P.E.W. Perspective

Meet Red, my able assistant. Red is what is known as a rollator. Whereas a walker is usually just a frame with four tiny wheels, a rollator has large wheels, handbrakes and is much better suited for outdoor use.

You may or not know that I have Parkinson’s disease. One of the ways it has affected me is that my stability and balance are not what they used to be. I have always been a runner, but with my current issues I am not only unstable but my legs get very fatigued in a short time. I had to stop running after taking a fall and cracking four ribs. Yeah, wake-up call for sure.

So I took up the next best thing – fast walking. I am too unstable to fast walk without support so I started out using trekking poles. The poles help, but I still feel unstable on the sidewalk or at the mall (where I walk 3 or 4 days a week). They still are good on the trail but I needed something different to allow me to fast walk.  That’s when I found Red.

I started thinking about what it would be like to have some sort of walker to walk behind that would enable me to walk fast. Poking around the Internet I soon found Drive Medical and the Nitro Rollator. It’s like a hot red sports car for a guy in mid-life crisis, except I am not exactly in mid-life. I will just say for now that Red has been just what I had hoped. I will do another post later with more detail.