000 or just suddenly after the birth, 0:00:51.000,0:00:54.000 and in his case, as you can see, 0:00:54.000,0:00:58.000 the right part of his brain has gone. 0:00:58.000,0:01:03.000 So the effect that this stroke could have on Mario's body 0:01:03.000,0:01:07.000 could be the fact that he couldn't be able to control 0:01:07.000,0:01:09.000 the left side of his body. 0:01:09.000,0:01:13.000 Just imagine, if you have a computer and a printer 0:01:13.000,0:01:17.000 and you want to transmit, to input to print out a document, 0:01:17.000,0:01:21.000 but the printer doesn't have the right drives, 0:01:21.000,0:01:24.000 so the same is for Mario. 0:01:24.000,0:01:27.000 It's just like, he would like to move his left side 0:01:27.000,0:01:31.000 of his body, but he's not able to transmit the right input 0:01:31.000,0:01:36.000 to move his left arm and left leg. 0:01:36.000,0:01:38.000 So life had to change. 0:01:38.000,0:01:40.000 We needed to change our schedule. 0:01:40.000,0:01:46.000 We needed to change the impact that this birth had 0:01:46.000,0:01:48.000 on our life. 0:01:48.000,0:01:50.000 Roberto D'Angelo: As you may imagine, 0:01:50.000,0:01:53.000 unfortunately, we were not ready. 0:01:53.000,0:01:57.000 Nobody taught us how to deal with such kinds of disabilities, 0:01:57.000,0:01:59.000 and as many questions as possible started 0:01:59.000,0:02:01.000 to come to our minds. 0:02:01.000,0:02:04.000 And that has been really a tough time. 0:02:04.000,0:02:06.000 Questions, some basics, like, you know, 0:02:06.000,0:02:08.000 why did this happen to us? 0:02:08.000,0:02:10.000 And what went wrong? 0:02:10.000,0:02:13.000 Some more tough, like, really, 0:02:13.000,0:02:15.000 what will be the impact on Mario's life? 0:02:15.000,0:02:16.000 I mean, at the end, will he be able to work? 0:02:16.000,0:02:18.000 Will he be able to be normal? 0:02:18.000,0:02:21.000 And, you know, as a parent, especially for the first time, 0:02:21.000,0:02:25.000 why is he not going to be better than us? 0:02:25.000,0:02:28.000 And this, indeed, really is tough to say, 0:02:28.000,0:02:31.000 but a few months later, we realized that 0:02:31.000,0:02:34.000 we were really feeling like a failure. 0:02:34.000,0:02:37.000 I mean, the only real product of our life, 0:02:37.000,0:02:39.000 at the end, was a failure. 0:02:39.000,0:02:45.000 And you know, it was not a failure for ourselves in itself, 0:02:45.000,0:02:50.000 but it was a failure that will impact his full life. 0:02:50.000,0:02:51.000 Honestly, we went down. 0:02:51.000,0:02:55.000 I mean we went really down, but at the end, 0:02:55.000,0:02:57.000 we started to look at him, 0:02:57.000,0:02:59.000 and we said, we have to react. 0:02:59.000,0:03:02.000 So immediately, as Francesca said, we changed our life. 0:03:02.000,0:03:05.000 We started physiotherapy, we started the rehabilitation, 0:03:05.000,0:03:07.000 and one of the paths that we were following 0:03:07.000,0:03:10.000 in terms of rehabilitation is the mirror neurons pilot. 0:03:10.000,0:03:14.000 Basically, we spent months doing this with Mario. 0:03:14.000,0:03:17.000 You have an object, and we showed him 0:03:17.000,0:03:19.000 how to grab the object. 0:03:19.000,0:03:22.000 Now, the theory of mirror neurons simply says 0:03:22.000,0:03:26.000 that in your brains, exactly now, as you watch me doing this, 0:03:26.000,0:03:28.000 you are activating exactly the same neurons 0:03:28.000,0:03:32.000 as if you do the actions. 0:03:32.000,0:03:36.000 It looks like this is the leading edge in terms of rehabilitation. 0:03:36.000,0:03:39.000 But one day we found that Mario 0:03:39.000,0:03:43.000 was not looking at our hand. 0:03:43.000,0:03:45.000 He was looking at us. 0:03:45.000,0:03:48.000 We were his mirror. 0:03:48.000,0:03:50.000 And the problem, as you might feel, 0:03:50.000,0:03:52.000 is that we were down, we were depressed, 0:03:52.000,0:03:54.000 we were looking at him as a problem, 0:03:54.000,0:03:59.000 not as a son, not from a positive perspective. 0:03:59.000,0:04:02.000 And that day really changed our perspective. 0:04:02.000,0:04:06.000 We realized that we had to become 0:04:06.000,0:04:08.000 a better mirror for Mario. 0:04:08.000,0:04:10.000 We restarted from our strengths, 0:04:10.000,0:04:14.000 and at the same time we restarted from his strengths. 0:04:14.000,0:04:17.000 We stopped looking at him as a problem, 0:04:17.000,0:04:21.000 and we started to look at him as an opportunity to improve. 0:04:21.000,0:04:24.000 And really, this was the change, 0:04:24.000,0:04:27.000 and from our side, we said, 0:04:27.000,0:04:30.000 "What are our strengths that we really can bring to Mario?" 0:04:30.000,0:04:31.000 And we started from our passions. 0:04:31.000,0:04:33.000 I mean, at the end, my wife and myself 0:04:33.000,0:04:34.000 are quite different, 0:04:34.000,0:04:37.000 but we have many things in common. 0:04:37.000,0:04:39.000 We love to travel, we love music, 0:04:39.000,0:04:41.000 we love to be in places like this, 0:04:41.000,0:04:43.000 and we started to bring Mario with us 0:04:43.000,0:04:47.000 just to show to him the best things that we can show to him. 0:04:47.000,0:04:53.000 This short video is from last week. 0:04:53.000,0:04:54.000 I am not saying -- 0:04:54.000,0:04:56.000 (Applause) — 0:04:56.000,0:04:59.000 I am not saying it's a miracle. That's not the message, 0:04:59.000,0:05:01.000 because we are just at the beginning of the path. 0:05:01.000,0:05:05.000 But we want to share what was the key learning, 0:05:05.000,0:05:07.000 the key learning that Mario drove to us, 0:05:07.000,0:05:10.000 and it is to consider what you have as a gift 0:05:10.000,0:05:14.000 and not only what you miss, 0:05:14.000,0:05:18.000 and to consider what you miss just as an opportunity. 0:05:18.000,0:05:21.000 And this is the message that we want to share with you. 0:05:21.000,0:05:25.000 This is why we are here. 0:05:25.000,0:05:27.000 Mario! 0:05:27.000,0:05:28.000 And this is why -- 0:05:28.000,0:05:33.000 (Applause) — 0:05:33.000,0:05:38.000 And this is why 0:05:38.000,0:05:44.000 we decided to share the best mirror in the world with him. 0:05:44.000,0:05:47.000 And we thank you so much, all of you. 0:05:47.000,0:05:49.000 FF: Thank you.[br]RD: Thank you. Bye. 0:05:49.000,0:05:53.000 (Applause) 0:05:53.000,0:05:58.000 FF: Thank you. (Applause)