Kickas.org Forums Ankylosing Spondylitis General Discussion #1 AS Web Support Group Mobility scooter and strange looks

A wonderful complete stranger responded to a request I listed on Craigslist and basically donated a mobility scooter to me.

It's awesome! My world had shrunk to eight hundred square feet, I couldn't go to fun places and activities with my family, I couldn't do so many things I used to enjoy. I was isolating myself, which makes me crazy mean.

Now, at least, I can get out and about.

The phenomena of strange looks doesn't happen on the street. It happens every time I go grocery shopping with my wife.

If I wear my black t-shirt with the huge gold Ranger tab across the chest, other vets give me high fives and fist bumps as we pass each other, which isn't a bad thing. We are a Band of Brothers. But I think I get dirty looks from unsympathetic "civilians" for a few reasons:

At 54, I'm relatively young, and look it.

I'm not morbidly obese, like so many who use store scooters (my scooter is silver, sleek and sexy).

I have both legs.

And, finally, I sound far more like Mike Rowe than I do Stephen Hawking.

Why else could they resent me and my scooter? I live in one of the most liberal counties in the United States; I know for a fact that a lot of people in the county despise veterans and active duty troopers.

I can't come up with many other reasons.

Has anyone else been there and done that?

Hi John, I've never experienced anything like it, but wanted to say how glad I am that you are now able to get out and about. You must have been having one hell of a dose of cabin fever before and I sympathize mightily!!

Enjoy your freedom and remember, no speeding tickets!

Hugs,

Kat, I'd say "You have no idea..." but everybody here does. Quite frankly I was going mad. The isolation was enough to drive me close to suicide (yet again).

As far as speeding goes, I've always raced only on the track since my first ticket at the age of 16. The scooter is a bit of a step down. My first car got down a quarter mile dragstrip in 9.22 seconds at 145 MPH. My last drag racing car, about 30 years ago, ran the same distance in 5.54 seconds at 290 using a rocket fuel called nitromethane.

The NHRA professiionals will be here in two weeks for the Mopar Parts Mile High Nationals. We're talking cars that cover a thousand feet in 3.88 seconds at 322 MPH. A thousand horsepower per cylinder. One Top Fuel engine has the same horsepower as two locomotives or eight NASCAR Sprint Cup cars. It's serious fun.

The slower classes of cars we mortals drive do"Bracket racing"--you tell the officials how fast you think your vehicle can cover a quarter mile and do your best to hit that time. That's called your "dial-in". My wife jokingly said I should enter the scooter--with a dial-in of a minute forty five at 4.5 MPH I'd almost certainly win the class.

How can that be, you ask?

It's a handicapped start. I get to leave first. The average car in the class usually runs something like a 15.00 ET, which means he has to sit there and watch me go down the track for a minute thirty. If he leaves before that, he red lights and goes home. If he's patient enough to get a green light he has to try to chase me down and get to the finish line before I do without going faster than his 15.00 dial-in. If he runs a 14.98 and I hit my 1:45.00, he goes home.

I probably would win a lot of races.

i was almost completely housebound this past fall and winter due to not being able to sit in a car due to my back being messed up the way it was, so i know that cabin fever sort of feeling. once i could finally get back in the car and just go places, even mundane places like work or the grocery store, what a feeling of freedom! you never realize how important the little things are til they are taken away from you.

thus, so glad you now have this renewed sense of freedom as well!

and sorry for the lack of sensitivity and understanding of others, but don't let that get in the way of enjoying your mobility scooter to your fullest! i say good for you! and glad for that kind-hearted stranger who made this possible!

I can see it now! Go win those races!!

Isolation is such a mixed blessing. I don't mind it for a few days at the cottage (well, my stepdad's cottage). It's comforting and allows me to decompress a bit. However, isolation enforced by my health is another story. For a couple of years, other than going to work, my life was in my house. Didn't have it in me to do anything (not even theatre for about a year). I was miserable, but didn't realize how miserable until one day my best friend chivvied me out the door and made me look at the world again.

I'm glad you made it through the isolation to join us and get your scooter.

Hugs,

Here's a thought. Maybe people are just freaked out and thinking ~ "crap, I hope I don't end up like that!"

I notice that even though I am by far the youngest in my tai chi class (50) for seniors, everyone averts their eyes and tries to pretend I'm not slowing everyone down when my husband takes my arm to help me limp up and down the stairs to and from the classroom.

It's even weirder using a "limper sticker" for parking when there is nothing visible wrong with me, just that sometimes it's freaking hard to walk that extra 100 feet into the store.

But hey, just think of how many kids will talk to you now that you're down where they can get your attention.

Kat, "There is no way that writers can be tamed and rendered civilized or even cured. the only solution known to science is to provide the patient with an isolation room, where he can endure the acute stages in private and where food can be poked in to him with a stick." Robert A. Heinlein

That's completely true. But once I've finished a book and e-mailed it to the publisher I absolutely crave human contact! My youngest daughter and my wife didn't want to be around me. My 7 month old grandson wanted to be around me, so I was okay.

But for four years my Universe consisted of my bedroom, the bath room, and the recliner in the living room.

I love my scooter!

Sue, my VA doctor/primary care provider actually referred me to a shrink so I could work on the grief issues around the things AS has permanently taken from me. (Drag racing, flying high performance aircraft, golf, skiing, skydiving, etc.)

If you read my story you know how unlikely it was that I'd go to the appointment--I have no idea how to grieve.

But the cute young lady she sent me to gets me. She looked me in the eye and said, "It must be pure Hell to be a serious adrenaline junkie with advanced AS. I'm glad you're coping because I couldn't."

Grrrrrrrrrrrrr. People can be so dumb! Obviously a person wouldn't choose to be in a scooter. I can't believe people give you dirty looks. Maybe they're just jealous of your sexy silver mini-hot rod!! That's it. They're totally jealous and fuming mad that they have to walk around in dirty old tennis shoes and there you go cruising by, living the good life.

Maybe you ought to get a t-shirt that says, "you can look, but you can't touch!" or maybe a finger flipping the.......no, that would be innappropriate as church ladies often shop in grocery stores. Hmmmmmmmmm, I'll keep thinking.

Very cool that you're a writer. I'm working on my first. 8,000 words so far, 72,000 to go. I have 3 kids home on summer vacation. Where did you say I could get one of those isolation rooms??

I'm glad you finally got one.

I won't use the carts shopping just because of that, all the looks but hey, draped over the shopping cart can be kind of sexy too..right?..lol

All I have to say is be loud, and be proud!