“When my husband first came home he went for more than a month without being able to have anything more than a wipe down spit bath kinda thing,” one woman tells me. Finally though, they found a shower bench that worked for them.
Showers are necessary, but let’s face it, they can be frightening when you’re learning how to move in a body that has new limitations. This caregiver and her husband experienced a scary fall with a standard shower chair when he was discharged home from rehab after having a stroke. This is what caused them to put a pause on showers and instead do wipe downs in bed. But this shower chair worked for them. It’s called an “adjustable extended shower bench” or “sliding tub shower bench.” It has a back rest but it is also longer—a bench rather than the standard shower chair people usually get sent home with—which allowed him to sit on one end and then slide himself over. “It made me more confident in being able to help him,” his wife told me. “It was $80, but it was well spent.”