A man who is paralysed from the shoulders down has shared a video which shows him sitting up unassisted for the first time in eight years.
In the video, Henry Fraser is sat on his bed leaning against his headboard. He then uses his neck muscles and the top of his shoulders to lift his body away from the headboard and sit upright, without any help.
Fraser, who was left paralysed from the shoulders down after suffering a dislocated neck in 2009, explained that it took him eight years of perseverance to get to this point.
“To many this might not look like much, but I’m only using a handful of muscles (my neck muscles and the top of my shoulders) to do this exercise,” he said.
“It’s taken a lot of hard work and digging deep.”
He also shared a motivational message for others: “Always look at progress in life, no matter how small it may seem, it is still progress.”
Fraser’s video has been liked almost 6,000 times on Twitter and received hundreds of comments, with many calling him an inspiration.
Ben Wimbush tweeted: ”Brilliant, as a fellow quad I understand how hard you have worked to get this far in your journey mate.” Lyndsay King added: ”You have amazing resilience and determination - this is such an achievement!”
Fraser later thanked everyone for their kind words. “I just wanted to show that hard work does pay off,” he said. “Thank you all.”