Two laps of Stewart Park today, as evidenced by my new best friend Strava. Who knew I had it in me?! Well, I know one person who knew: Alex, my awesome PT. Today she did something really cool other than coming out in the rain with me; she did a lap in a wheelchair! Now, whilst that may sound a bit strange, it’s actually brilliant. As someone with no experience of a spinal cord injury, Alex cannot understand what everyday tasks like pushing around a park are like, nor can she understand what it’s like to have to move your legs in and out of bed by hand. Whilst the second part is extreme, the first part is not, and she decided to do something about it!

As a sports therapist, Alex has a brilliant understanding of the human body and the way it works. The only problem is that I don’t use my body the way most people do, and so for her to hop in a chair and actually experience what I do is certainly above and beyond. As she says in her own post on Instagram (Peak_Potential) “The main thing I’ve learned is there’s so much more to being in a chair than just ‘Pushing is hard work’!”. Personally I really appreciate the lengths she has gone to, just to put herself in my shoes and personalise the approach to my training.

It was an interesting session today. Pushing 2 miles sounds pretty easy, but when you factor in hills, camber, mud, moss and so much more it quickly adds up to a fairly decent cardio session. We did two loops of the park and Alex was in the chair on the first. With this being her first outing in a chair she was quickly feeling the burn in a different way than she is used to, which meant a pretty easy time for me. The second loop though… well the less said about that the better. I think you could probably hear me coming before you saw me with all the puffing and panting going on. The interesting thing though was that Alex received a few comments that she still isn’t quite sure how to take. Nothing offensive of course, but a few off the cuff remarks that those of us in chairs receive on the regular. I think it was a bit of an eye opener as to the way in which people treat those of us in chairs differently. Nonetheless, I am very grateful Alex put herself out there in order to better understand my needs, and how she can tailor the work we do together more accurately.

A final point from today is that I’ve realised how much improvement I have made over the last few months. There is still a very long way to go for me to get where I want to be, but at least I know I am heading in the right direction. I’m feeling rather stressed at the moment (more on that later) but today has certainly shown me that we cannot predict the future and I am allowed to have positive hopes for what is to come.