1/1/2025
So it feels weird, but normal at the same time writing 1/1/25. Wow. We are now closer to 2050 than we are to the year 2000. This must be what it felt like before the stock market crashed I bet? Either way, this is pretty interesting! I feel like I’m living in some sort of weird, dystopian future. The world is doing some really wild things while my accident happened, and as I recover from the SCI, the world seems to be in such turmoil as well. All for another time.
So my hips are getting really full! And I’m feeling my joints move more and more as I move in the chair and try to stand! I’m letting the brakes stay off while I reach for distant objects when I’m sitting in the chair! Celebrate small milestones! This is what I’m going to do on my journey to “do one new thing each day!” Place things just out of reach to help promote stretching and weight shifting! This should be fun, hopefully I don’t fall!
1/2
Okay! Back in the standing frame! This week flew by! I don’t even know what day it is!!! I just did some really interesting leg workouts! It’s been too long in the standing frame!
I drove the whole way! We made it back in a solid 7 hours, and only stopped twice! That was the first time we’ve ever done that! I’m really proud of myself for that!
What a heck of a week. I really do love my family. It’s always a great time getting to see everyone, and I think it’s just awesome how well we all get along! It’s so wild. We all are such different walks of life. From mothers and fathers, single ones to engaged folks. We all have different jobs, hobbies, and all like a little different food. Drive different cars, like different music. Sounds basic, but when you add it all up, sometimes these can make or break it for friendships. But for us, no way. We stick together through thick or thin. It’s pretty incredible.
I’m a bit tired, and wanted to get some notes in before I went to sleep. I think that this should do for now. My legs are tired, straight, and I’m doing it! New things every day! More to come on that tomorrow!
1/3
Doctor’s appointment made me wake up after the trip at 6:15am. And then they couldn’t do the procedure? Huh, well I guess things happen for a reason. Maybe this will be my opportunity to stop getting the Botox injections? I don’t know? The doctor did say that my tightness is truly making leaps and bounds of progress! We did have an interesting conversation about “voluntary spasms” and how is that really all that different from volitional movement? I got my doctor to think twice about that one. The voluntary spasms are much more reflexive, but there is a grey area, and I think it’s important for me in my recovery towards volitional control.
Gym went well, hitting the heavy bag has some really profound effects on the body! I’m really pleased with how my legs and body feels after I do this! How do I get muscles to turn on at the right time? And not all together? Tapping? Or cueing? Like, how can I get my knees in further/ more extension, add tactile feedback, and get them to be worked before they fully get into extension? How can I do that by myself? With just my two hands? I need to work my legs slightly in extension (vs being flexed seated) and slowly work up to standing height!
Alright, so after all this thinking, I was able to come up with something rather interesting of a setup! This took me a bit to figure out, and it all started from me using a resistance band in the mirror. I was doing some very small leg lifts, but they weren’t very productive, didn’t lift my leg high, and were really hard to do. I kept thinking, and realized I needed a pulley to pull with my hands, that was mounted to the wall, to be able to get my leg in extension as well. I kept thinking, and headed over to the cable machine, because this wasn’t working very well.
I added the ankle strap around my ankle, put the weight really high, and adjusted the cable height. Then I clipped to my ankle. And had a thought, “I can’t use the cable now? How can I pull?” So I realized, “duh! I’m in the chair, on wheels! I’ll just move myself backwards!” What I did, was created a way for me to stretch my hamstrings, while also simultaneously working my quads! This felt amazing! I had to cut the reps short because I had to pee so gosh darn bad! But wow, my legs feel crazy right now! my quads feel fuller, and my hamstrings are freaking out, like they should! They just got a huge individualized stretch! And it was almost effortless? This was crazy, just a little thinking and ingenuity really can help make some really interesting changes!
I feel like it takes about a week or so, for an idea to set in. Give yourself a week, you will see. This seems to be ringing more and more true.
Adjustable seat height? This would be interesting as a therapy technique at home to practice taller and taller standing exercises. Maybe there’s something there!
1/4
My ball of my foot/ toes are planted, staying put, but my heel is rotating?! What is this! This is such a cool development of my lower legs! This has to be activation of the gastroc’s and they gotta be doing something for that to happen!
So at the gym, and I notice how much after I do these new modified leg kick/ stretches, that my quads are feeling more full and more activated in my other workouts with my feet on the floor? Sounds like I better keep doing them!
I really need to keep working on my breath in the standing frame without the chest support. This has been helping me, to allow my chest to fully expand, as well as expand my lower core and torso. These muscles were definitely shut off (paralyzed) for a bit there. There really was no activation, and now it’s firing like crazy! I was noticing how much I’m able to get my lower back to expand during my breath.
Holy smokes, my legs are really making some gains! I couldn’t really fit my right leg under the water bottle machine in the gym, that was a first!
So after a bit of Mario with Callie, I decided to get in the standing frame for a bit. It’s late, I know, but my legs are feeling so good and very interesting! I want to explore this more! The change in activation in my legs is significant, and I wanted to try to lean into the spasms a bit more. Since I took away the chest support, I have a lot more room for leaning and trying to use my hips. This was wild that my legs and glutes were activating so much, I’m so loose and relaxed from this!
I really was working on leaning into the spasms, and not fighting them, trying to let them take their course, and to get myself straighter and straighter. I took a lot of bouts up and down to readjust, give my legs a break, and reset. They really are going, so I didn’t want to overdue it!
I’m feeling more and more like my spastic muscles are calming down. That it’s somehow slowly turning into volitional control? Seems to be pretty early/ hard to say, but it’s getting better everyday. I gotta keep up on it! This is going so well and my body is feeling more and more like it should!
The Astronaut on Earth 
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