From Nate Gonzalez, USMC retired.... recipient 2008
PSA to my disabled community:
This year marks 20 years I've been in a wheelchair. When I first was injured I had agoraphobia. I stayed in my house for 5 long years never going out. Every time I went out it felt everyone was staring at me. The world wasn't made for a wheelchair.
It took many years to accept my new body and the chair I sit on. These days I get even more stares from riding around in my iBot. I want able bodied people who stare and point to know I just want to be normal, just like them. Blend in a crowd. Be inconspicuous.
Then I realized what I was doing, I'm one of a very select few iBot owners with this amazing chair. The only way I can normalize disability onto mainstream consciousness is to go out and live my life without fear of attention and show the world, hey look how far we've come in technology for people with spinal cord injuries.
Thank you
You've given me back something I never thought I would have again. My legs. Going to take this chair everywhere I go and show it off. Someone out there who's paraplegic needs to see this.