It had been a while since I’d tackled a new sport, so I was psyched to go indoor rock climbing with PCAS a few weeks ago. When I arrived and the front desk guy mentioned “the blind group” that was coming that night, I was a little concerned at potentially being the only one with a physical disability. But it’s not like that’s ever stopped me before.

The rest of the group came, and indeed, I was the only physically disabled one- the rest were able-bodied volunteers and visually impaired people I know well from other PCAS activities. It’s interesting to consider the different challenges that we face while climbing- I can see the handholds, but have a hard time making my hands and (especially) feet get to those spots. My blind friends have average (well, actually, above-average, since they are very fit) balance, coordination and strength, but can’t see where to grab on to lift themselves up the wall. As you can see, it’s not a matter of who has it easier- we each have different challenges.

My biggest challenge to rock climbing was my lack of proprioception in my lower extremities. Proprioception is the sense of position of parts of your body in space. To use a basic example, if I’m sitting at a table (so that I can’t see my legs), I often can’t tell if they’re crossed or not. My neurologist tests this by moving my big toe up and down- I have to close my eyes and say which way he’s moving it. I usually can’t tell. This became an issue in rock climbing when I couldn’t tell if my foot was on a foothold or not. Or, for instance, if someone below would shout up, “there’s a foothold six inches to the right of your right foot”, I wouldn’t be able to get my foot there without looking, and even then it would be tricky.

To adapt for this, it helped to have someone climb up next to me and guide my feet into place. You can see Reid doing this:

Another thing that helped me immensely were ascenders- basically extra handholds attached to ropes, which were much easier for me to grab than little, slippy handholds. Apparently paraplegic climbers have used these to climb great distances. All I can say to that is, man am I glad I have my legs to help.

I also learned how to belay (that is, being the person on the ground attached by a rope to the person climbing, as a safety measure). I thought it was awesome that we had blind people on belay for other blind people, or for sighted people, and me in the mix too. It was just another example of how disability really doesn’t have to be disabling at all.