My name is Becky Puhl and I do survival swim lessons in Volusia county. My students over 36 months old all have diagnosed disabilities. Many of them are nonverbal autistic children. I met this family earlier this year and was able to provide survival swim lessons to their son. JJ is nonverbal with ASD. To me it was important for this family to know that should he make it to the water unattended he knew what to do fully clothed and could roll over and float.

From Lee Ann, Jj’s mom:

My husband James Krisciunas Sr past away suddenly on November 5th at the age of 50. He fought a long hard up hill battle for his life he gave it all he had in him for six years after finding out why he was always getting so tired all the time he was diagnosed with CHF, COPD, CKD stage 5, along with batting DIABETES for over 10 years with tons of up and down along the way.

He leaves behind a completely shattered family that will never be the same again he was the sole source of income of our little family. James was a proud and devoted husband and father. He leaves behind two extremely intelligent boys. Who live life just as there Dad did, with the curiosities of the world just waiting to be explored. They were his reason for living and fighting so hard to get through each day just so he could get to be with them for as long as he could.

Tyler's is 13 year's old and would spend every other week at our home, he was and always will be his dad's best friend they had a great relationship full of comedy camaraderie with just a touch of underlining occasional fatherly discipline. Tyler is completely devastated by the loss of his father.

JJ is our son we share together he is 8 year old non verbal austic, who does not completely understand that his Daddy has gone to heaven.

I was blessed with the opportunity to be a stay at home mom for the past 7 years so this was a complete shock that I lost him so suddenly he was laughing and joking just hours before he passed away.

I am doing the best that I can to help get my family through this extremely challenging time in our lives as we move into the new phase of life without Dad and husband, it's definitely going to be an uphill battle that I will fight with the same way my husband did I will give it my all