Suddenly I find FOUR wheelchairs in my house - of different sizes , colours and make, of course. I keep shuffling them according to 'when' they are needed, and the living room sometimes resembles a parking lot! LOL! So as the story goes, Vin had his first wheelchair when he was about 5 years old. It looked like this
Vineet's First wheelchair (2004)
I had cried when it first rolled into our home..it tore my heart,but, of course. But for Vin, it was like a 4 wheeled car! He could not wheel it, but it was enough for him that he could be moved around everywhere. It was the Best option we had in the year 2004, because it was the only one which had the smallest rear wheels.We couldn't be bothered about the front wheels as such... We hardly knew anything about wheelchairs!! It was bought from a shop in Kolkata's Chittaranjan Avenue -its a very long road with Medical Equipment shops on both sides. My daughter Vinisha was just born, and must have been a few months old when I had gone with my husband to check out the wheelchairs there. We ordered this one for the seat dimensions,etc, and since we wanted a foldable one with built-in potty, they said it would take them some time for them to deliver. So Vin's papa went and got it some days later when it was ready. It was made totally of iron pipes, and as we realised later, the foldable part was hardly of any use - it got jammed because of the iron nuts and bolts :( Vin had already made it apparent by then that his favourite colour was 'green'. So I painted the wheelchair green(all by myself, of course, haha), coz the silver looked a bit sickly for a vibrant kid like my Vin :) So now it looked like this
Phew! It was hard work!!
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WHEELCHAIR NO.2
Errrrr...wheelchair no 2 was hardly ever used. It was totally miscalculated because we thought that with small wheels, Vin could not reach the wheels and wheel it himself, so let us get him one with big wheels with small dimensions.(By now, the shop was ready to make custom-made ones for us - It was a great thing for us back then...) So now we had big rear wheels, Vin's seat size, a little bit bigger front wheels, etc. Vin's dad had gone to order for this one, I made the dimensions myself, but when it came down home, it was a total failure :( It was just TOO HIGH. We used it for school when Vin started school in April 2005,but when the third wheelchair came over in Feb 2006 , we kept it aside for emergencies as the first one was getting old now. We began our hunt for another decent one as Vin was now was going to start regular school. This wheelchair stayed with us for some time - sometimes people borrowed it for use(say broken legs, etc) , and in the end we donated it to someone needy. I have very few pictures of it. This is one of them
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WHEELCHAIR NO. 3
Aaaahhh!! What can I say about Wheelchair no 3...I just LOVE it...and so does Vin. One day I noticed an ad about wheelchairs in a small column of our newspaper. I don't remember if they mentioned anything special, because the next moment we had called them up and asked about their address in Kolkata. The person in -charge told us that his agency had acquired some imported wheelchairs from Germany(?) and we could have a look. He told us they cost around Rupees Seven Thousand - a very big amount for us those days...(the iron ones cost only Rupees One thousand eight hundred back then!!) but we still wanted to have a look.
So it was a sort of a warehouse in Kolkata's narrow lanes and the moment my husband saw it, he knew this was the one. But I was a little sceptical about the seat size- it was an adult size, but the gentleman was very very kind enough to call over his own son who was younger than Vineet, and showed us that even he could move it around. As we discussed, the gentleman and Vin's papa got an idea- the foldable wheels could be fixed with velcro straps and not opened fully.Then the adjustable rexine-leather seat and backrest could be folded inside. Of course that would make it a little bit higher, but otherwise, it was Super. The wheels just glided so smoothly and they had tyres you didn't need to pump air into- rubberised I think. Everything about it was just so fine. We were happy except the price part, but we had to invest in this one. It looks like this- we have not put the foot-rest because it was too low for Vin's feet and it was non-adjustable. We would have to find a way to put something there....
The pic date says 28th Feb 2006, at 7.11.a.m.
I think it came a day earlier and this was the first day of school when Vin went with it? But maybe not, as I see that the seat and backrest have been adjusted for Vin and the wheelchair is a little high. Oh! I don't seem to recollect...old age duh! So he was just finishing Kindergarten and about to go to Class I. About the footrest now, it had a clip-in system which was super, but not working for Vin as of now. So we got an iron-welder to fix iron grooves on both sides like the one he had for his old ones, and put in one of the old footrest.We could put in only one of them because they were big and the breadth of this wheelchair was small.Both wouldn't fit together. It worked somehow...though I was always unsatisfied about this factor, but then we couldn't find any other way....Its the one we take for journeys and outings because because of its big front wheels,it easier to move about. Plus it just snaps shut with a raise of the finger!!:)
Touchwood, its still the BEST we have had till now..as if its blessed by GOD himself. Thankyou Jesus! Praise you Jesus! Its one of the many miracles we have witnessed in the path with Vineet...
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WHEELCHAIR NO 4
By now the first potty wheelchair was in bad shape and we needed another potty wheelchair for the house. So off we went to our favourite shop on Chittaranjan Avenue and ordered another one with our own dimensions for Vin. Oh what Super luck this time- it turned out just so fine and right in all ways.The arm-rests were lower as was the back rest.The arm rest was just about enough for a cardboard to be rested on it, so Vin could have meals by himself and even do some home work on it! Super!! :))
I see fotos of it as early as 30th April 2007. Although its potty is no more in use, Vin still finds it most comfortable for meals.
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WHEELCHAIR NO 5
Aahhh!!! What can I say about wheelchair no 5 ..... ITS AMERICAN!!!!! LOL!!! I'm laughing with pure joy because never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that Vin would be able to have one of those wheelchairs that looked SO damn Fabulous on the internet. Its a Quickie G T i and I had known about it from various places and SB Groups on the internet even before this one came. Now that I am writing about it, I feel it was a dream of sorts - the homecoming :)
Maria Linny is my messenger from God - she's been sent to help me and Vin in all our difficult times...I became friends with her on the net via the Spina bifida group that I have made on ORKUT. I shall have to have a seperate place for her here later I realise now. Coz Vin's journey is incomplete without me telling you about Linny (hugs for you Linny). So Linny was coming down to India in June 2009 and was bringing down her daughter Teena's extra wheelchair which was battery-operated. I couldn't believe my ears when I heard about it. She was coming down to Bangalore and we decided we would meet there. It was so un-imaginable that someone whom I had never met in my whole life was taking all the trouble to get a wheelchair with batteries and two sets of wheels, all the way from USA. Till the time we both met in Bangalore, both our husbands were so sceptical about the whole episode! haha! They kept phoning each other up to ensure it was actually happening!! But then miracles do happen....
It has jazzy light-up front wheels (which amaze people here all the time :), a pair of back-wheels for support and to avoid toppling , detachable armrests and everything about it so USA-made. He removes the armrests when he's practising his Octapad. I sometimes can't believe there ARE people who make a wheelchair so lovingly....So one set of wheels can be 'hand-pushed', while the other has batteries attached. So even at the slightest push, it can go faster than hands.Now Vin got a scare the first time when he sat on it in Bangalore with the battery-wheels,so he's still afraid to try them out, but the hand-driven ones are his favourite as of now.He can even play cricket on it!! :) Yes, we have to pump air sometimes. The footrest was high with the 'pressure-seat' Linny gave us, and low without it. So now we have our own-made cushion seat for him. I decorated it with white ribbons for Vineet's First Holy Communion in 2010. :)
14th November 2010
WHEELCHAIR NO 6
Now Vineet's second potty wheelchair (the comfortable home one) was getting old and rusty. So we had to get him a new one. Now inspite of me tediously taking measurements, Vin's papa tediously taking it down on the phone, and ordering it , it came with one disaster - high armrest. In fact too high an armrest. Now Vin does not want to let go of his 'comfy-wheelchair'.
SO THAT IS HOW THERE ARE 4 wheelchairs in my living room!!! Hahaha!! Not that I mind at all ;P Its good for the other kids of the house who sometimes like to race!!
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A small note-
And now I have my eyes on the 'beach' wheelchair wheels. Recently I was going through my old saved fotos and I came across fotos of beach wheelchairs. It looks like this-
Most of them were motorised and out of reach for us. I thought let me see if there have been any new improvements in them. I googled and saw some videos ,and then I came across this site-
CLICK HERE FOR THE LINK TO THE WEBSITE HOTSHOT PRODUCTS
This guy Hank is good coz he's given the option to just change the normal tyres of a normal wheelchair into balloon tyres with the help of some attachments at a price we can afford. I'm very very keen to proceed into this thing because our family loves the beach and so does Vin. In fact he's told me -Lets go to Goa again!! So I have told my dear friend Linny to look into it, and of course she too is working on it :) Love you Linny!
I was quite ashamed of how inaccessible public places in Kolkata was even now in 2019 😖 I did what I always do - took pics and posted them all over the internet.(Wait for a blog on the 2 public places we went to in these 2 days and how Inaccessible they were!) Thats the least I can do to raise awareness...PLEASE PEOPLE, try and put yourself in the shoes of the disabled for one day and you will know how difficult we all have made their lives by #inaccessiblity . IT IS NOT THEIR DISABILITY WHICH MAKES THEIR LIVES DIFFICULT.
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