You walk along the cold hard tiles of the mall environment, as the sterile lights and white noise of shopping sounds fill your senses with dread! Today is school shoe shopping day.

Being in a busy environment can be highly exhausting, but arriving at a destination to find that the environment has been changed to suit your needs is entirely unexpected! Suddenly the annoyance of the world and the dread of returning to school fade. You feel like you are in a welcoming environment, an environment that has thought about you and made a few adjustments to make sure you are comfortable – relaxed even!

Halfway through December, I participated in a shoe fitting exercise, as part of a new partnership between Autism Spectrum Australia (Aspect) and The Athlete’s Foot. Coming into their Marrickville store just after 6pm, I was introduced to the people working at The Athlete’s Foot before taking a quick look around the store. Now most people may not notice, but there were a number of minor details that made the initial experience more relaxing.

The use of minor lights and indirect lighting made me smile as I looked over their footwear. Socks, shoes and sandals gathered on the walls, in easy to find locations. After a quick peruse, I wanted to try the MyFit 3D Instore Fitting Experience. Stepping onto their reading board, I adjusted my feet so they sat inside the black dots. As we waited, Lachie (the Marrickville store manager) informed me how the device works, before asking me to step in front of the grey line. Taking a quick walk on their catwalk, I gave Lachie all the information he needed, without us talking about feet. We actually spoke more about Pokémon, than shoes!

After finishing our discussion on the new games, Lachie showed me on his iPad all the information he learnt from just one minute of standing and walking. I saw a complete scan of my foot, from the top and the bottom, heat maps showing me how I stepped off from each foot and he noticed that on my right step, I stepped from the inside. The only time when I started to lose focus was when Lachie went into super high detail about each shoe.

As someone who was running low on spoons (refer to Spoon Theory), I found myself losing track of the conversation. I was so exhausted from the day I had, so I asked Lachie about his rate of conversation and he both gave me a moment and made me feel really comfortable with bringing up more matters later on in our session. I was also able to use Lachie’s iPad to help me understand how the process works which was really helpful while being on low spoons.

Lachie then offered me three different shoes to try on. And with each new tread or step, I realised that I was welcome to be myself, that this lovely store allowed me to use putty or my headphones if there was too much sound going on.

We tend to forget the that it is the minor details that are all we need to make an environment more accessible and inclusive for others. Some of the environmental issues that others take for granted are really important to a person living with a disability.

I am glad I got to participate in this project, because I know shoe fitting can be difficult. But I hope that if you go shoe shopping with someone on the autism spectrum, next time you choose The Athlete’s Foot!

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