Walking Toward What’s Next

“I cried like a baby because of this woman.”

Sitting in the therapy gym at St. John Community, David Swiss points across the room toward Jessica McGuinness, Rehabilitation Site Supervisor at St. John Community.

“She gets all the credit,” he says.

Just four months ago, Swiss lost both of his legs.

For over a month, Swiss and McGuinness have spent countless hours together at the Specialty Care Center at St. John Community. He jokes. She challenges him. He sets ambitious goals. She figures out how to help him reach them.

Together, they have accomplished something remarkable.

At 73 years old, Swiss walks through the therapy gym on prosthetic legs wrapped in Spider-Man graphics.

Why Spider-Man?

“Because I like Spider-Man,” he says with a grin. “It beats having flesh-colored legs. They’re boring.”

Humor and honesty come easily to him. So does determination.

Swiss still remembers the day everything changed. It was winter and about 10 degrees. He stepped outside to take out the trash. He slipped on ice, struck his head, and lost consciousness. He estimates he was outside for 30 to 45 minutes.

The frostbite was severe.

Doctors initially hoped they could save portions of his feet. Then the discussions turned to amputating toes. Then more of his feet. Eventually, neither leg could be saved.

Both legs were amputated below the knee.

What followed was pain, uncertainty, and a future he had never imagined for himself.

McGuinness remembers meeting him during the early stages of recovery.

“He was angry, understandably so,” she says. “I think he was trying to figure out what life was going to look like.”

Swiss doesn’t disagree. But eventually, he reached a decision.

“I just felt like, hey, your life has changed irrevocably,” he says. “What are you going to do about it? Sit in a wheelchair and rot? Or get off your butt and walk? I chose the latter.”

Once he made that choice, there was no turning back.

When Swiss received his prosthetic legs on April 27 2026, his first goal wasn’t complicated. He simply wanted to see how far he could go.

The first time he stood, he walked approximately eight feet between the parallel bars.

“I wanted to see how far I could go,” he says. “One or two steps isn’t going to do it. More is better.”

McGuinness was stunned. The prosthetist was stunned, and Swiss was overwhelmed with emotion.

“I was elated,” he says. “It was liberating.”

The next day brought another goal. Swiss started making lists, ordinary things most people never think about.

Climbing stairs. Picking something up from the floor. Standing without holding on to something. Walking across a room.

“I made a list one night,” he says. “What are the everyday, stupid, mundane things that we all do that you have to be able to walk to do?”

Each item became a problem to solve. And Swiss likes solving problems.

McGuinness quickly learned that if she asked what he wanted to work on next, he would already have an answer.

“I know he’s brewing ideas in his head,” she says. “So we problem-solve together to figure out how to do it safely.”

The work has been demanding. Walking with a prosthetic limb requires significantly more energy than natural walking. Swiss is learning to use two prosthetic limbs while also managing COPD.

Every gain has required a lot of effort.

“He came down to the therapy gym every day,” McGuinness says. “Morning and afternoon. He put in the work.”

Swiss credits her for much of his progress.

“She’s a total pro,” he says. “But she tempers that with some humor and some kindness. She doesn’t let me slack.”

Then he pauses.

“We click.”

It is a simple explanation, but it may be the most accurate one.

“She presents an idea, and I just do it,” he says. “She’s found a way to get into my head, and I found a way to get into her head.”

McGuinness has worked with many patients over the years. Few have approached rehabilitation quite like Swiss.

“I would be hard-pressed to find anybody who has shown that they are this motivated,” she says. “A lot of people will say they are and then not put that effort in, but he has walked the walk now, literally and figuratively.”

The impact has extended beyond his own recovery. His progress has inspired many throughout the St. John Community. Staff members have followed his journey closely, while fellow residents have watched him push himself toward new goals each day.

Swiss never asked for that role. He’s too busy focusing on the next goal.

At the time of his interview, he was preparing for a challenge that had been on his mind for days. Getting up from the floor.

Not because he expected to fall. In fact, despite months of rehabilitation and learning to use prosthetic legs, he hadn’t fallen once.

But he wanted to know he could get back up if he did. That’s how he approaches recovery. Find the problem. Solve it. Move on to the next one.

After completing his therapy, Swiss will leave St. John Community and continue his journey through LIFE Butler County. He admits there is anxiety in stepping into a new environment and a new routine.

“It’s a good level of anxiety,” he says. “I’m stepping into the unknown.”

But uncertainty doesn’t seem to bother him the way it once might have. In fact, his entire perspective on life has shifted.

“Maybe this was intended to be,” he says softly about losing his legs.

He pauses, searching for the right words.

“I cannot help but think something made me change.”

The experience, he says, has done more than teach him how to walk again. It has given him a renewed sense of purpose.

“This has jump-started me,” he says. “It’s motivated me to get up and figure out what, at this stage in my life, I do.”

He doesn’t know exactly what comes next. But he knows what he wants it to include.

“I want it to be something rewarding and beneficial to other people,” he says. “I don’t know what that journey is yet. But I’m going to find it.”