Adventures Beyond the Home with Stretch
Access for All
Sharon and my life together have been one exceptional, yet ordinary (to us), adventure after another. We came from two different life experiences and perspectives, yet our highly unlikely meeting enabled us to be our most vulnerable, present and authentic selves, sharing hidden truths, some even from ourselves.
I was born and raised in a suburban, smog filled basin outside of LA, California. I longed to leave this place and live somewhere with blue sky, seasonal weather changes, and close to forests and waterways. Sharon grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She was a city kid with adult responsibilities at an early age. Family responsibilities didn’t include playing in the great outdoors. When we met, in Portland, Oregon, I had been living with the diagnosis of MS for 5 years.
I never lost my spirit of adventure, but I needed to become more creative in how I pursued my adventurous ways after my diagnosis and rapid progression (three years) from cane, to walker, to power chair. I worked for a nonprofit agency as an Accessibility Specialist. On the weekends, I looked for new ways to explore nature. I discovered there was very little information that would help me know if I could navigate backcountry trails in the beautiful Columbia River Gorge not far from my home.
I asked federal, state and city park agency representatives to a meeting to discuss how to bring better information to websites. From this meeting in January 2009, Access Recreation (AR) was born. We developed what became a groundbreaking approach to inclusive website information on parks and trails called, ‘The Guidelines for Providing Trail Information to People with Disabilities’. Based on the Guidelines, we created AccessTrails, profiling 36 parks and trails across the Portland-Vancouver region.
Today, I am co-owner with Sharon, of Access for All, LLC (A4A). Our company is composed of AR members and new A4A members with and without disabilities. We offer training and consultation services for trail information agencies and organizations. We also provide accessibility consultations for a variety of small and large organizations around the world. Due to my travel limitations and challenges sitting at conferences and Summits I’m asked to facilitate, I attend these events virtually…unable to really interact with attendees and participate in breakout sessions.
Discovering Stretch and New Possibilities
I was Googling something unrelated to robot technology, and saw a random ad. I clicked on it. A man was walking down a hallway having a conversation with someone on a tablet attached to a robot. Hmm, I thought this robot could come in handy for an upcoming Summit training I was hired to provide in about a week or two. I had to attend this in-person event virtually due to my quadriplegia.
I contacted the robot’s ad address explaining my situation. I received a quick reply from V Nguyen, an occupational therapist at Hello Robot who was also in Portland, where I live and where the Summit was being held. V said she had Stretch, the robot, at her house and was available the date of the Summit to bring Stretch, so I could be there in-person via a robot. The Summit was fantastic! Thanks to V and Stretch, Sharon and I were able to more fully participate in breakout sessions and mingle with attendees at the after gathering.
V brought Stretch to my home soon after to assist with any activities of daily living. My number one issue is getting outside on my own. I asked V if Stretch could help me with that. “I haven’t been able to independently go outside in at least 10 years.” After a quick tutorial on how to operate Stretch with the eye tracking system on the PC tablet attached to my chair, it worked! The result was exhilarating! I was filled with joy at the opportunity to go outside and enjoy the natural environment in my own backyard! This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship!
Empowering Both the User and the Care Partner
Through having Stretch assist those to live more independently, care partners are free to do other things with their time. For example, my care partner can be out shopping longer knowing that Stretch can give me the pill I need every 3 hours. I can navigate Stretch to get me a snack I have on the counter. Frequently, I need assistance for inconsequential things like rubbing the top of my head when it itches. Stretch can do this by grabbing a small cloth and rubbing the top of my head or cheek when need be.
Because my care partner, Sharon, is also my wife, I can bring her sweet things to brighten her day, like a poem I wrote that Stretch could take out of the printer and hand to her.
It will expand the worlds of people with advanced mobility (and other) disabilities, to overcome obstacles for full independent movement. It did this for me. My dreams for what I can and want to do in life have increased exponentially.
Visiting the California Academy of Sciences: Expanding the Dream
Another way my dreams expanded was when V asked if I would be interested in going to the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco. “Oh, yeah!” The time spent with Stretch at the Academy goes down as one of the most memorable adventures I’ve ever had (and that’s saying a lot)!
Stretch attracted curious visitors at the Cal Academy to speak to us. This was one of many fun activities for us. Their excitement as well as ours was pure delight. One of the University students in the hospitality realm said meeting us on Stretch was the highlight of her visit to the Cal Academy! An amazing statement since from all I saw, the Academy was extraordinary on so many levels. Sharon even had a chance to play “rock, paper, scissors” with a scuba diver in the coral reef. Our paper lost to his scissors. He expressed his delight by flipping upside down. SHOW OFF!
It tripled the fun to have my two sisters, Donna and Jeanne, along on this grand adventure with Sharon and me! Being able to walk and talk to each other while in the living ocean with its sea animals like the jellyfish and colorful fish within the coral reef was extraordinary.
Once, when I was following Vinitha and V’s instructions on where and when to go, there was a moment that truly took my breath away. I was told to do a 180° turn. When I did, Sharon and I were stunned by our surroundings. I felt we were inside the coral reef itself. Everywhere we looked were colorful fish and coral.
Co-Designing Stretch with V and Vinitha at Hello Robot Inc.
Working with V and Vinitha to co-design the robot to accommodate my eye tracking technology and become intuitive to use by changing the icons to be more recognizable for the function they served made it easier to navigate Stretch. It made for a simple, stress-free, and thoroughly enjoyable trip to the Cal Academy. V had reassured me that this would be the case. True to her words, V and Vinitha’s calm control and reassuring demeanor made the entire experience fun to be a part of.
Co-designing Stretch’s capabilities with V and Vinithia created more opportunities to learn, play and grow together, while making Stretch smarter. That it’s bound to assist others on their path to independence was worth the sharp learning curve it took to get here. I have had many opportunities to work with companies / agencies to make major changes to their standard policies and to the traditional ways they operate. NONE have engaged with as much respect and true desire to listen, understand and apply my unique methods of eye tracking and abilities as V and Vinithia with Hello Robot have. Their inclusive approach, co-developing Stretch as Sharon and I made suggestions, made for a pleasurable and quickly productive way to operate and accomplish great results.
Jubilantly,
Georgena