With his cheeky smile and big brown eyes, six year old Ethan looks angelic.

But the little boy, dubbed a real-life spiderboy because of his extraordinary climbing skills, is driving his parents to despair.

Ethan is so fearless that he regularly scales the drainpipes of the family’s house in Huntingdon, Cambs, attempts to climb out of top floor window and swings like a monkey from door to door.

But his antics are a nightmare for his parents. Ethan is autistic and his unique condition means he must be watched 24 hours a day.

ironically when he goes outside he has to be strapped to a wheelchair in case he runs off. At night Ethan, who can only say one word (Go) and doesn’t even understand ‘no’, sleeps in a ‘special needs’ bed which is nailed to the floor.

His brave parents have now decided to tell their son’s story in the hope they can raise awareness of Ethan’s unusual type of autism, which leaves him unable to feel fear or understand the consequences of his daring skills.

Ethan’s mother Sharon, 36, who with husband Richard, 38, a full-time firefighter, also has a daughter, has been forced to give up her job as a care home manager to look after her son.

She first noticed her son was different from other babies when he was six months old and he didn’t miss her when she went back to work. He was finally diagnosed at 15 months as autistic.

Ethan goes to a special needs school where he is watched round the clock and the council is about to spend money to make their home ‘Ethan proof’. But she is terrified her little boy will kill himself- and she longs to hear from any other family with a similar child.

I placed Ethan’s extraordinary story in the Daily Mail where it appeared on page three. Read it in full here.