3/23
Wow! My legs are so engaged today!!! Callie and I were able to have a great start to the morning! I’m pretty glad to have her to work through all the things I have to improve in my body. It’s been a lot to try to tackle on my own, so I’m glad I have someone as intuitive and rational as Callie to help! Goodness she brings some good perspective to the table!
I was really happy to have my legs so active and engaged today! Callie and I made it to the grocery store, and I was pleasantly surprised how engaged my core was throughout the trip! Taking a depth breath in when I feel a spasm coming, has really been helping!
Got on the floor, did some exercises, tall kneeling, crawling, and shoulder work! I’m really glad with how I’m able to “kneel walk” back and forth across the bed frame, these movements are going really well! I’m super pleased with them! I’m now sitting on the floor in a long sit, using the astronaut pants, and getting a stretch of a lifetime for them! How can I keep/ help maintain the hamstring flexibility? Especially if I have to get up into the chair right away when I’m done? What else can I do?
Reading the book right now, and wondering how I can incorporate the Pilates equipment at PT, or some of the movements I’m learning here, into Pilates?! I need to think about this one. I know I need some upright parallel bars, the bosu ball for the knee block, and honestly that’s really it. I thought it was super interesting how they had this piece of equipment, called the “CoreAlign” that allowed for feet to be shuffling back and forth!? It was pretty cool, I wonder how some of these pieces of equipment can be incorporated?! I know it wouldn’t take much time for Ashley, Bridget, Joni or Rose to figure this stuff out! I just need to see how I can get the equipment?!??
So like, I’m sitting here in the Astronaut pants, and I honestly haven’t seen my legs this straight before! This is amazing! I’m doing seated quad pulses/ contractions, to get them firing independently from my hamstrings. They never seem to get a chance to do this! I hope it helps!
3/24
Well, the sensations are off the charts today!! All the work yesterday is paying off!
Heightened sensory remapping, this is a cool term that I have found for what I’m currently working on doing with my body. Since so much of my sensation decreased, all the compression clothing I’m wearing has really been helping my body take advantage of constant skin contact to help me remap where my body is!
Today was an overall productive day, that was filled to the brim. I was able to do some awesome work with Joni in the LifeGlider! I think this was great! It really has been helping me, and getting up and in it has been helping my core strength a ton as well! Glad to know I was able to do this even after a really good round of tall sitting exercises to boot!
“A thing merely appears to have color, it merely appears to be sweet or bitter. Only atoms and empty space have real existence” – Democritus
It’s always interesting reading some of this quotes from philosophers from way back in the day. turns out there is something really interesting to learning about their schools of thought, and applying it to my current situation and understanding. It seems to really help, and I seem to be able to make connections with things out of nowhere!
3/25
I actually did something really interesting and fascinating for the first time at work! I did some sit to stands on the FIFA fence! Evan helped me zip tie the foam block to it as a knee block, and since I was able to slip my feet under the fence, it turned out to be some of my best sit to stands on my own to date! It’s great being able to always try new and different things for my body! I really need that!
Wow! This was really wild! Honestly this new therapy and techniques are feeling really wild!
Perception and action. What’s interesting is how these two ideas in psychology and neuroscience aren’t typically studied together, as György was saying in The Brain From The Inside Out. I feel like those two topics are definitely something I would like to learn about and explore more, because that chapter was very fascinating. Talking about which precedes the other in our brain, and how it might not be as straight forward as it all seems.
Right now, after going to the pelvic PT I’m noticing a huge change in sensation and feel the large pull from my pelvis in so many directions. It probably isn’t a bad idea to have gotten to bed at the time I did. Winding down finally at 8:35 is a fine time. I know I don’t need to do this forever, but my body is appreciating the fact that I’m giving it so much needed rest. Re-wiring your body is no joke. It’s been a busy day today.
My body right now is having a flood of sensation, and I am really enjoying and focusing on my breath. I feel like this is one time I get some minor relief from the constant onslaught of signals, processing, work, exercise, and keeping myself alive. There’s just so much that I need to do, it’s hard to keep up.
I’m going to keep it brief today, because I know that my body will thank me later after he gets some rest. These legs need it.
3/26
Wow, my whole pelvic region and legs are drastically changing, I can tell!!
Standing frame time today had got me feeling wild and crazy, to say the least. I’m out now, and I’m like, tired. Goodness.
I didn’t ask to be in this wheelchair. This wasn’t even something that I even, for the life of me, ever saw coming. I just woke up one day in the hospital. It’s pretty awful to think how quickly life can change, and so drastically too. I try not to have to let these thoughts ruminate too much, but goodness sometimes.
So, today at therapy went great! LifeGlider, Pull to stands, tall sitting work!! This was all good work!!
Shoulder work! To warm up, and they are really moving better and better with each coming day!
10lb medicine ball! This has been no joke! I’m perched pretty high up in the seat, and moving more and more! It’s wild work, because it’s so sketchy. It feels like you’re dropping into the sketchiest line possible. You don’t know if you’re gonna fit or gonna make it, but you keep your head up, and keep moving towards the other side. Wait, we’re in therapy, not the mountain. For a second there, I just got in my head the viewpoint of dropping into a run, and how sometimes you don’t know exactly how it’s going to go, but you feel it out with each turn, transition, and rip through the woods. Boy do I miss that right now.
I need to remember to be contracting these abs way more throughout the day than I am usually! Honestly the cue that Joni gave me when we were doing the tall sitting was great because I could really feel how much more stable I was after consciously engaging the abs!
I’m finding out more and more everyday I’m literally raising an “adult infant” inside my body… I gotta relearn and re-teach myself everything…. It’s wild, slowly but surely I’m getting stronger!
3D printer! Getting a few things printed off!!
Spikey massage ball for proprioception! I am feeling it so much on my feet! Callie was rolling it over the soles of my feet, and I was feeling so much! She’s finishing up some knitting, and I am wrapping up these notes zzz!!
3/27
My legs. My core. Is feeling so much engaged! Wow, with each breath, with each rise and fall of my chest, my core is able to be engaged a little bit more, my glutes and hips feel like they’re filling out, my quads are filling in, and same with my hamstrings! My knees and lower legs too, with each exercise, weight bearing into the ground, I can feel my calves waking up, ankles feeling more, and more feeling into the beds of my feet! I feel like there was something in my dream last night, about kicking my feet side to side like a windshield wiper, and how my legs were just responding and doing this! It’s so fascinating how they’re more and more capable each day!
So, I got some new fun tools yesterday, the squishy deflated ball, and the spike ball. The spike ball to help with myofaacial release in my feet, and the deflated ball to help decompress my lower back! I tried the spikey ball last night, Callie helped me and boy was I feeling a lot through the beds of my feet!
3/27
So like, when I just tried to sit up And led with my chest… I actually freaking did it?!
It’s crazy. Today I’ve very much been trying to be so much more conscious and aware of my chest, abs, and glutes. Keeping my chest and sternum lifted, to help my breath and intercostal muscles, my abdomen engaged and helping me stay upright, and then my glutes engaged, helping keep my upper back less strained, and helping keep me upright!
My legs today have felt better as the day has progressed! I know I was seated for much of today at work, but after Pilates, and during, I was able to get up and moving around so much!
Therese and I did a lot today at Pilates, this was quite the session! Working my upper body, lower body, shoot! Just like Therese had said, “even getting into position for these exercises is a workout!” And she’s right, it really is when I have to move my body around so much! Doing sit to stands in the parallel bars, swapping chairs, getting on the reformer, it never ends! Glad to have gotten on the reformer and got myself moving! Little bit each day, slowly but surely we are gaining on it!
I’m laying in a long sit right now, and my neck is honestly tired, I know I haven’t been looking down all day, it’s just been a lot of work doing everything that I am doing!
neuro-linguistic embodiment, embodied cognition, or embodied language processing are all 3 terms to describe the theory and idea that an organisms sensorimotor capacities (ability of the body to respond to its senses with movement), body and environment play an important role in thinking. This is actually kinda interesting because this is an idea I’ve heard a few times this week, hearing Therese as well as some of my PT’s talk about giving my body “information”. I think this is something I better look into more, because I think there’s something to it, and I am just at the crux of this information! I really enjoy taking time to try to understand the science and biology behind all these ideas, for some reason I think it helps my brain in particular work.
3/28
So like, when I push up with both my hands on the wheels of my wheelchair, but also think “chest out, glutes engage, spine engage” my entire body is contracting in ways it typically never does?! Like, this is truly amazing and cool! How can I build off this?! I’m doing partial sit to stands, and my body is engaged so much!
I mean, I’m literally feeling this in my entire body, in my quads, gastroc’s, feet too!!!! Can I basically do these all day?!
Wow!!! I literally just did 5 on the toilet, and since that is lower, I was able to really be grounded and push up more than from the chair!!! This was amazing!!! Just mini squats as much as I can!
It’s been a long day. Lots to do at work. Need to get some rest.
Callie and I ad an amazing time kicking off our new Mission! More on that in a bit, we definitely made it down to Kenosha to start documenting our travels to see all the lighthouses on Lake Michigan!
3/29
Holy crap, after wearing everything all day, my entire right side under my abdomen, under where the lobectomy is, is firing up in sensations?! It always comes back as pain and tightness, and this side has all the feels right now?! I feel like I’m expanding my ribs more and more with each breath!?
Also, why are sit to stands where I “pull” so much better than in parallel bars or a walker?!?! This has been such a great progression!
Wow!! These sit to stand transitions off the toilet are getting so much better! My feet are staying planted, my chest and head up, and then when I go to scooch back into the seat, my feet are pulling up on their own! No hands needed!
Whoa, these legs are feeling wild after everything today! I’m straight up exhausted, my heart rate was up to 150 just from showering today. I’m pretty sure my legs are going through a pretty massive change, and I’m feeling how much energy it’s drawing out of me. I’m completely exhausted and it’s 1:30. This is insane. I only ate breakfast. That was it. It’s crazy how tired last night got me, which is pretty wild. Just 2 drinks, that was it. Just enough to catch a nice warm glow from it all, not even close to drunk. It was wild to think that 2 drinks, is 1 too many to have a decent nights sleep.
I’ve needed a lot of rest today. My body has been upright a lot this week, and I can feel it. My whole body is fatigued, and when I don’t get a rest day, it’s really tough. Been trying to manage that a bit better, so I’m glad that I got some rest today. Better get all rested up before we head out to get a bite with Lucas and Kami!
Had a blast with them tonite! Always a good time hanging with those two! It’s also just wild, having to think about times in the past. It’s hard, to be nostalgic, to talk about my dog that I don’t have, or literally anything I don’t have. That’s why I’m working hard every day. I want to be able to get max back. I want to get back on my feet so bad. I need to keep moving. The only way I’ll never get there is if I never try. So that’s what I must do.
The Astronaut on Earth 
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