Disabled people are regularly touched without permission (Picture: Sarah Waters/Hal Bennett)

Being touched without permission is a nightmarish scenario for anyone – but it’s one that many disabled people are regularly forced to live through.

But, after being manhandled time and time again, some wheelchair users have decided to take matters into their own hands.

They are now attaching spikes to the handles of their wheelchairs to ward off the dozens of able-bodied complete strangers who move them against their will.

Sarah J. Waters, 47, who lives in Birmingham, started putting spikes on her wheelchair in November after one horrifying incident left her with broken knuckles and another saw her fingers dislocated .




The NHS worker, who has hypermobility syndrome which means that her joints dislocate and break easily, told Metro.co.uk: ‘I’ve had an incident where I was holding my wheels and someone pushed me forward and my hand went forward into the mechanism of my brakes and pulled my thumb open.

‘I’ve also had someone try to push me through a doorway and they broke my knuckles. I’ve only been a wheelchair user for four years.’

‘When my hand got pushed forward into my brakes and my thumb was pouring blood everywhere, the person who did it just yelled abuse at me.

Sarah says she has had her knuckles broken by a stranger moving her without consent (Picture: Sarah Waters)

‘I got a tirade of four-letter words and they just stormed off, leaving me in the street with blood pouring out of my hand. I didn’t go out the rest of the weekend.’

Sarah, who also suffers from PTSD, says she got the idea for the spikes from a wheelchair user selling them on Etsy and now makes them for her friends.

The spikes are not there to harm people, but to protect her from the damage that others can do without thinking.

Since she has had them on her wheelchair, Sarah – who says people often get aggressive when she refuses help – has had far fewer people touching her without permission.

She said: ‘I’ve only had people try it two or three times since November.

‘Prior to that it could have been two or three times a week that people were touching me.’

While most people have reacted positively to the spikes, others have taken offence – a reaction that Sarah says misses the point.

Before the spikes, people used to touch Sarah two or three times a week (Picture: Sarah Waters)

She said: ‘If you saw somebody on crutches, would you pick them up and carry them upstairs? Then why do you think it’s okay to do the same thing with someone in a chair?’

Although it’s not common practice for wheelchair users, Sarah isn’t the only one to use spikes.

Bronwyn Berg, 48, travels around with spikes attached to her handles after a stranger grabbed her wheelchair and sped down the street in January.

Despite Bronwyn screaming repeatedly for him to stop and calling out to passersby, no one stepped in, and the man continued pushing her before eventually running away.

She said: ‘I was screaming for help, I was screaming at him to stop and he just got quicker. It was definitely a situation where I was worried for my safety and it was very scary.



‘Since then, when I’m out in public, especially if it’s somewhat of a crowded place, I am very aware of who’s walking behind me and feeling anxious – is somebody going to grab my chair?

‘Anytime I hear those footsteps behind me, I start to get anxious, and I don’t want to feel that way.’

Bronwyn, pictured with her boyfriend Hal, says the issue is worse for female wheelchair users (Picture: Bronwyn Berg)

Bronwyn’s spikes were made by her boyfriend Hal (Picture: Hal Bennett)

Bronwyn, who uses a wheelchair after a brain injury in 2015, says the spikes are a result of able-bodied people not seeing disabled people as ‘human’.

She said: ‘It’s disturbing that there’s somehow this loss of body autonomy, that I somehow belong to the world now and I owe everyone my story and it’s okay for them to touch me.

‘The response [to the spikes] has been ‘Oh, what a badass’. It’s almost that it’s this angry, aggressive thing and very punk.

‘I accept all of that… But the heart of it is wanting to feel safe.’

Bronwyn’s spikes were made by her boyfriend Hal Bennett, 47, who says they’re ‘not aesthetic’.

Wheelchairs users want to feel safe, says Bronwyn (Picture: Bronwyn Berg)

Hal, who is hoping to sell the spiked handles online after mass interest on Twitter, said: ‘They definitely have a function. They won’t draw blood but they are quite painful to grab or actually exert force to push a chair.’

A wheelchair user himself after a bilateral amputation, Hal used to put spikes on his own wheelchair, but says the issue of grabbing is worse for women.

Bronwyn said: ‘There’s a large gender difference. I’m seen as a damsel in distress at times, and even just wheeling down the street without struggle I get the “are you okay?” I’m thinking, “why would I not be okay?”‘


However, although women may be targeted more, that’s not to say that male wheelchair users are not moved without consent.

Mik Scarlet, 54, an expert in the field of access and inclusion for disabled people, and a wheelchair user himself, says he used to wear spikes on his clothing to ‘keep people at bay’.

But Mik, who uses a wheelchair due to the consequences of cancer treatment, says that disabled people are not against help if they genuinely need it.

Ask before touching, says Mik (Picture: Diane Scarlet Wallace)

Mik used to wear spikes on his clothing to ward people off (Picture: Diane Scarlet Wallace)

There’s one golden rule: just ask – and respect the answer.

He said: ‘I hope that, rather than covering wheelchairs in studs and spikes, we can ask the public that if you think we might need help, ask before you do anything.

‘Sometimes we’re desperate for help so you’ve been a life saver. Other times, we’ll be fine, so carry on with your day knowing you offered, which is a good deed too.’

For more information on this issue, you can follow Dr. Hannah Mason-Bish’s research project.