To ask you what you TRUTHFULLY think when you see a 'young' and 'healthy looking' person on a mobility scooter?

[fassbender]

I have multiple sclerosis and am 36 years old. Over the past year my walking has got worse (I use crutches) and I am now thinking that I need a mobility scooter. It sounds silly, but I am so nervous! I know that I should have a 'screw what everyone else thinks' attitude, but I think that I am going to feel self conscious. I live in a small town and have been well until recently so I know that I might get lots of questions/pitying looks. I also wonder what people will think if they see me at the park, for example, and then I get out of the scooter to play with the kids, then get back in to go home.

I think we all know that the category of people i am talking about very much DO exist. It's a shame that other people who have ballooned due to illness and lack of mobility may be judged as just being fat and lazy and that would be wrong of course, but I am not talking about people who have become very fat because they are disabled, I am talking about people who disabled by their extreme, off the scale obesity. I think most of us can tell the difference - I know I generally can. I am not sure that MS or arthritis ever made someone of previously normal/average weight so morbidly obese that their stomach reached below their knees, did it? Drugs and enforced inactivity will make you much fatter, I understand that, but i doubt they ever turned an average 11 stone woman into a 30 stone woman all by themselves.

Also, years ago, before the obesity epidemic it was pretty rare to see someone very morbidly obese, regardless of the reasons. Unless there has been a sudden unexplained increase in the number of chronically ill people with conditions that affect their mobility (and I see no obvious reason why there should have been) then I think we have to be honest with ourselves and face up to the fact that obesity in itself has caused a new wave of disability.

And it does not make me someone lacking in compassion or empathy to say that out loud.

You know the fat people i know have never said ooo im going to get myself 1 of those scooters so i can whizz to greggs for a pie

Well, Straight, I'm on the way to 30st - OK, a loooooooong way to yet, but my foot is on that road. When I get there, how will you tell I'm not just a fat lazy bastard?

And how can you tell?

Because my disability is mostly invisible, and my fatness is very visible these days. Sometimes I eat cake, or get a takeaway because I can't stand to cook. Nice food is one of those rare pleasures, when I can eat without being sick, because being in pain 24/7 is fecking depressing.

To maintain my weight right now, I'm looking at a maximum of 1500 calories, probably less than that as I am more often than not confined to bed or in a chair.

I've lost eleven pounds recently. Took me eight weeks of not allowing myself very much naughty food, although the healthy stuff was nice, it was a bit limiting when it comes to days where I can't make the food to eat it. I'm still overweight and trying to lose, as I need some operations to improve the quality of my life and not be quite so incontinent.

You know when life is pretty much pain and denial of pleasures because you either can't do it or need to lose weight it really sucks balls! I reserve the right to eat some crap occasionally while cruising (read crashing, poor thing is a kerb magnet) on my scooter.

And you probably see us a lot more because we can actually get around these days, scooters (and wheelchairs) and public places are a lot more accessible.

katie gostraight save your pity and faux sympathy disabled and ill people have spent decades fighting against patronising condescending people like you thinner disabled people are acceptable medicated obese people are acceptable but those lazy fat gits are not because lazy fat gits come with signs so you know who they are eh

I am not sneering at anyone Mrs why does every mention of obesity have to come with an assumption of sneering? Extreme obesity is a growing problem (if you'll pardon the pun) and it's and affecting many people's health, mobility and ability to work - we all know that. To mention it or acknowledge it is not necessarily to sneer, it's just ridiculous to say that. I have not laid any blame at the feet of any individual or made any negative comments about obese people at all, I have merely stated the irrefutable fact that are a category of morbidly obese people who cannot walk far because of their weight (as opposed to other underlying disabilities that pre-dated their obesity)and some of them use a scooter. Every HCP knows this, but I am not allowed to say it or I'm sneering?

Okay so I admit it is not always possible to tell whether the chicken came first or the egg, but I still stand by what I said - plenty of people use scooters as a result of their obesity first and foremost.

The question was what do you TRUTHFULLY think when you see a 'young' and 'healthy looking' person on a mobility scooter? and my response was
I can't say I've ever noticed a young and healthy looking person on a mobility scooter, they mostly seem to be old people or people who are just too fat to walk far.

Therefore the people who look not just fat, but too fat to walk far for whatever reason are not, to my mind, very healthy looking people, and they are usually not all that young either. I just don't see many people on scooters who look 'young and healthy.' I do see lots of people in wheelchairs who look young and otherwise healthy though.

I cant really be arsed with this, but do you really think anyone who balloons to 30-odd stone did it on purpose just for the shits and giggles?
And the fun of riding on a mobility scooter, of course.

If I see an obese person on a mobility scooter I assume they're obese because they can't exercise... seeing as they can't even walk unaided.

Ffs you have to be really thick not to see the correlation.

"what do you TRUTHFULLY think when you see a 'young' and 'healthy looking' person on a mobility scooter? "
That you probably have MS, like me.

Forget what other people think, even the judgypants ones and remember the important thing is that you can get out and enjoy life with your kids as much as possible.

I have what currently appears to be a young and healthy daughter, 6 months ago you would have probably described her as underweight though it is just her build you wouldn't these days due to the medication she is on and the fact that she can not do anything more energetic than climb 1 flight of stairs. I hope you never get put in the position of watching someone you love change so much so quickly due to health issues.

Op knowing people can be wheelchair bound for a number of reasons I wouldn't think anything at all so if a mobility scooter would make your life better use it.

First part was to GoStraightGoStraight

Where did I say that or even hint at it Beyond? How has this become about attacking me for being a fat hater with no compassion or empathy? I answered one fucking question with an honest answer - lots of people on scooters would appear to be too fat to walk very far, and therefore, whatever other hidden disabilities they may or may not have going on, whether they are as a result of obesity or the other way around, they don't give the appearance of looking very healthy.

I hope you never get put in the position of watching someone you love change so much so quickly due to health issues. I already said upthread that I have, due to heavy steroid medication. It didn't triple their body weight though, or even double it, in spite of them eating and drinking more than they should because of the misery of being immobile and in pain. But that was just my experience - I am not calling anyone with a different experience a liar.

You said old and to fat to walk that is sneering and assuming and saying they are not worthy of your sympathy

Or not and

Do you think the obese are undeserving then? Because you said that - I didn't. Anyway, whatevs and all that - negotiating Mumsnet is like picking your way through a room full of eggshells in Doc Marten boots sometimes.

I wouldnt even compute it and would think nothing of it.

Ok, well I once saw a healthy looking young woman on a mobility scooter with a young child on it with her, I thought how great it was that she was still able to take her kid to the park, but also how difficult it must be having mobility problems with a toddler.

My immediate thought was MS, but I also wondered if she had long term problems with SPD from pregnancy. I was on crutches with it at the time and thought it might be my future.

As to the turn the thread has taken as regards obesity and mobility scooters, I suppose I've always assumed that the mobility problems came first from my experience, weight just piles on when you can't move, great if some people manage not to gain so much weight, but so many others struggle.

Having suffered short-term mobility problems due to pregnancy, I am hyper-aware that you just don't know what is going on with someone. I could put my crutches down and play with dc, but walking was lots more painful without so I would pick them up again to leave I got some strange looks, but I chose early on to not live by the opinions of the ignorant, and suggest you don't either OP. Do what will make your life easier