Mel Carter's Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me - home sign with Polly Samuel (Donna Williams)

Mel Carter's Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me - home sign with Polly Samuel (Donna Williams).
The lyrics and music featured in this video are Mel Carter's Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me. I do not own copyright to this song, nor do I claim to.
This is for my husband, Chris Samuel and my/our closest friends and so many of you out there feeling close to our journey as we walk our path with metastatic breast cancer.
Because I grew up with a severe language processing disorder as part of my autism, my father communicated with me via objects and home sign (gestural signing) which he probably picked up from his mother who was also rather 'autie'. I lost the grandparents when I was 4 (my main carers). As I was deemed 'psychotic' not deaf (autism in 1965 was deemed childhood psychosis back then) signing was discouraged in the household but once I was diagnosed around aged 10 with severe language processing disorder my mother was able to 'tolerate' it and so, with telegraphic speech, gestural signing and representational objects, I acquired functional speech between age 9-11 and moved out of echolalia.
I think in home sign and loved it as my early receptive language but was always sad it was not understood by others much except my father. My gorgeous husband Chris loved it and I used it at home a lot with him to augment language comprehension and retrieval. When I got metatastic cancer spread throughout my liver it was hard to speak and breathe so I reverted to gestural signing which Chris largely understood. A wonderful friend, Rosemary Crossley, brought us a communication board which helped me type out communication to those who couldn't get my gestural signing at all.
Since chemo I can speak and breathe again but the chemo drug is running out of steam and the liver will ultimately enlarge, crushing my diaphragm again and leaving me struggling to speak and breathe. Not for now though. But I hope this video shares my love of this kinesthetic language and what it is to think through one's hands... and the depth of my love as I 'sing' thing song through my hands... a song my father left in my room as a 45 rpm single I played on a pop up 60s record player when I was 3-4 years old and locked in my room (how mothers commonly 'coped' with 'autistic' children in the 60s when they weren't put in institutions). Life is full of light and dark and I have no regrets. The theme park of life has been amazing.