Thursday 22nd August - My Oxygenated Life

Random observations about the stairlift 

The stairlift takes 50 seconds to go up or down. This can seem like an eternity! However it means I have tine to dust all the annoying panels on the stairs with my big toe as I travel. It made my socks rather dirty at first, but now the panels are so clean it hardly needs doing. I'm experimenting with brushing down the stairs (they are wooden ones) with a brush now as I slowly glide along.

BB can't get past the stairlift easily when it is in its 'ready for use' position at the top of the stairs. 

Both of the above need to be factored in when we both decide we should go to the loo before going out. It's also a consideration for deciding 'who go up first' at bedtime!

As far as I am concerned there's no such thing as a 'quick dash to the loo'. It actually takes a bit of planning as I need to take supplementary oxygen with me; either cuddling a cylinder, or, my preference, taking the Inogen portable concentrator. 

We send the lift to the bottom of the stairs every night, to make it easier for BB to go down in the morning as he is always first up. (I'm lucky enough to have breakfast in bed; a cup of coffee and a piece of toast!)

I usually bring it back up and ride the lift down in the morning, but more and more I'm tending to walk down using the Inogen, which means I appear in the sitting room without alerting BB with the gentle whine of the stairlift. He calls this 'stealth mode'!