Navigating Stairs

Our house was, I think, originally a single-family house, built in 1910, and split into three apartments in the 1940s. I am guessing that the owner lived upstairs because that was the larger and much nicer apartment, so when we got rid of the extra kitchens and one of the bathrooms, we kept the ones upstairs, so our kitchen and bedroom are upstairs, with a smaller bedroom downstairs, and we turned another into a walk-in closet and took a wall down between two others to form a large library.

I give you all of this as a way of illustrating why we tend to go up and down the stairs often throughout the day. Until the past couple of years, I would run up and down the stairs more often than I would walk. But after a few falls (not all the way down the 15 stairs) and some stumbles, I am more careful going down the stairs now, but it's less painful running (not fast) rather than walking upstairs, since my knees hurt more when I ascend the stairs slowly.

I used to credit our staircase for my relatively good physical condition, because I make about 20 trips up and down daily. With the onset of joint pain and issues with gout in my foot, I'm forced to hold on to the banister and slowly navigate the stairs. I still make lots of trips up and down, but I'm moving much slower and not getting the vascular benefit from it.

I'm certain we will eventually have a stair climber thing installed because we have no plan to move from this house. As I have said before, all our bedrooms and 2 full baths are upstairs, so we will still need to navigate the stairs unless we have a major remodel of the house. The stair climber thing will be the much cheaper and easier option if we get to the point where we can't navigate the stairs on our own.

We never had a house with stairs. No stairs, gas in the kitchen, fireplace and a porch big enough to two step on.

Have any of you ever misjudged where the last step was, either because you were descending a stairway in the dark or carrying something? It's quite a shock.

Like @Beth Gallagher I attribute the fact that I am relatively mobile to the stairs I have to climb several times a day. I do always use a rail though, as I am afraid of falling, especially on the way down. When my back was broken, we found that we could easily live just on the first (ground) floor, so that could have been a drill for the years to come if we remain here. My brother-in-law and his wife built a new house so they could remain on one floor, and a well-to-do friend did the same thing recently and construction is still ongoing. That guy already has three houses: one lake house near us, one in Hawaii on Maui that is on one level, and a two-story place in downtown Anchorage where he used to conduct business and which he seldom uses any more. He says he now wishes he had just added an elevator to his current lake house as it would have been cheaper than building an entire new house just a few hundred feet from his old house. His current lake house is becoming his daughters "escape" for when she and her family of 3 children and hubby come out to play from Anchorage.

Ken Anderson said:

Have any of you ever misjudged where the last step was, either because you were descending a stairway in the dark or carrying something? It's quite a shock.

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Yes. It was several years ago and I was headed downstairs with a full cup of coffee. I remember "pawing" at the air with my foot and then tumbling into a puddle of coffee on the floor. It is a weird feeling... "spatial confusion." Thank goodness it was the next-to-the-bottom step so I didn't have far to go.

Our house is small and has a attic and concerted room wit5h 2 queen size beds, the stairs we have save room in living room, spiral staircase, only 10 steps.

We could live downstairs if we had to, converting one of the "formal" rooms into a bedroom if necessary. Unfortunately we only have a half-bath downstairs so bathing will still be an issue. I suppose we could have a bath remodel but that's still a lot more money than the stair climber.

Beth Gallagher said:

We could live downstairs if we had to, converting one of the "formal" rooms into a bedroom if necessary. Unfortunately we only have a half-bath downstairs so bathing will still be an issue. I suppose we could have a bath remodel but that's still a lot more money than the stair climber.

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Same here. We have a small bedroom downstairs, which I've converted into an office with a futon. But we have only a half-bath downstairs, so we would either have to expand the bathroom or keep going upstairs to bathe.