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Bit of This, Bit of That
Written by Sean on Monday, August 17, 2009
I don’t really have anything in particular to discuss today. There’s a couple upcoming posts that I’ll be writing, with more depth and thinking, but you’ll have to be patient! For now, here are a few things happening in my life I wanted to mention.
I’ve received a 100 page thesis that someone wrote about BIID. She had asked me, Claire and a few others. I had a first read of it, and I must admit, I was pleased with the results. I don’t agree with all the author’s conclusions, but that’s fine. One thing I am rather happy about is that the author did not sensationalise BIID, and did her best to represent us fairly. She succeeded in that. That was good. I’m waiting to hear back from her to see if I can make the paper available.
As far as therapy goes, the last meeting was interesting, short though. I’m not actualy starting for 6 or so weeks. They gave me the option of working with the social worker I don’t "click" with, or work with a woman. I thought that perhaps putting myself out of my comfort zone and working with this guy would create results. I’ve always done my what I could to have a good feeling & connection with my therapists. But I haven’t all that much result on the BIID front. Perhaps this will change? Who knows? Time will tell.
Finally, Chloe and Lane talking about fluidity and using their wheelchair made me think of a couple moments of "wheelchair magic". One was when I was going forward fairly fast. I was aiming to pull beside someone, facing the other way. As I arrived at his side, facing in the opposite direction, I popped a wheelie, still moving, locked one wheel and turned 180°. I stopped dead in my track. I was side by side with the guy I wanted to be beside, facing the same way. Couple of the people in the room noticed and commented with words like "sweet" and "cool". I acted cool as a cucumber, but I was quite happy with myself. The other moment was getting through a door too narrow to let me through in my chair. My chair was a bit too wide to get through. But I got through. There’s a special technique to get through a narrow door like that. You can’t always do it, it depends on the setup. And it’s hard to explain. You have to back up into the opening, wedging yourself in backward. Basically you end up with the door-jamb at your back, your back wheels on each side of the door-jamb. Then you "hop" the chair sideways until you’re able to unwedge yourself and get out. Quick graphic below!
Tags: BIID, Research, Therapy, Wheelchair
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6 Comments
2 On 17 August, 2009, Sean said:
Let us know how you make out with it :)
3 On 17 August, 2009, Lane said:
I hope you are able to convince her to make the paper available in some form. Even having a list of the detailed questions a thorough, academic, non-sufferer considered would, itself, be interesting.
The spin-stop-wheelie is not a beginner’s maneuver. I’ll leave that for later. ;) Quite cool.
My biggest wheeling performance question is how to conserve inertia. That’s not something that they taught me in rehab, nor something I’ve been able to figure out sufficiently on my own. It seems like I do an unnecessary amount of braking to navigate slalom-type courses (which abound at my workplace). Of course, I don’t have a good frame of reference, so I’m not sure. My old chair did it’s own unintended braking, so I just had to do the pushing part.
I try to use differential thrust (aviation lingo) instead, but in a great number of cases, only braking gives adequate control. Should I be giving greater consideration to weight shifting - it seems that that works primarily for very tight turns? Is there a better way? Just wondering.
4 On 17 August, 2009, Sean said:
@Lane, you’re right, the spin-stop-wheelie isn’t a beginner’s manoeuvre, and I’ve landed on my ass a few times doing it (including once that my wheel popped off the chair!).
As to conserving inertia, everyone does it a little differently. I have a fair amount of camber in my wheels (10deg) and I don’t use a lot of body weight shifting when i push. Depending on the angle of the ground surface, I end up either just slowing one wheel down with one arm while pushing with the other, or breaking hard, really depends. On tight turns, I often rely on what’s around me to turn. Walls, doorframes, heavy furniture (don’t hang all your weight to turn quick on a flimsy, light bookshelf for example, unless you want to break it ;) ).
5 On 17 August, 2009, Lane said:
@Sean, you know the wheel popping off thing is ironic in a way, because I developed a certain degree of aptitude with the hopping techniques due to the fact that my wheels - the one in particular kept falling off of my old chair. (I could have bought new axles, but I was too cheap - always thinking that if I lubricated them they’d surely get better, right?) When you talked about using the hopping for the door thing, I was like “yep, makes sense - good idea.”
Basically, I think you’ve confirmed that we’re using the exact same techniques and it’s a fundamental problem of physics. In essence, you have to convert some energy in order to alter your course: reduce your speed by heating up your hands, the wall, or add torque, etc.
I haven’t tried a flimsy bookshelf, but having experimented with myriad different “stationary” objects, I did discover one that happened to be on wheels of its own. Who knew? It was good for a laugh.
Talking of nice wheelchair moves: I tried a good one while leaving my office today. The idea was to turn off the light, shut the door, and zip out of there, all in one swift and elegant maneuver. I jammed my hand into the door jamb (hence the name), thereby reopening cuts from the most recent hike and adding to the collection of bruises. No problem; I’m indestructable as well as inelegant.
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1 On 17 August, 2009, Paradox said:
What a cool tip! I know just the door where that might be a solution!