The Chair Has Arrived

I am starting to feel like a television shopping channel. I keep trying out and reviewing new products that have a real impact on my life. It seems that every week there is a new episode featuring a different disability aid as my rapid sweep through product lines continues with PSP. What most people buy over years, I buy and use in weeks or sometimes days.

The range so far has included walking canes, walkers, electric wheelchairs, shower chairs, thickeners, prism glasses and choking first aid devices. The list keeps growing and next week a new bed arrives, but today the chair is the star.

I have bought many chairs in my lifetime and used far more, but I have never bought a chair as a standalone product. It was always part of a set with something else, a table and chairs or an office chair with a desk. I have never seriously thought about chairs. This week however, I bought a chair and what a chair it is.

I sit a lot and will need to sit even more because walking is hard, because after eating I must sit to avoid reflux and because I am home almost all the time. I needed something really comfortable that reclines and more importantly rises forward to help me get up and move to the walker or wheelchair. It had to support my back and neck and still feel comfortable. At six foot five that is not simple.

I like to think I am a logical and rational shopper who doesn’t get talked into buying a product he doesn’t need but I, like so many others, ended up on a call with a salesman after seeing a chair that seemed far too expensive but perfect for my needs. He convinced me not to think of it as a cost but as an asset, something I would use for many years. As it is considered a medical chair he also talked up the health benefits, even adding a blessing in Hebrew. It was an investment. I was pretty much sold.

If that was not a final decision, it was to come a minute after, following his description of the special features, which I call boy toys. A heater and massage function, zero gravity mode, a ten-setting remote that moves the chair in every direction, a charging pad for my phone, Type-C and USB ports and a cup holder that keeps drinks hot or cold. At that point the credit card was handed over and the rationalization began.

It is because of PSP. I deserve it because I have worked hard. The most amusing reason was that it costs a fraction of a full-time carer and is a one-off cost and this might help me avoid needing one for longer. Basically I am generating a technical profit.

All humor aside, though, this chair is genuinely important and much needed. It’s not just a luxury – it’s a daily ally in a body that’s betraying me faster than I can keep up. These posts capture the rapidity of the decline with PSP, how one week I’m testing canes and the next I’m upgrading to power chairs. But alongside that, there’s the effort to match its relentlessness: piling on devices like this one to reclaim some control, while stepping up exercise routines – gentle stretches, physio sessions – to try to hold onto what strength I’ve got left. It’s a quiet war, one adjustment at a time.

The chair arrived and it is great. I am writing this sitting in it. I spent a large part of my 28-year career on planes and thankfully almost all the long-haul flights were in business class – after all, a 12-hour flight each way is a long distance for a one-hour meeting – and I have sampled more than enough high-quality flatbed seats. I have the eye masks and my kids have the free socks to prove it. Now I have one of those seats in my house, which is just as well because I cannot travel abroad anymore. My only question is why the chair does not come with a hot towel and a complimentary packet of nuts. Surely they could have managed that, although maybe they were worried about my choking?

Finally as a reminder I published a Booklet today – a compilation of a few relevant blog posts – as a Patient’s View for Caregivers – please go to https://benlazpsp.com/2025/11/26/caregivers-booklet/