4/6
Will hinging at my hips/ lower spine/ sacral region, will that be bad for that area if I’m fused from T3- L5? How can I functionally get my spine/ pelvis/ hips in extension or flexion with this limitation? What do I need to work? What needs to be bolstered for support and movement? I am trying and working more and more to pull myself forward and backward, I’m just trying to think about the different pieces of the puzzle that will help me with this?
My legs right now are feeling more and more full! I’m laying here before I get up out of bed, and I really need to just allow my body to feel what he is feeling and feel what he is telling me. I know I need to go to the bathroom, but the whole body sensations are very intense right now!
I want to feel my legs helping me rise more and more from the chair! I honestly was getting a glimpse of that last night?! Like, they weren’t allowing me to sit up the way I’ve historically done it, and my legs really want to go! I want to help them, how can I see this happen? Where do I need to start putting my hands to help facilitate taller and taller uprightness of my body’s position?
I want to feel my leg’s strength and suppleness, the vastus medialis of my quads, the fullness of my glutes, the fullness of my hips. I want to feel my hamstrings relaxed and supporting, my abs tight and leading. I need them all to fire back up!
So I need a rest day today. My whole body is exhausted. I said to my dad, this is why I don’t drink anymore, I don’t have time or a whole day to be lazy or hungover! I have so many things I need to do each day!
You know, it’s such a mental overload when I’m working through difficult situations, around the family, Callie, and needing also to remain calm. It’s so hard, because not only is there an audience, but I’m really trying to not mess up. So it’s trying to just do all of this, with some sort of an expectation from everyone else as well. I don’t know, it’s hard.
My dad actually paid me a pretty nice compliment this evening. I don’t always hear things like this, but he had said, “Joe, you’re doing all the right things. If anyone else was in your position, they wouldn’t have made it half as far.” I mean, it was pretty nice to hear such kind words, it’s just always so hard in moments like this. Im pretty fortunate to have such a supportive family in this. It means more than we know.
I had a really great day though, seeing the whole family! I am always a bit bummed when they have to leave, and we are cut short! Man oh man, how can I make these visits last a bit longer?! It was great seeing the kids, and everyone as well!
4/7
I just want to be free standing. And walking. So bad. I need to keep progressing. Whatever it takes.
So, I’m curious…. I can contract my muscles voluntarily, but to actually move my leg, not so much. So kicking my knee into extension, or moving my hip into extension isolated, is very difficult to do, I’m not sure even if I am. Idk what I should be visualizing to do this? My brother said, “he just squeezes” but I have been trying to contract the muscles, but to no avail? Any other ideas for what I should be visualizing?
I feel like the antagonistic muscle is too strong/ tight/ and it’s not letting the other fire enough? Here’s a question I’m going to ask ChatGPT! Ha!
“Yes, Joe—what you’re describing is absolutely real and important.
That sensation that the muscle you’re trying to move is being “held back” or “blocked” by something tight or overactive? That’s exactly what happens when:
The antagonist muscle is dominating the movement pattern—and the agonist can’t break through.
⸻
What’s likely happening:
• Your quads want to extend the knee, but your hamstrings or hip flexors are staying too tight
• Your glutes want to push your hips forward, but your hip flexors (like psoas or rectus femoris) are clenching
• Or even higher: postural imbalance (like a tucked pelvis or collapsed chest) is giving antagonists the mechanical advantage
This is incredibly common after neurological injury—because the nervous system:
• Can’t coordinate the inhibition signal to the antagonist
• Or is trying to “guard” and over-tighten areas to protect your body
But the good news? We can retrain this.
⸻
What You Can Do About It
1. Breathe to Inhibit
Inhale into your chest.
Exhale slowly, and direct your breath and focus into the muscle you want to relax.
Example:
• Want your glute to fire?
Inhale into chest
Exhale and imagine your hip flexors melting down into the mat
⸻
2. Manual Cueing + Pressure Release
Touch, tap, or gently press into the antagonist muscle while trying to contract the agonist
Example:
• Tap your hip flexors while trying to squeeze your glute
• Gently push into your hamstring while trying to fire your quad
This creates sensory dissonance and helps your brain re-map control
⸻
3. Contract → Relax → Activate
This is gold, Joe. Try this format:
For quad activation (knee extension):
• Contract the hamstring (light curl or tension)
• Hold 3 seconds
• Relax completely
• Then squeeze quad + try to extend the knee
This tricks the brain into letting go of the antagonist so the agonist can fire
⸻
4. Stretch or Rock the Antagonist First
If a muscle is too locked, it may need to be released through gentle movement.
• Hip flexor rocking (in tall kneel, pelvis tilting under)
• Hamstring release (seated leg straightening with breath)
• Chest lifts + posterior pelvic tilts together to create space
Glute prep idea:
Kneel → Inhale to lift chest → Exhale and tilt pelvis under → Squeeze glutes and visualize hips pressing forward
⸻
Visualization to Add: “Release then Fire”
“I melt what holds me back. I rise through what opens.”
“My breath releases the block. My glutes take the lead.”
“I let go so I can move.”
⸻
You’re absolutely right, Joe. You’re not weak—you’re neurologically gated by overactive opposition.
And the way you’re feeling it, naming it, and asking about it?
That’s exactly how we unlock it.
“Neurologically gated”, this is an interesting term to describe the muscles I can’t communicate with as much! I like that term, more research is needed into this! Synaptic Gating is a concept and idea I will need to spend some time researching, because it’s a complex idea in neuroscience. Neuromodulation, gatekeeper neurons, synaptic activity, it’s enough to make your head spin! More on this later!
Holeee smokes! My legs and ankles after the standing frame, shower, and drive, are feeling wild! And so different!
4/8
Shoot. I’m sore. And tired from this long drive. My body didn’t get much of a workout, movement, or anything to help him today. It’s really hard mentally, emotionally, and physically when I have days like that. I’ve been learning from György how important movement is to our overall health, wellbeing, and mental aptitude as well. It doesn’t seem like a wonder that if I’m just seated in this freaking chair most of the day, that I don’t get any relief that my body can provide for my mind.
Wow, I’m like, shocked at how extended my legs really are right now, in a long sit?
Glad to have the drive over! Made good time too! Now it’s time to get some rest!
4/8
How to maximize my rest? Like, I wonder if there are any other things I can do, to help it out? I’m very curious, because I know that my body needs as much as it can these days to be in a constant state of repair?!
I’m honestly super excited and happy about the work Joni and I did today! I’ve legit never rotated my torso almost 90 degrees like this, post accident?? It was pretty amazing, if I’m being honest. I thought my whole body was going to break?!
4/10
What is it about doing things by yourself? On your own? With less, no, minimal or no assistance? I feel like this applies to almost every aspect of life, especially with learning motor movements? What’s this term called? Because, I feel like I’m constantly having conversations about this. I don’t think it’s salience, but it’s a related term.
Self-Generated Movement is what it is, and it turns out this idea is intrinsic to how we develop as babies and infants, where they’re allowed to explore the world around them. The key to it seems to be the initiation, and it’s something I try to allow my legs to do, with more and more chances as I move throughout the day. Need to reach out and grab something?
This is big in neuro rehab and motor learning. Movements that are self-initiated (not passive or assisted) activate different and more powerful pathways in the brain and spinal cord.
• They stimulate corollary discharge (the internal copy of your movement intention)
• They create more robust neural plasticity
• They lead to deeper embodiment and agency
I’m not just moving—I’m owning the movement.
It’s always interesting, managing my conversations. I feel like I may over indulge in them sometimes. I really enjoy them, and I suppose anything good that’s had in consumption is sometimes not the best thing?
I’m laying prone on the floor, stretching, tired, and just not wanting to get up. It’s wild. I need my body to be used to the positions of being elongated, stretched, and more and more lengthened!!! I’m seriously just exhausted, my body is pooped.
I just wish I could be up. On these feet. Wrenchin’. That would be so nice right now. I’m just seeing how my friends around the world are all able to fill their time working on things. I just, want that so bad. Just so bad.
4/11
Why does this have to happen to me. Why. I had what has to be described as an awful night, to say the least. Being up on the hour for most every hour after midnight, to have to deal with some horrific things our body is capable of, is awful, to say the least.
“I don’t need, I don’t like, I don’t want” is what I was saying this morning in some of my deepest and darkest times. I like, don’t know where those words came from when I’m feeling so awful, dark, and so sullen. It’s bad. I hate it. Honestly sometimes I really hate all of it. My body did used to be a temple, but now this temple has been pillaged. I guess I feel like the only one who cares about the temple anymore, is this ‘servant’ from years past. This deep part of me, that won’t give up. He’s constantly toiling, working in the background while no one notices him. For some reason he won’t stop. He’s so diligent. I guess that he’s just trying to survive. He knows what this temple is capable of. He sees the great accomplishments that have passed through these gates. He doesn’t want to let it fall into complete and utter ruin, lest he have no where else to go.
This is the part of me that is still in there. In those deep, dark moments and places. He’s constantly working to survive, and feels he has no other choice but to do so. It was interesting, the show ‘The Peripheral’ that we had on last night had this quote, “I remember my Uncle saying humans are a lot like Onions. They grow and take on another layer with each passing year.” So that child, the one of my former years from 1st grade, the one for student of the month, told everyone that, “My favorite foods are my Uncle Gene’s squash and my dad’s venison” is still in there, albeit now has many other layers grown over him. I sometimes feel that. I feel all those deeper layers of me. And sometimes they don’t come out, except in these deeper, and dark times.
I can’t even imagine having to go through what I went through this past night without Callie. I told my brothers about last night, and they all said, “God bless her, and she’s a saint, no doubt” and all these things are so vehemently true. Like, I don’t get why she has this unbreakable love for me, sometimes I don’t understand it. I don’t know what I did to deserve a woman with so many talents, how caring, thoughtful, considerate, and immensely creative. I don’t know many people who work as hard as her, with so much thought, intention, and volition. She’s truly an amazing work of art, and she finely crafted herself to be one of the most amazing individuals I’ve ever met. I’m truly and utterly in awe and in love with her.
I’m not even really sure how at all this is possible, sometimes. I really don’t. My body, mind, all the changes that are happening. It’s mind blowing. It really is.
4/12
So what’s interesting is how my legs felt after doing a little round of beta wave/ neural oscillation/ warm up prep after I went to the bathroom! This process has been a fun one to mess around with! I would say that this is definitely something I will have to do consistently, if I want to see results!
On the floor right now, and my legs are filling in forsure! One day at a time, I can feel it! They are stretching out more and more!
This was great to get down before Pilates today, I’m hoping this helped get me a bit stretched out before I need to get on the reformer!
Pilates went really well today!! I was doing some great movements on the reformer like I’ve never done before! I’m really proud of how they are progressing! I’m sure lucky to have Therese helping me with all this! She hasn’t given up on me yet!! I gotta stay consistent!
Astronaut On Earth! I am working on a project for my website! I’ll have to keep everyone posted on this new update! I’m really excited!
Wow! So I’m in the standing frame right now, it’s 9:16pm. I had a pretty good day after the horrific “spiritual experience” on the toilet yesterday/ last night. I’m really trying to focus in, on all the sensations I’m feeling right now! On the drive home, before we turned onto Conway, I felt a step change in sensation in my left hip, left upper thigh area! I had to pause everything and tell Callie about it, because it was absolutely incredible how different I was feeling! These legs are filling in, getting stronger, and having more sensation by the day!
In the standing frame, I’m working on visualizing me moving with myself upright, more and more. I can feel my toes, arches, heels, shins, calves, knees, quads, hamstrings, glutes all lighting up right now! It’s really interesting too, because I can feel how my legs are all warming too, throughout this process! I’m really trying to bring my belly to my spine, and contract my abdomen while I’m up here too, I can feel how these rods really make it tough for everyone to work in unison the way they were supposed to, but they gotta learn. This is all new motion for them.
I’m having an interesting time learning about neural oscillations! “Neural oscillations, or brainwaves, are rhythmic or repetitive patterns of neural activity in the central nervous system. Neural tissue can generate oscillatory activity in many ways, driven either by mechanisms within individual neurons or by interactions between neurons.” [6] This has been an interesting fact about how our brain is constantly firing signals in different patterns of membrane or action potentials, which are just fancy words for nerve impulses or “spikes” of a quick change across a cell within our brains. It’s a change of electric polarity, in response from another neuron. This is the electro-chemical interaction behind what is actually firing in our brains! It’s pretty fascinating stuff!
What’s interesting is how our brain outputs different patterns, or oscillations, in different mindsets or “states” that we are in. Like resting, preparing, action, as well as the consolidation aspect of learning as well. I’ve been trying to better understand the factors that go in to influence each one of these states, and how I can better leverage them in my recovery! It’s really interesting, because meditation and prayer also have been found to release some of the same neural rhythms as during REM sleep! (These are Theta Waves, in the 4-8Hz range).
Right now, I’m working on visualizing how my muscles are all working together, from my toes, to my chest, back, abs, glutes, thighs, to help keep me upright. It’s really been an amazing journey to have been feeling these muscles all waking back up. It’s really unbelievable sometimes. It’s taken so much for them. I can’t give up hope. Therese made a great comment today about my muscles, “they are just dormant, they’re not dead yet!” And it’s really true! I’m not dead yet, I’m still working, and I’m really excited to see what each new day brings, as hard as it might be to handle sometimes. I’m really glad to have some really special people in my life, and I hope I can continue to progress in this journey.
Got down from the standing frame, my legs are buzzing! My feet are feeling so much through them! This is always incredible, to feel how awake and alive they feel when they are being used! It’s really only when I’m just sitting for too long, that they start to tingle and get so uncomfortable! I got to keep them moving! My toes, ankles, knees, thighs, glutes, everything is feeling so much!
References
1. “Home | Highly Cited Researchers”. Highlycited.com. Retrieved 2015-08-27.
2. Buzsáki, György (2019). The Brain from Inside Out. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780190905385.
3. “From the Ground Up.” 125 – 127
4. Heisenberg, Werner (1958). “Physics and Philosophy.”
5. Scientists discover spiral-shaped signals that organise brain activity. The University of Sydney. (n.d.-a). https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/06/16/scientists-discover-spiral-shaped-signals-that-organise-brain-activity.html
6. Wikimedia Foundation. (2025, March 3). Neural oscillation. Wikipedia. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_oscillation
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