Fulton man’s memoir demonstrates the power of a fighting spirit
Syracuse.com | December 19, 2011 | By Sara Tracey
Craig Abbott’s autobiography begins at what could have been the end: He was dying.
At 18, one of his hundreds of cases of pneumonia turned into something worse. An ambulance was called when Abbott had difficulty breathing, made more difficult by his spinal muscular atrophy type 1, a disease that can weaken the muscles used for breathing and coughing.
On the drive to the hospital, the cough assist machine in the ambulance that would clear his lungs to improve his breathing wasn’t working. He passed out while the ambulance staff used a manual respirator to breathe for him. He came back to consciousness 13 hours later, hooked up to another breathing machine.
Abbott, now 23, of Fulton, said he opened his book “Classified Terminally Ill: A Young Man’s Story of Beating the Odds,” with this incident because of his fighting spirit. It’s a resilience that friends say Abbott has possessed his whole life.
Click HERE or on the image below to read more…
SMAHeadlines.com 