Tuesday, March 17th, I had a walking session with the Atalante X exoskeleton – my favorite exoskeleton in the world. I want to tell you why these sessions mean so much to me, because I think it goes deeper than most people expect.
More than movement
People often assume I love these sessions for the exercise. And yes, I love the feeling of being upright, of my body moving through space the way it was designed to move. There is something profound and irreplaceable about standing at full height, feeling the floor beneath my feet, watching the world from a perspective I do not always get to inhabit.
But what I treasure most is something deeper than that.
The Atalante X is a wearable robotic exoskeleton – a full-body device that supports and guides the legs and trunk, allowing people with spinal cord injuries and neurological conditions to walk. It is built with sophisticated sensors and actuators that adapt in real time to the user’s movement and effort. It does not simply move your body for you. It works with you, demanding active participation, requiring your nervous system to engage.
That distinction matters enormously to me.
The work my brain does
Every time I step into the Atalante X and begin to walk, I am not just exercising my muscles. I am doing something that science tells us is essential for people with neurological injuries: I am practicing. I am sending signals down motor pathways that have been quiet for a long time. I am giving my brain the hard, deliberate work of reaching toward muscles it has partially lost contact with – and asking them, again and again, to respond.
This is the principle of neuroplasticity. The brain retains the ability to reorganize itself, to form new neural connections, to rebuild pathways that have been damaged or disrupted. But neuroplasticity is not passive. It does not happen by waiting. It happens through repetition, through intention, through effort – through exactly the kind of sustained, demanding practice that a session in the Atalante X provides.
I think about this every time I walk. With every step, I am not just moving forward in space. I am sending a message. I am telling my nervous system: this is still possible. We are still practicing. We are not finished.
The difficulty is the point
Sessions in the Atalante X are demanding in a way that surprises me every time. My entire body is engaged – not just my legs, but my core, my trunk, my arms working to maintain balance and momentum. There are moments when the effort is immense, when I feel muscle groups working that I rarely feel in daily life, when my brain is straining to make connections that do not come easily.
But the difficulty is exactly the point.
I have learned to welcome that strain, to recognize it as evidence that something real is happening. When I finish a session and I feel that particular kind of exhaustion – the kind that comes from your brain working, not just your body – I am reminded why I never want to stop. I have never felt my brain working so completely, so intensely, as I do after a session in the Atalante X. It is firing, reaching, straining toward something. That feeling is the reason I keep coming back.
What it gives back
Rehabilitation from a brain injury is a long road. There are days when progress feels invisible, when the distance between where you are and where you want to be feels vast. I will not pretend otherwise.
But the Atalante X gives me something that carries me through those days. It gives me the certainty that I am doing the work. That I am not passive in this process, not a spectator in my own recovery. That every session, every step, every signal sent down a quiet pathway is an act of reclaiming something – of insisting on possibility, of choosing hope over resignation.
When I finish a session, I feel restored in a way that goes beyond the physical. I feel like myself: someone who works hard, who refuses to give up, who believes – because science supports believing – that what has been disrupted can still be rebuilt.
A thank you
I am deeply grateful for every opportunity I have to work with this technology. To the team behind the Atalante X, and to everyone who has made these sessions possible for me: thank you. These hours are among the most meaningful of my week. They are not just exercise. They are hope, made physical, made real, one step at a time.
Thank you.
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