I’m Rosie… Get me out of here!

The Grand Old Duke of York was lucky that he was able to march his men up the hill and down again.  If he’d been reliant on ramps, he might have found himself going nowhere.  Recently I have had a few frustrating encounters with ramps and one really good one.

I rely on buses and taxis to get about in my power wheelchair, and lately I have had problems both getting in and out of vehicles.  After much persuasion, I decided to give Uber Access in London a go.  The car came, punctual and all – but I could not get my wheelchair in.  The way the carrying area inside the cab was set up would have been fine if I had been in a manual wheelchair, but there was a raised rectangular box, designed to hold the wheelchair in place while the cab was in motion, which was too high for my power wheelchair to go over… but I did get up the ramp to it.  A degree of success, I guess, but not enough to get me anywhere.

My trusty London buses have let me down a few times recently too.  If the ramp doesn’t work when I want to get on the bus, I just wait for the next one.  If it’s not cold this is no bother, but whenever I get on a bus and cannot get off, this becomes a whole performance. The most recent time when I could not get off the bus was when I happened to be at the terminus, so it was reasonably straightforward.  The bus driver was in a bit of a panic when the ramp wouldn’t open, but the solution in this case was relatively simple.  I know that manual ramps are kept at the depot – something he was unaware of – so I sent him off to find it.  Once back, he put the ramp in place and I could make my descent.

The time before that was not nearly so straightforward.  The stop where I wanted to get out was in the middle of the bus route.  The driver initially wanted to take me to the terminus, some 45 minutes away, but I objected, as did all the passengers, finding this an absurd solution to my predicament.  I suggested moving the bus to a spot with a higher kerb so that someone could bump me off the bus, leaving it free to continue its journey.  But apparently that was against regulations. The other passengers were very patient, some drifting away without moaning, others trying to help.  Some went to nearby shops to see if any had a ramp we could borrow, but with no luck.  I then rang the person I was visiting – a physiotherapist as it happened – and asked him to bring along his portable ramp to get me off.

It is wonderful to have ramps on buses and terrific when the automation works, but no one seems to have thought through solutions for when it doesn’t.  It would be so simple if each bus could either carry a manual ramp or have a manual override function so that the ramp could be cranked out by hand.  I have suggested this a number of times, but obviously never to the right person at Transport for London.

But my really good, surprising ramp experience took place in Covent Garden, an awful place for powered wheelchairs as so few kerbs are dropped.  One day I might even turn my frustration into good use and devise a power wheelchair map of how to get about this well-visited part of central London.  I had gone to the Hockney Exhibition in Tate Britain and fancied a coffee with my friends.  We left the museum thinking it would be easy to find somewhere to stop, but found ourselves in Covent Garden before too long.  My friend suggested going to Paul in Bedford Street (https://www.paul-uk.com/find-a-paul/french-restaurant-london). I was very dubious about being able to cross the threshold, but much to my surprise, they had a ramp that was taken out and unfolded for me to use.  I was made to feel very welcome, and ended up having afternoon tea (with a French twist – I enjoyed it) instead of just a coffee.

So three failures and one triumph.  But I have still not found the perfect ramp to carry on the back of my wheelchair.  One day…

But ramp or not, for me Movement is Life.  Rosie

Next time, maybe something on toilets again or a trip to Amsterdam.

Cosy Toes

Having cosy toes makes winter a pleasanter experience.  And the coming of spring has made me realise that although I was well cocooned in an oversized version of those padded, zipped blankety things – sometimes called cosytoes – which you see on pushchairs, what I was using was not wholly satisfactory.  Toddlers have the luxury of someone to arrange the cosytoes, possibly lift them in and then zip them up.  Well, I don’t. I have to do the whole thing for myself.

My current cosytoes is made of slippery showerproof material.  It has a zip that runs like an ‘l’, down one side and then across the toes. I had to guess the size I needed from small, medium, large and extra-large.  The place where I got mine was not able to advise me on size, so I chose one that seemed the right length. However, it is too big, with lots of surplus material.  If I hold it up, it comes to my armpits. But the next size down would probably be too small to envelope me comfortably. I need to drape all of this wonderfully padded and warm material over my wheelchair, with the part that opens hanging over one arm of the chair.  The combination of the slippery fabric and the additional weight on one side that has no counterbalance on the other makes this a time-consuming and frustrating activity to get right.

Once the padding is in position, I have to manoeuvre myself into the chair, trying to keep all this slippery stuff in place – there is no way to fasten it on to the wheelchair to stop it moving.  When I have managed to seat myself, I may then need to adjust the part I sit on as it often moves as I manipulate myself into place.  And then, I must lift my feet over excess material and on to the footrests before finally reaching down to zip myself up across the bottom of my feet and up the side of the cosytoes.  What a feat this is!  Maybe everyone should have a go at wheelchair gymnastics.  Once installed in the wheelchair and ready to go, I feel a sense of achievement combined with exhaustion, but my toes, and legs, do stay cosy.

Getting out of the wheelchair with the cosytoes on it is also difficult, as I have to reverse all the actions, lifting my feet out and finding firm ground, free of stuff that can slip away from me, then levering myself out while not entangling myself in the bulky protective warm layer that, were it to have a mind, seems set to sabotage a safe and secure transfer to unwheeled territory.  But being warm when outdoors on a cold day is worth all this travail.

Having had a winter of discontent with my cosytoes, I have had a lot of time to mull over the problem and work out what I think would be better for me.  My main requirement would be a cosytoes that has a central zip. This would mean both that the weight on either side of my wheelchair would be equal, making it easier to arrange on the chair, and that it would be much easier for me to zip up.  It would also be good if there were some sort of fixing to hold it in place while I get in, ready to muffle myself up before setting off into the fresh air.  I have now found a company that makes bespoke cosytoes  and have just ordered myself one. (http://www.specialisedorthoticservices.co.uk/)They asked for lots of measurements, which should deal with all that superfluous material, and will place the zip centrally for me.  So far, the process has been very smooth, and I have found the company very helpful in answering all my queries.  Expect a report back over the whole process, from ordering to usage, at some point.

But whether I go about with cold toes or not, for me, Movement is Life.  Rosie

 

Next time, I’m likely to write something on ramps.