The latest installment of my Times column.
On from the challenges associated with keeping up with a child on wheels, I find myself wondering if I should try my tennis chair for this purpose. I can certainly push much faster in it than I can in my everyday wheelchair. This is partly due to the 26 inch wheels instead of the everyday 24".
The only problem is that any kind of change in pavement level would leave me stranded, as the tennis wheelchair is designed for use on tennis courts, which aren't supposed to contain steps or drop-kerbs.
The other option I briefly toyed with was to put her on wheels but with some kind of harness and lead so that she would stay a fixed distance away but no further. Two obvious problems spring immediately to mind.
Firstly, that she might end up dragging me around and develop a power lifter's build at the age of four.
Secondly, people might misunderstand the set-up and assume that I am exploiting my child as a mobility device akin to a team of huskies.
There would also be inevitable compromises in her ability to balance, so Instead I have decided to try and refine and improve my 'this time I really mean it' voice in the hope that she might actually pay attention to me, instead of assuming that everything is a game.
On from the challenges associated with keeping up with a child on wheels, I find myself wondering if I should try my tennis chair for this purpose. I can certainly push much faster in it than I can in my everyday wheelchair. This is partly due to the 26 inch wheels instead of the everyday 24".
The only problem is that any kind of change in pavement level would leave me stranded, as the tennis wheelchair is designed for use on tennis courts, which aren't supposed to contain steps or drop-kerbs.
The other option I briefly toyed with was to put her on wheels but with some kind of harness and lead so that she would stay a fixed distance away but no further. Two obvious problems spring immediately to mind.
Firstly, that she might end up dragging me around and develop a power lifter's build at the age of four.
Secondly, people might misunderstand the set-up and assume that I am exploiting my child as a mobility device akin to a team of huskies.
There would also be inevitable compromises in her ability to balance, so Instead I have decided to try and refine and improve my 'this time I really mean it' voice in the hope that she might actually pay attention to me, instead of assuming that everything is a game.
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