The rep counter goes from “7” to “8, 9,” before Tony Grise stops the leg press at the “10” mark. A new timer begins, allowing a few moments for a reset before continuing to another set. Some might be apt to catch their breath and mentally ready themselves for increased press weight, adding more strain and difficulty. Tony pauses briefly and pulls out his phone. He groans. “I’m going to lose this game, aren’t I?” He flips his phone forward, revealing a digital backgammon board. Naturally competitive, Tony relishes trying his hand at a problematic computerized opponent. Just as a breakthrough is emerging, he notices the equipment timer has exceeded the one-minute mark—time for another set. He pauses the game and continues the exercise. After this set, it’s onward to another machine, scanning the gym for the best-suited option. He sets the weight, and then the routine follows—set, backgammon, repeat.
The go-go-go attitude was seemingly in Tony’s blood since birth. Over the last few decades, he bounced around, finding places and jobs from which he could pay the bills. He lived in Africa for a time and later built steady work as an Uber driver. He started a family with his partner Chrissy. For Tony, it is simply the spirit of adventure.
One day he picked up an Uber passenger who was a private pilot. They got to talking and the passenger encouraged him to pursue flight school. So he did, eventually getting to a place where his passion could be monetized, as a flight instructor.
Out of a desire to get better acquainted with twin-engine planes, Tony flew one with a fellow instructor who was testing Tony’s ability with the specific plane. They made the turns and leveled out an optimal altitude, before turning back towards the airport. Then, something went wrong. “I realized that we weren’t getting the manifold pressure that we needed from the engines,” Tony recalls. Within a couple of seconds, they had lost a couple hundred feet of altitude. “Fred took over the controls and I deferred to his experience. At that point, my job changed to troubleshooting a way to get the engines restarted. After we dropped to around 500 feet, you get to thinking ‘I don’t know if I’m going to survive this.’ The closer we got to the ground, the more frantically I was flipping switches—trying anything that might help.” A decision made that potentially saved the lives of both pilots was to not deploy landing gear, knowing that it could get tangled up on an uneven ground surface, increasing the dangerous circumstance.
They landed hard on the belly of the plane—with the other pilot coming away with minor injuries, and Tony with an incomplete spinal cord injury. “To go from not knowing if I was going to survive the crash to now being back on two feet just four months later—that’s incredible.”
Following an initial stay at the Hennepin County Medical Center, Tony transitioned to the Shirley Ryan Ability Lab in Chicago. There a practice of significant work began to develop—the kinds of attitudes, nuances, and discipline that would allow Tony to work at a level that suited his abilities and desires.
When he arrived at QLI, Tony was given complete agency in his program. At the top of mind for him, of course, were needs related to his home environment—a third-floor apartment and over three dozen steps to get up to the top. His physical therapist Connor Davis took instantly to Tony, connecting over a similar history of working odd jobs, and hustling for the bigger picture, so the first big challenge was tackling a flight of stairs—knowing that he needed to leave and return home every day when Uber driving. Within a week of being at QLI, Tony exceeded expectations, being able to climb a flight of stairs and even a few more. Their core program goal was completed. Did Tony and Connor simply stop meeting, to quit while they were ahead? Far from it.
“Where do we go from here?” is a question Connor notes as always being front of mind. They dig deep and find the next wall, the next barrier, and chip away at a new goal until it is accomplished. This next phase took a bit longer to materialize. They worked at rebuilding tone, stabilizing a shaky right foot, and re-establishing a solid gait pattern. Tony and Connor engaged with the help of fitness coordinator Tyler Von Rentzell, increasing gym time outside of therapies and ultimately transitioning to the community environment at the YMCA. Still, in line with the fast-paced and intensive way Tony works, it simply adds fuel to his fire.
Occupational therapist Melissa Faller muses, “He’s not the kind of person who likes to settle. He placed trust and faith in us and away we went. Tony is very intentional with his sessions—he is always goal-oriented even when not directly handling a task. His first thought after injury was “What about my kids?” They are his biggest motivator—Tony is always in charge of getting them up and ready for school.” Within the strategies implemented, a key step was to give Tony an amount of autonomy. Because of his advancement within his injury—he moved on from mastering activities of daily living to swiftly completing QLI’s driving program,” which was started and successfully finished in two weeks. The broad strokes of the program’s vision and barriers to them were all achieved—to get up to his apartment, be able to attend to his kids’ needs, and get back to his livelihood his an Uber driver.
Their goals became more community-oriented, trying to maximize potential and align functionality with his physical recovery. Before driving sessions with Melissa, they’d simulated loading luggage into the trunk of the car, just as he would for Uber clients. Further, the team and Tony would ask questions related to his apartment and the three flights of stairs—having the strength and balance to carry loads of groceries up, or in the mornings bringing things down that his kids might need for school. Imagining too, if he had a fall, and needed to transfer up to a standing position using only his single-point cane. It’s a tough one to master, but Tony takes it nonchalantly, not allowing himself to grow frustrated, keeping things light conversationally with his clinicians, then taking a deep breath, looking ahead as if to say silently to himself “I got this,” and then tries again. If he nails the transfer, great. If not, try again. Recovery, Tony knows, is not a done-in-a-day deal, it is ongoing, continuous.
Tony, an inspiration already through the accomplishments in his program, continued to rise above and beyond. “I have never seen a client create the type of community that Tony has,” says life path coordinator Janelle Thomas. Maybe it belies a quiet leadership quality he has, the ability to draw people in. He’d walk from house to house, getting to know other clients. He, with a passion for video games, had a mind to start up video game competitions in the Lied Life Center, particularly around racing games
like Mario Kart and Forza. It wasn’t just fellow gamers who turned out, but clients who had never played a game in their lives. With the clients who play, Tony didn’t just build a good relationship, he figured out the adaptive needs they have, ensuring an equal field. It’s a change of pace, an opportunity for true bonds to grow—they are not on islands in their recovery journeys.
Though Tony has been in the hustle, the go-go-go, all of it has been for others. “I didn’t think I was going to come out of this. The journey, all the trials, and tribulations, has chiseled me mentally—there’s a determination that I never knew was within me.”
