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Walking Is Weird
Written by Chloe on Friday, January 23, 2009
I was browsing this site and came across Sean’s "Walking the Dog". It started me thinking about what it’s like to walk in public now. I was going to post a comment, but my thoughts on it kept expanding.
Prior to June 10th 2008 I had never used assistive mobility devices (wheelchair/braces/crutches) in public. I’ve never broken anything lower down than my right ischium (part of the pelvis); never screwed up my legs sufficiently to need a crutch.
My first public use of leg braces/crutches was June 10th; then the wheelchair on July 4th. Seven months is a long time ago. Now, the only time I am walking in public unassisted is when I’m wearing ski boots. So how does it feel?
For starters ski boots make one walk differently. They restrict ankle motion, so one does indeed have a minor mobility impairment. This actually feels good, or at least better than walking in regular shoes. There’s an interesting observation here. Everybody else at the ski resort is walking in ski boots too. We all have the same mobility impairment. So the fact that walking in ski boots does help slightly with the BIID has nothing at all to do with being different from anybody else, nothing at all to do with being noticed or getting attention. I’m just like everybody else. Nobody gives me a second glance. Guys don’t even pay much attention to women where I ski. I make no effort to prettify myself here, and neither do all the other hard core ski chicks. We come to ski the tough stuff. Women who want to show off their bodies and make up and expensive clothes go to different ski resorts.
Most of my walking is done at the mid-mountain restaurant, where I have my staple of french fries and coffee. Even though the ski boots help a little bit, it still seems very weird to be without some combination of wheelchair/braces/crutches. It feels wrong. It makes me self-conscious. It feels like people must be staring at me. I know that they’re not though.
As a teenager I felt very self-conscious because I was different from everybody else. Now I only feel self-conscious to be perceived as able bodied. Before June 10th I thought I would be self-conscious about using leg braces or a wheelchair in public. That never happened at all. How strange it is to feel self-conscious about being the same as everybody else, but not about being stared at because one is different! How could I be self-conscious about the simple act of walking? It sounds ridiculous. But it’s just not the way I am supposed to be.
As soon as I step into my skis the weird feeling of being able bodied vanishes. The feeling of being self-conscious also vanishes. This seems odd. I am almost as able bodied on skis as off them. I know that people are looking at me too, since I rather obviously ski like a maniac. When I’m skiing nothing seems to be wrong; it’s only wrong when I’m walking. Is it because I never saw anybody skiing until my late thirties? So it’s not hard wired that I’m not supposed to be able to do it, in contrast with the walking? Is it because I can imagine my ski poles to be crutches? Is it because skiing is the only activity where I can experience not being able to do some things because of my left leg? Is it because of the excitement of thinking "this might be the one" every time I head down the slope?
Sometimes I just walk around unaided at home. My partner does not like this. It freaks her out because she thinks of me as being paraplegic. It is very weird for her to see me walking. She thinks it would be better for my mental health if I didn’t walk at all any more, in public or at home. But, I’m cautious. I am the kind of person that doesn’t turn back when I set out on a path. This is literally true when I am hiking; I make it to the peak one way or another. This kind of walking is a metaphor of how I live. It can get scary.
I’m just thinking out loud at this point; thinking about not walking, at all, ever. Once I start down this path… But I am already on this path… There is no turning back… The only question is… How long is the journey?
Tags: BIID, Crutches, Impairment, Leg Braces, Paraplegic, Self-Conscious, Walking, Wheelchair
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5 Comments
2 On 24 January, 2009, Claire said:
At this point I simply *cannot*, ever, go out without a mobility device. At all.
Sometimes, I wish I could. There are times when I could just be AB and go for a walk or go skiing. And then use my wheelchair the next day. But guess what? It doesn’t work that way, not if you’re wheeling openly among friends and family and everyone thinks you can’t walk unaided.
I love using my chair. I *HATE* walking with mobility aids. I also can’t go full time wheeling, because my impairment isn’t that bad. And my husband would kill me. And I’d probably blow out both shoulders.
It’s a strange path we’ve chosen and it’s not easy. Is it worth it?
For my own part, I did not choose the BIID path, nor would I ever, but here it is and I’ve got to deal with it best I can.
Is it worth it? Gosh, Claire, none of our options are easy. It comes down to presenting our true selves versus self denial and repression. Currently I live a quadruple life (an oversimplification) hoping the different segments won’t overlap. There are people who have only known me in leg braces or wheelchair; there are people who know about my BIID; there are people who see me with the single crutch; and there is but one person left that I see frequently, who knows nothing of my BIID or assistive devices. That person is my ski instructor friend. She had arrived a few minutes before I did when I skied this week, so after parking I ran (yes you read that right) across the parking lot to chat with her as she was putting her skis on, to see if there was a chance of us doing some runs together. It turned out that she was busy giving lessons all day, on groomed intermediate runs while I was off in remote areas tangling with cliffs, so our paths didn’t cross again until we were both back in the parking lot. I can’t even remember the last time I ran. Extremely weird!
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1 On 23 January, 2009, Ronald said:
I think the journey is forever. An impairment, mobility aids, finally feeling the way one should, the sum of the parts is sooooo much greater than the whole. May your journies be rewarding ones.