Now I just want to throw a ball with both hands! New life and new arm for Josh

NINE-YEAR-OLD Josh Cathcart is celebrating his new lease of life.

Hehas just given me a fist-bump.

Usually this would barely warrant a mention. But as this is the first Saturday the nine-year-old has EVER been able to give someone a fist-bump with his right hand, it feels a bit special.

You see, up until two days ago, Josh didn’t have a right hand to fist-bump with.

But now, as the world’s first recipient of a child-sized ‘i-limb quantum’ the most advanced prosthetic limb on the planet a whole new set of experiences and possibilities has just opened up to him.

It’s been a long and hard journey to this point. One that has, at times, dragged the young lad from Dalgety Bay in Fife to the depths of despair.

The cruelty of others was the hardest thing to bear.

“People called me a ‘one armed freak’,” Josh says quietly. “It made me really sad.”

His dad, James, adds. “People some he knew and some strangers called him terrible things. They called him a ‘fat, one-armed ****” and a ‘one-armed hobo’.”

The foul abuse took its toll on the youngster whose story was first told in the Sunday Post.

James shakes his head at the memory. “Josh said he’d didn’t want to be here,” he says. “He said he wished he was dead. Imagine how that feels. Your child saying they wished they were dead.

“Josh just wasn’t coping.”

James and wife Clare, both 33, knew long before Josh was born that their son was missing his right arm from just below the elbow.

Clare explains: “At the 19-week scan the hospital discovered his arm had stopped growing. We were given the weekend to tell the doctors what we wanted to do.”

James adds: “As if we would make any other decision than to go ahead!”

In some ways Josh couldn’t have been born into a better family when it comes to dealing with life without body parts both his dad and grandad are missing limbs or digits!

“I lost a finger at work 10 years ago and my dad lost a leg in an accident 27 years ago,” says James matter-of-factly.

“So he’s in the right family! We could all teach him how to cope with it.”

Josh nods in agreement: “It made me feel like it was kind of all right.”

But as he got older the jibes wore him down.

“His classmates were brilliant,” says Clare. “But some other people weren’t.

“I remember when we were on holiday at a caravan park other kids were laughing at him in the swimming pool. He just wanted to go back to school because he felt that was the only place where folk accepted him.”

Salvation for Josh and his family was to come in the form of cutting-edge technology.

When James and Clare heard of a revolutionary bionic hand made by Livingston-based firm Touch Bionics, they knew it could change Josh’s life for the better.

They set about raising £70,000. And last week, after a heck of a lot of effort, they spent a week at Touch Bionics’ base where Josh was fitted with his new arm.

The arm works using sensors located in the socket, which fits snugly over his elbow. A battery and wires in the forearm relay electrical signals to the fully-jointed bionic hand.

By using different muscle movements in his arm Josh can open and close his hand and perform a series of actions such as gripping, pointing and even giving a thumbs up.

I ask James and Clare how they felt when they first saw their boy with two arms.

James says: “It was amazing to see the excitement on his face. He was like ‘Woooah!’.”

Clare takes a moment to think, then begins: “I couldn’t give him two hands. So to see him standing there with both arms was just . . .”

She trails off as the emotion floods back.

“Clare blames herself,” explains James tenderly.

Tears well up in Clare’s eyes and her voice wavers and cracks.

“Yeah, as a mum you do,” she sniffs. “When you’re pregnant and something is wrong with your child you think it’s something you’ve done. You know it’s not, but . . .”

Josh looks concerned and says: “Mum, please don’t cry” as his little sister Lacey, 7, goes over to give her mum a big hug.

They’re clearly a close-knit family with a strength that has helped get them through the tough times to this happiest of weeks.

And even a matter of hours after getting his new arm, the transformation in Josh is clear for his family to see.

“Before now he’d never make eye contact with people,” says Clare. “If he talked to someone he’d be staring out of the window or at the ground due to his lack of confidence . . . until this week.”

James chips in happily: “Now he has a big smile on his face.”

Josh agrees his arm has changed things already. “I feel more confident,” he smiles. “It feels really, really good to be first in the world with this arm.”

And what are his plans now he has two hands?

Josh hums and haws for a second, before he decides. “I want to throw a ball with two hands!” he declares.

He’d love to play in goals in a football match but he’s not allowed to take part in contact sports in case the arm is damaged.

“My gran’s going to get me goalie gloves anyway,” smiles Josh.

“When he played tennis before he’d hold the racket under one arm, throw the ball up and quickly pull the racket out to serve,” says Clare. “Now he can hold it and throw the ball and hit it.”

James looks at his son and says: “He’ll find out on his own what he’ll use it for and what he won’t. No one will force him.”

Whatever he uses it for, there’s no doubt it will change his life.

Before I say goodbye we pop down to the play park round the corner. As lively Lacey hurtles up the climbing frame, Josh takes a breath and tackles an almost vertical wooden ramp, pulling himself up a metal chain, old hand over new hand, as his proud parents look on.

“That’s the first time he’s ever done that,” smiles Clare.

One thing’s for sure there are going to be whole a lot of fabulous firsts coming up for Josh Cathcart, the boy with the bionic arm.