Ever since I was a toddler, I always walked. In my lifetime, I used walkers and canes; now I am reliant on transversing with a wheelchair. In many years of going to Shriners Hospital For Children in Philadelphia, doctors would tell my mom not to allow me to resort to using a wheelchair. Their reason for saying this? My muscles would get weaker and there would be issues surrounding my health if I became reliant to a wheelchair. I’m not a doctor, but I know my body; I am healthy and I am slowly recognizing issues that have come up in the past few weeks.

My life consisted of walking every day. Even when my college has a small campus, I am always exhausted by the end of the day because of constantly running around from class to class and also because of the steep ramps. I even recall having to chase down SCAT and panting whenever they are at a great distance from where I am (like the athletic building where my speech communications class was). Regardless of the exhaustion I felt and the hurdles there were along the way, I walked and dealt with it. I dealt with walking after hurricane Sandy and when I was living at a rental house.

After hurricane Sandy, I became weaker over time due to the lack of walking when I was home. I did walk again at the rental house, but somehow that came to an end three years ago when I fractured my toes. It was the moment when I put on a boot to help with my foot that became the end of walking. Despite how I can walk very minimally, I became a wheelchair user while I was wearing the boot and after the boot came off my foot. At the time, I used my Quickie 2 lightweight wheelchair that I’ve had since I was 12 due to a surgery. Since fracturing my toes three years ago, I continued using the wheelchair and developed a fear to walk again due to the risk of falling.

Becoming a wheelchair user made my life easier and I became more independent than when I was walking. Over the years, the Quickie 2 became small for my body and it can be uncomfortable regardless of how many hours a day I would sit in it. Even with coming home after a long day of classes, it would become painful to be on SCAT (a paratransit company in Suffolk county) when my ride got longer than 45 minutes. It was late last year when my parents came to make a decision that it is time for me to have a new wheelchair. The Quickie 2 wheelchair that I have had been sitting in for so long was slowly breaking down; the brakes did not work as well as they should and the tires needed to have air put in every couple of weeks.

An anxiety provoking process began on January 29, 2016. The process began just fine as I was measured and saw the new wheelchair I would have at the end. In the months since January, the process became nothing short of stressful between having to be remeasured, getting prescriptions and letters from doctors, and dealing with getting the approval by insurance to pay for the wheelchair. It was September when the process finally began to get to the end, but a lack of communication occurred in the duration of getting final details. This continued on until October 17, which was the day I got an email indicating that a delivery is scheduled for October 18. After a few hours from work, I came home to wait about 20 minutes until I got my Quickie 7R wheelchair. From the first moment I sat on it, I knew that the chair was made for me and works for my body. So far, it may be awkward, but I know that it will take time for me to become adjusted to my new wheelchair.

Regardless of then negativities that doctors have pointed out, the wheelchair gave me something that I never really had whenever I walked: freedom. Sometimes I consider walking, but I still have a fear about doing so again. A wheelchair is not a safety net as most able bodied individuals may think, but it allows wheelchair users to fully navigate life independently.