Comment by koliber | Hacker News Reader

Comment by koliber | Hacker News Reader

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Everyone should spend an hour or two in a wheelchair. It gives so much perspective and builds empathy.

I am an able bodied adult. A couple of years ago I hurt my foot and went to the hospital. It was a minor fracture of a minor bone, but they ended up putting a cast on to make sure I would not put weight on it for some time.

It was the middle of the day and I was alone when they discharged me from the ER. This was in Poland. The plus side is that the ER bill was $0. The downside is that I had no crutches and no one to help me. There was a medical supply store across the street and a wheelchair I could use at the entrance to the hospital.

I hopped on over to the entrance and sat down in the wheelchair. Wheeling down the smooth floor was no problem. However, once I hit the pavement, things got tough. Every crack and uneven spot was a real obstacle. I got stuck all the time. Each pebble had the ability to stop me in my tracks. Conquering these minor challenges took more physical strength and tactical planning than I anticipated. Keep in mind, this is while rolling down some average pavement.

Eventually, things got harder. Curbs. A proper curb was an impossible challenge. I imagine that someone who has more experience and body strength might be able to somehow get a wheelchair on the curb. I needed to wheel over to a spot where the curb was lower, at a crossing. This added distance but it was necessary. Not that a lower curb was easy. It still required careful planning, strength, and tactical positioning.

Eventually I made it to the store. Walking on crutches was a blessing. Still needed to return the wheelchair to the hospital. This meant doing the same journey, but slightly uphill, while toting crutches.

This was a while back, but I think of this experience regularly. The world is much different for someone in a wheelchair.

Once while volunteering in a hospital I was collecting up wheelchairs used to take patients to their cars, and I decided to try one out.

What I learned is that staff, patients and visitors in hospitals are really kind and helpful if you're in a wheelchair, and hospitals are (obviously I guess) pretty well adapted to wheelchairs. I also learned it's very difficult to open doors with spring closers - I suspect there's a trick to doing it, but I didn't have time to figure it out because any time someone saw me struggling with a door they'd help me with it.

I also learned you will never feel more self-conscious than when a nice elderly lady helps you with a door, then you reach the place you're delivering the wheelchair, and you have to walk back past the nice lady, revealing you were faking being disabled for your own entertainment.

My undergrad university had a disability awareness week every year, and one of the activities was a challenge to get from one building on campus to another, in a wheelchair, in under ten minutes (the usual class change time). There was a large hill between the buildings that was basically impossible to get up or down safely in a wheelchair, but there was another building you could go through that had exits at the top and bottom and an elevator--if you knew to use it. Other than knowing how to bypass the hill the only real challenge was crossing one street. The rest of the route was on smooth, essentially flat, well-maintained sidewalks.

Like anything wheeled, the type of wheels alone can make terrain navigation much more easy or entirely hellish. I suspect most hospital wheelchairs are optimized for being cheap, including having cheap wheels that do fine on the smooth polished floors of hospitals, and ok-enough for brief journeys (often pushed by someone) just outside to a waiting vehicle, but are not appropriate for going across the street or even at a home with carpet.

My grandpa had a few wheelchairs, me and my cousins would try them out / have fun going up and down the ramp to the house door. They had better wheels (needed for lots of picnics outside on grass, or down the stairs in the basement), the difficulty was mainly a matter of strength, not getting stuck on something seemingly innocuous. (Though you do learn pretty fast I think when you should go over something back-wheels first, either by necessity or just to make things a lot easier.) I remember even as a late teen pushing him up some steeper rough grass though, it could be pretty tough. He wheeled himself around most of the time, he had good arm strength as long as I knew him. I remember getting grabbed by him once too (in trouble for something, what I don't remember) and knowing I wouldn't be able to get away.

These kinds of experiences are so meaningful. In college I was in the so called “gay-straight alliance” and we did an exercise where the straight people had to wear a t-shirt all day that just said “I’M GAY” and we weren’t allowed to deny it if anyone inquired. Definitely an unforgettable moment in my adult life.

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