Nick Wilson is a Speaker, Presenter and Content Creator, aka Disabled Adventurer, an Ambassador for Purple Tuesday, and the Disability Expo, who Champions suicide survivors and abilities over disabilities, through his talks and adventures.He openly, and very frankly, shares his lived experiences with mental illness, physical disability and surviving a suicideattempt to; inform society, encourage change and inspire and empower others, with authenticity and a message of hope.He is also an Army Veteran with an impactful story to tell. After 14 years of service, Nick left the military, with aspinal injury and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder PTSD, as a result of multiple deployments across the globe such as,Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. Through his battle with both physical and mental disabilities,surviving attempted suicide and managing suicidal ideation, Nick continually demonstrates resilience and the ability to overcome adversity, whilst forging a new career as a successful public speaker, budding presenter, video producer and an adventurer always looking for his next challenge.Through finding ways to better manage his health conditions and environment, Nick prevents his disabilities fromdictating his life or fulfilling his purpose of selflessly helping others. This is clear to see by his commitment to supportingthe local community and wider society, with the many achievements he’s obtained being recognised, locally and nationally, winning him an award at the prestigious “English Veterans Awards” and being named “Male Role Model of the Year” ‘21 and “Changemaker” of the Year ‘22.In a bid to understand the workings of the mind, Nick studied Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Mental Health First Aid and Neuro-Linguistics Programming, becoming a trainer and practitioner in all three. Armed with his lived experiences, professional skills in mental health and life lessons learned, Nick founded Talk Mental Health CIC, a social enterprise to; champion men’s mental health and advocating for the sharing of our livedexperiences. From launching in May 2020, TMH has directly helped over 250 guys locally and hundreds of thousands,nationally and globally, through the videos Nick creates for social media.As someone who promotes hope through his messaging and embracing abilities over disabilities, Nick has completedcountless charity fundraising work throughout his career raising over £125,000 for charities, through organising events such as; 1000-mile cycle for D-Day commemorations and the first Basra half marathon. Nick also ran successful mental health campaigns during 2018/19, creating hashtags #Realmentalk and #Timetolisten reaching over 250,000 around the world.Through his challenges Nick has;• Ascended Mount Snowden in a powered wheelchair, creating the first ever VR experience of doing so from awheelchair user perspective• Became the first disabled person to complete 96km of the Ridgeway National Trail in a wheelchair• Completed a 385mile cycle on his specialised recumbent trike, from Margate to Lands End• Spent 10days travelling Route66 with, Bike Tours for the Wounded, on a Harley Goldwing.During these he’s had to overcome; heat exhaustion, debilitating chronic pain, mental struggles, failure and homelessness,whilst navigating Covid and a severe lack of funding, however, regardless of this he has still found ways to achieve them.
