my new chair

I'm in love with my new chair.

I can't believe I spent so much money on a chair, but I'm so happy I did. And in the long run, it's actually a great value.

I've had a long series of office chairs that last a few years and are never quite right for me. I need to add a removable back support, or sit on a pillow, or use a foot rest, or something, and I'm never really comfortable.

Fibromyalgia makes my joints hyper-sensitive, and arthritis doesn't help, and the march of time just adds insult to injury. My old chair was so uncomfortable that it was exacerbating everything else.

I started looking for a better chair, but every place I looked had the same models. And they were mostly crap. For $250 or $300, you can buy the best chair at Staples, but it's not well made, and comes with only a one-year warranty. Which is why I've been buying a new chair every two or three years.

Driving around one day, we saw the ergoCentric retail store, and went in, just to look. The prices looked completely out of our range. It seemed ridiculous.

But the chairs are amazingly comfortable. They adjust for five different parameters, and are warrantied for a full ten years. These days, when things are purposely made to fall apart, that's pretty amazing. Their factory is right here in Mississauga! Not just Canadian-made, but locally made. They are also a very environmentally-conscious company, and although I wouldn't choose the chair for that reason, it doesn't hurt.

But the price seemed prohibitive, so we kept looking around. And all we saw was crap, crap and more crap.

We started thinking that if we spend $200-300 on a chair every two or three years, spending $800 on a chair that is supposed to last a lifetime isn't so crazy. It might actually be a bargain.

Allan also suggested that I think of this chair the way I think of my glasses or custom orthotics: something I need for my health. I spend an enormous amount of time in my chair. It's not just blogging and emailing (although that would be a lot); it's all my writing and any other work I do from home, like legal transcription.

The more we shopped around, the more convinced I became.

The only other option was an Obus Forme chair. $650 before tax, three to four weeks to order, three-year warranty, and it wasn't nearly as comfortable as the ergoCentric, for $150-200 more.

To seal the deal: an interest-free payment plan. Twenty-five percent down, the remainder spread over a year.

On Monday we ordered it, and on Wednesday we picked it up.

I love it.

This week I am transcribing, and I am utterly amazed at the difference in how I feel at the end of the day. At the end of a long day of transcribing, I'm used to being in pain, and barely mobile. Yesterday I felt completely fine.

ergoCentric advertises that they are the first chair recognized by the Canadian Physiotherapy Association, and now I know why. Wow!

Some good ergonomic info on their site here.