Josh Crickmay proves that anything can be overcome in life
Instead of letting suicide attempts and depression get the better of their son, Josh Crickmay's parents took matters into their own hands and changed his life.
Josh joined Jane in studio to talk about how he has turned his life around and his book, "Josh's Big Year"
One in 160 children have an autism spectrum disorder. According to Focus for Health, currently autism has no real cure, but treating the medical conditions that aggravate autism symptoms can drastically improve a child’s health, and many parents report that their child is considered to be “recovered”.
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Josh Crickmay is one of those sufferers, but this young lad is doing big things!
From a broken, suicidal, autistic teenager, who dropped out of school at 15, to a passionate young adventurer, comes a remarkable 300-page, self-published coffee table book, called 'Josh’s Big Year'. The book was launched late last year. He was responsible for the photography, layout, and design of the book, which took more than two years to produce.
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At the age of 15, Josh landed in hospital and was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome or High Functioning Autism, after suffering with severe bouts of depression and several suicide attempts.
His parents, Andrew and Kathy, decided that they needed to take matters into their own hands, and began an adventure with Josh, focusing on his love of birds, photography, and writing. Let's stop for a moment to acknowledge how amazing these two are! WOW!
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They embarked on an adventure that would take them to all corners of South Africa and then the Amazon and the Andes to celebrate a 'Big Year'. A 'Big Year' is a personal challenge or an informal competition among birders to see how many species of birds they can identify by sight or sound within a single calendar year and within a specific geographical area.
Josh's challenge was to identify more than 1,000 birds from two different parts of the world - 500 in Southern Africa and 500 in the jungles of Ecuador, South America.
I'm so proud of this guy and wish him all the best in his future adventures!
