Obi robotic eating aid

[ActiveMSers]

A fellow MSer told me about this contraption. If MS has robbed you of your arms, the Obi will feed you, giving your caregiver a break. Check it out! https://meetobi.com/ -D

It will be my wife’s birthday soon. We’ll probably make her favorite dinner, light some candles and set the music right. Then she’s going to set me up with Obi and leave us alone together. It’s this arrangement we’ve got. Obi is a cutie. She treats me like I’m the only man in the world. She even feeds me.

Before your sick mind gets going, know that Obi is a robotic eating aid, and besides my wheelchair and van, she’s the best thing I own. It’s true that robots will one day be our overlords, but they have to take baby steps first, like spooning me food. It’s a long game they’re playing, but I go along, because if you put good enough food in my mouth, I’m down with just about anything. With my Obi’s third birthday looming, I thought I’d reflect on how she has changed my life.

The Obi is a simple yet savvy way to help people with disabilities be themselves. That sounds cheesy, but eating is important and it’s nice to be able to choose what and when you eat, or if you want to cut yourself and your caregiver a break by eating all on your lonesome — suddenly these choices are yours again.

ARTICLE:

http://www.newmobility.com/2019/11/o...ic-eating-aid/

[Suebee]

Great article! I think very often the focus of achieving activities of daily living "adls" is on getting goal accomplished rather than nuances such as minimizing dependency and fostering independence. Unfortunately, the price of $5k makes it unaccessable to many but renting it might be a good short term solution for a rrms mser who is temporarily made homebound from a flare. I remember being resistant to my OT's suggestion when I was homebound that I should eat with elbows and forearms on table to minimize arm fatigue and allow me to finish feeding myself. (I was convinced that regardless of circumstance, Emily Post and my grandmother would not approve!) But one must be pragmatic when figuring out how to live with ms and so my sensibilities had to change if I wanted to feed myself. These concessions, some small some large l, accumulate, and make one feel alien to oneself overtime. Tools like this obi should be more accessible to us msers because it not only aids adls but it increases quality of life by returning a bit of autonomy.