You CAN travel with chronic pain, an embarrassing bathroom-related disorder, or strange dietary restrictions. In fact, getting away for a vacation can actually help alleviate chronic pain symptoms.
In Travels With Pain I provide practical advice and insights about just that–travel, vacation, adventure, and relaxation for people living with chronic pain and other hidden disabilities.
Much of my advice comes from personal experience. I am a professional travel and food writer. I am also a partially disabled chronic pain patient–see About Me for a catalog of my woes. And almost without fail, I find that my symptoms diminish when I’m out on the road. No, the pain doesn’t vanish, and I have to manage my health and my body carefully when I’m away from home. Mishaps sometimes occur.
But a change of scenery and a new adventure (or a chaise lounge on the beach with my own private cabana boy) always perks me up–I get excited and distracted and don’t think so much about my problems.
I hope this tactic works for you too. Try it! It’s fun.
I would love to follow this travel blog and your other blogs; however, I do not use facebook. Is it possible for me to follow you via email?
Thank you,
Ann
Thanks so much for reading! I’ve been so pleased and flattered by the response I’ve gotten to this blog.
I’ve added a Subscribe by Email link to the right-hand column here, and will add one at eatswritesandleaves.com as well. That should shoot my blogs right to your email account.
Please let me know if you have any problems with the emails, and I’ll work at fixing it.
Hi,
years ago but post accident I could still walk at a leisurely pace for short distances on flat ground… so I toughed it out… and took lots of drugs.
NOW I just get a chair and all the advantages that come with it.
I also check my Brompton folding bicycle as my “handicapped mobility aid” and it helps me get around at my destination much better than a wheelchair.
I bought it in Amsterdam at Tromm’s Tweewielers ( http://www.tromm.nl/ ) the page is in nederlands but they speak perfect english… it’s a full service bike shop that specializes in folding bikes….
By now my Brompton has been to California twice, Jamaica four times, All Over Europe several times, plus “local” trips like New Orleans or St. Louis plus serving me for years at work 5 days a week…
now sometimes it takes some social engineering to get the less open minded to accept it… usually just showing them the steel leg brace on my leg… and in the US reminding them that they have to comply with the Americans With Disabilities Act.
At the Louvre in Paris I checked it at the coat check and got a wheelchair…. same as the D-Day museum in New Orleans or the Rijksmusuem in Amsterdam.
The Comic Art museum in SF just let me in with it.
Eat New Orleans (good food btw) just let me fold it and put it under the table (standard procedure for me).
At the Clignancourt markets in Paris some were OK, some took some sweet talk… “I’m just a crippled old man, it’s like a wheelchair, and you’d let a wheelchair in right?” (wheelchair in french is a “chaise rollant”)
For Amsterdam or Paris contact me via http://www.hackamoretravel.com and I’ll help with “handicapped friendly” hotels. With a little advance planning you don’t have to stay in a modern cookie cutter hotel just because you can’t climb a long flight of stairs… though if you wait sometimes you have to… but even then some are better than others.
I love the photos of these! I think I’ve seen them a couple of times while traveling in Europe, but not so much here in the States. A pity–they look like the perfect solution to getting around while on travel.
Question for you: how much do you need to bend at the waist to ride your Brompton? And what’s it like to carry around folded, weight-wise? How does it make getting around easier for you than walking does, specifically? (Okay, I think I’m asking for a guest post, or a post on Hackamore Travel that I can link to.)
My particular condition makes bicycling on a traditional model ill-advised for any length of time. Recumbant bikes are much better for me–in fact I’ve got a recumant stationary bike at home as recommended by my physical therapist. And sometimes I can’t carry more than about 5kg.
So I’m not sure that this mode of transport would work for me personally. But I’d love to give my readers information about it as an option, preferrably from a “power user” like you.
So glad I’ve found this blog. I have my first trip to Asia booked for next year and am grateful for any advice I can find
I am fortunate enough to have been able bodied but now I’m disabled. Almost six years ago I had surgery at age39 to stop bleeding in my brainstem.this surgery left me with facial paralysis and balance problems. I’m unable to work or drive. I used to be an active RN. I have taken care of the disabled but I never once put myself in their shoes. My daughter read this article which had me fire up so I decided to respond.
I have found that people are mostly good and will offer their seat or open doors.
However there is a dark side to humanity so I feel the need to speak out. People will take advantage of the system if they can. Her are a few of my experiences as a disabled person. At my daughters college graduation they had a handicapped section I was very appreciative of this. When the graduates first entered all the able bodied people stood up in front of us some where asking photos I couldn’t see my daughter enter and this made me furioso suppose if I was able bodied I would have done the same thing not thinking of the disabled people behind me. I have been to the airport several times where I have been put on the airplane first and put in font of the line. I will never forget the traumatic event of being put on the airplane last. I felt rushed and humiliated at all the stares. My seat was at the back of the plane this just felt wrong.
Another thing that I experience is there are times I am unable to find handicapped parking. I know we are minority which leads me to believe people are cheating the system. I usually always see an able bodied person using the parking I am aware people have hidden disabilities but when their is no handicapped parking at the mall I suspect people are cheating.
One other area where I find problems is once I get into a store there are no scooters available so I have to walk behind a cart. This is no easy task. I usually see the scooters are taken by very large people. I realize that some of these people are disabled but every time I go to the store. It leads me to believe there is cheating going on. I decided to get my own scooter but my insurance company would only cover a very heavy one that’s a whole other issue.
Well I think these perks are here for a good reason. If I can get one person to stop cheating that old be an accomplishment.
Allison
Allison,
Thank you for sharing your experience and your perspective here. I am sorry that you’ve been through so much and seen so much likely cheating in a system that’s supposed to help you/us.
I do think that Scott Rains is right, though…as the Baby Boomer generation ages, we’re going to see the accessibility systems fill up fast, not with cheaters but with more legitimate users than the bare-bones-minimum systems can handle. I can only hope that what we’re seeing now will help sound a wake-up alarm that what’s needed is less “cheater awareness” and more universal design.
Thanks I agree.