“About six years ago, I was diagnosed with Lou
Gehrig’s disease or ALS. My doctors told me that I would have
a gradual loss of my ability to walk. I knew I was going to be
in a wheelchair at some point. However, each transition into a
different device, no matter how useful for my own mobility,
created certain barriers that I did not have before. Later on,
when the disease necessitated the use of a manual chair, a
simple three-inch curb on the street suddenly became the end
of the world for me. Fortunately, around that time I saw the
iBOT® on “The Today Show”. This was the chair I was waiting
for. The day I
heard that the FDA approved the iBOT®, I called Independence Technology and started making arrangements
for an assessment. I wanted to be first in line to get one.
I am a practicing attorney and when some of the court
facilities proved to be inaccessible, I had to hire an
able-bodied lawyer to represent me instead. With the iBOT®, I
no longer need to do this. The iBOT® grants me the physical
presence in the courtroom where I can rise up and look the
judge in the eye. I no longer have to sit looking at someone’s
belt buckle and they don’t have to stoop down to talk to me.
Being at eye level turned out to be one of the surprising
benefits of this amazing machine and the feeling of
humanization it provides is priceless.
Unless I am
sitting at a desk or sitting at a dinner table, I use the
iBOT® in Balance Function almost all the time. The iBOT® also
“normalized” many other things besides my work. For example, I
can “walk-in,” I call it “walk” when I am up in the Balance
Function, to a restaurant and stand at the bar with
able-bodied people. When I was in a regular wheelchair and
went to a bar, my arms were not strong enough so that I could
reach the drink on a bar. Now I can put my elbows on the bar
and interact with people. Another amazing advantage of the
iBOT® is that I find myself doing things that I could not do
in a regular wheelchair, for example, going to a stand-up
reception. In short, before I had the iBOT®, I would choose
not to go to any kind of event where people are having
conversations while standing in the middle of the room. You’re
on a different plane and you go unnoticed or you’re noticed as
a negative factor.
With the iBOT®, I'm better at my job, I'm able to
socialize more, and my interaction with my friends and
family has been strengthened. Many people do not even
notice that I am in a chair. I feel more equal today in every
aspect of my life. I don’t feel that people are looking at me
differently, but rather for who I am as a man, a husband, and
an attorney. The iBOT® has not only leveled my life’s playing
field, it has elevated my life.”
