6/22
Wow was that one of the saddest and most heartfelt moments I’ve had in such a long time. The image of Max, sitting and watching, patiently for me, as I was pulling out of the driveway. I miss that old boy. He knows, he knows all too well, how much I miss him. It’s crazy how a dog can have such depth of emotions, but Max does. That English Shepard mix was truly one of the greatest things that happened to my life. I miss him so much. It’s so hard these days for me to see him, for him and I to play, for us to do anything together. I want him back so much.
Being so completely exhausted today made for a wild time trying to get up into a half kneel in the pull up bar. I was really trying, but I just needed to get moving and stretched out. It was really interesting too because my watch said my “Body Battery” was dead all day, and the rest I got last night, didn’t charge me up at all! Haha well I’m awake so what’s that about!?
I’m so tired, I only got 3 1/2 hrs of sleep is probably why. My body was acting pretty obstinate this morning, I’m glad I went to the bathroom, fueled up, ate, drank some water, and moved in for the day. I really needed that. Goodness, these days are sure wild.
It was great though seeing John’s house all updated! Him and dad put in some work! I’ll tell you what, I don’t know too many people who put in a full days work after their day jobs, to fully restore a house! These two did. It’s pretty amazing what the hands of someone who knows what they are doing is capable of. It’s pretty amazing. We got to hang out, watch Julia crawl and cruise around, and see Max today. An overall pretty alright day. I’m just always so bummed when I have to drive away and leave my best friends, John and Max. It’s really hard. I don’t know I guess I’ll have to do something about that one. For now I’ll keep on what I’m doing.
Observing Julia though, I was amazed at how her legs would move while trying to stand up! It’s honestly pretty remarkable seeing how infants like this will move in any way that they can to get moving, and more and more upright! She was scootching on the floor pushing with one leg mostly, then would get to the gate, and pull herself up from a pretzel! It’s pretty interesting to be able to watch! I’m telling you, there’s something very remarkable about doing all this movement for one’s self, I just don’t know all the words to describe it!
6/23
“I’m safe” is something I’ve been trying to tell myself more and more often when in bed, to be able to try to give myself a chance to get some much needed rest. It’s so weird, feeling what I feel. My body sure does have a way of really trying to let me know something is going on, but here we are trying to figure that out. Off to start the day with a wild way to wake up. Goodness.
Okay that was a 12hr drive back from Michigan. I think we doubled the driving time somehow. That was awesome. Oof. Goodness.
Okay, 10:11pm, in the standing frame, and we just made it back to Milwaukee after a weekend with the family for the bachelor party’s for my brother and Jill! Goodness they were a blast! My body is ready to get back in the groove of moving! It’s feeling so interesting right now up in the standing frame! Not as tight as I would have thought for not getting up in it all weekend? I know I’m getting down on the floor and in tall kneeling more often, I can only imagine that is helping! Off to get some rest, it’s been a helluva day.
6/23
My legs, oh my legs! To be getting more activation in my glutes and quads, to continue to be getting further and further into extension, is truly incredible! I’m waking up this morning, and my legs are extended more than they ever have been! Also, the urge to have to go #1 is changing too.
The book I’m reading, Bessel van der Kolk’s book “The Body Keeps the Score” has been truly interesting because this psychiatrist has been expanding on neuroscience principles to help better understand what is happening to both our bodies and our minds after traumatic events. I am learning alot about the brain, from another source who has spent many years working with people with some very intense trauma for themselves too. Everyone’s has definitely been different than what I experienced, as I would imagine is always the case. It’s just so odd, waking up one day in the hospital, and not knowing what the heck caused you to be in that room. I guess maybe that’s why I’m constantly so hopeful and continually pushing myself to progress? I’m not sure.
The aspect I want to expand on, and learn from this book, is how the body stores trauma. My left obliques, lower left abdomen is so spastic, tight, and feels like where most of the nonsense that I’m feeling is originating from. It’s also what feels like the origin for why my left leg is under developed too. Not really sure exactly, but I think it might make some more sense the more I learn about this, more to come!
It almost feels like I’m trying to rebuild parts of my autonomic nervous system (ANS) with mirror neurons. Seems like a wild or crazy idea, but yesterday when Callie and I were driving, and I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom, when she said, “A little bit, but I can hold it, it’s not too bad.” My body had a shift in the urge to have to go? It was so odd, and it definitely took a few miles driving with a pretty uncomfortable body before that started to wear away? It was interesting tho! I’m going to have to try this more often!
Wow, so on the floor today, and my body was responding to some interesting new movements! I got gymnast rings, to hang from the pull up bar, and to be honest, they have changed everything! my legs are responding in ways they haven’t yet to date! There’s something really special about constantly putting my body in new positions, and repeating some movements it knows, like crawling. It’s really cool! Doing all these pulling exercises while laying supine are movements I haven’t quite done before yet!
Is this is the same as movement? Patterned memory of basic movements in our legs, understanding how our legs move and why, and repetition of movement?
Okay, so this is what I’m thinking. It seems as though, skipping right to leg movements, without getting a good core, foundation, back, and midsection, are like playing chess, and skipping ahead in puzzles or tactics that are way above your pay grade. Without having a good fundamental understanding of the game, you just flounder without actually making any real progress because you didn’t cover the fundamentals before jumping into 2000+ rated techniques. I feel as though it’s the same with our bodies, to master more complicated techniques, we need to first master the most fundamental first. And I think that’s what I’m doing with all the floor work?!
Wow! I just blasted my obliques and abdomen with the theragun while in bed, laying supported, and my body is so relaxed, and so present right now! It’s amazing and so very wild how intricately our bodies are woven together. It feels inside my body like no two muscles are disconnected. It’s wild! Truth Be told, I can feel how all these movements are linking them back together, it’s truly amazing!
6/25
They’re filling in! Day by day my lower body truly is feeling more sensations! Last nights session on the pull up bar and gymnast rings was an interesting moment for my body’s exploration! I was really feeling how my legs and body is waking up! I wonder, just getting our bodies into these positions on our own, and providing them feedback, tactile sensations, is how it all starts? I just am noticing how when I went to go do pull ups with my legs on the ground, I was able to get my legs to adduct, and help push me up to the bar! My belly was really working to accomplish this! I even tried to pull myself up into a half kneel from a new modified cross legged position! I am wondering if this is the same or similar to how infants do this? I was observing how Julia pulls herself up this weekend, and couldn’t help but notice that she was using her legs in any way possible to get up! So I’m wondering if that’s how it all starts? We will see because I will continue to try to do these and progress through these motions! I think these rings were a great addition to my movement routine!
OH MY GOODNESS! This is insane, my legs were working and responding like crazy when I was doing these pull-ups just now! They were kicking in more and more with each rep! I raised the pull-up bar up about 4”, and with each inhale, I pulled myself up, and tried to push my feet and legs into the ground! Turns out, the more reps I did, the more my legs were adducting, and they were pushing more and more into the floor! My chest too, is expanding, and I was able to get my left shoulder positioned, chest stretched out, and shoulder back farther than I ever have before! This was a really good workout session!
My legs right now are getting me so much further into extension, I’m utterly shocked right now! That change was so quick!
6/26
Waking up this morning, my legs are staying more and more extended, and more activation during my shower, too.
“Sensation is a logarithmic function of physical intensity, therefore when the stimulus strength multiplies, the stimulus strength adds.” This is an interesting concept from ‘The Brain From The Inside Out’ that I’m thinking this is how it works with movements as well! The more variety, the better? With your mainstays backing you up?
Weber-Fechner Law is a law in Neuroscience, and it’s got me thinking, and wondering, “how is this related to movement?”
It really seems like what I’m doing in my day to day activities is truly based on a logarithmic function. It’s so slow. But! I can feel the change! The smaller the weight, the more noticeable the differences, so it makes me think, the smaller the muscles, the more noticeable the differences too? This Law seems like it explains this phenomena, but I don’t know if it’s helpful? Really? I’m not sure I will have to learn some more about it first, more to come!
Log rule dominated dynamics, this is another idea I would like to try to relate and understand for relation to movement as well!
Definitely need my reciprocal motion + weight bearing. Today I’m feeling tight, and I just want to relax. I know that I’m moving more and more, but I need my body to respond to how I would like it to, especially in bed. That’s time to relax.
6/27
Stochastic resonance, is a behavior of non-linear systems. That is most certainly the case of our body’s central nervous system, and how it heals. It’s where random fluctuations in a signal can cause actual changes in the larger overall state. Or in other words, It’s when adding a little bit of noise (randomness) to a weak signal actually helps you detect or amplify that signal better than without the noise. sometimes a little bit of randomness actually helps things work better, which is wild, and true! I’m curious, how this could possibly relate to my body? All the extra movement, extra random things I’m doing sprinkled in here and there? Just trying to live life? Probably has an effect? Hmm interesting thought!
My legs didn’t get the best rest last night is what that kinda felt like. Not super stoked about that.
Wow, Pilates today! Therese was talking about how our stomach and abdominal muscles are the opposing muscle group to your legs! This really is an interesting way to be thinking about my legs and torso, you never really think about the other muscles resisting motion from your legs, if I’m being honest. But I’m starting to finally learn about how this is true!
Starting movements from the core and shoulders, as opposed to your legs or arms, is honestly a really good way to think of it. I was talking to Therese about how I have a hard time pulling my arms through the full range of motion, she has a good way to think about it, that helped me understand this idea a bit better.
Water balloon analogy, think of your core as the water balloon, and once it’s thrown and hits a surface, that’s analogous to our core extending out a limb for movement!
“Sweeping the floor” was another analogy she gave me to help better complete the movements for my shoulders! Practicing my routine, with the hug, shaving, and breath, I will have to continue these exercises!Try to do the magic circle behind me? We will have to see!
So like, something really interesting happened. And that was when I started to hold and contract my abdomen voluntarily, right here after I was done eating dinner….. my legs and abdomens “tingling” is slowing down… this is so weird?! Is that what this is? Is that what the tingling is, just a lack of contraction when there should be? I’m honestly beginning to believe that this is the case!
The idea of sadness, and how it’s different from unhappiness has been so interesting learning from Tolkien. I realize it’s okay for us to be sad, but it’s not okay to just despair and think as if nothing can change or get better. Especially when things truly are able to! Unhappiness is so much different from sadness, as they are completely different emotional states, and I think I am now finally understanding this! Which, I think is very liberating at times. Sometimes it’s still really hard, but I have to slow myself down, and remain the course. Unhappiness is much more related to despair, and that is honestly a quite different emotional response than sadness would be. Settled determination is where I need to be, moving forward, and constantly progressing, even if it is slow. Even if there is no one to see it. I just need to constantly keep myself progressing.
When have you ever heard of someone talking about sadness in a positive way? Or about how it’s different from despair? Like, when is that usually talked about? It’s so interesting of an idea and now I would love to learn more about sadness, and its true role in our society, and how it may have fallen out of place? More to come!
I do things better when I’m with other people, seems to be a very real case for me. For certain things, I think it’s almost necessary. This was a very interesting realization!
6/28
So my left leg wasn’t completely drenched in sweat this morning! And he was super extended! Some changes must be happening! I tell you what! I was doing something interesting this past night (and still am) and while laying supine/ on my side, I’ve been trying to contract my abdomen, like, the whole time I’m laying, until I fall asleep. I think something is going on, where my body is responding to this constant signal being sent. almost as if I’m waking it up because my brain is telling my body, this part is still relevant, TURN IT ON! So, after a long period of contraction, he is! It’s almost like I’m overriding the resting tone and spasticity! My tingles in my legs drop way off when I’m doing this! It’s sometimes hard to maintain, this constant voluntary contraction in my abdomen, but the hope is the longer I do it for, the more used to it my body gets, and the less I have to think about it!
It’s so interesting, I can feel how substantial my low back, hips, glutes, abs, quads, shins, and feet are feeling! Like I’m keeping the signals on, instead of letting them go dark, when there really should be a signal there! It’s not that our muscles and brain ever stop communicating, but the radio static comes from our body and brain being in the overdriven state, where the signals are trying to be sent, but no one is telling them to be, there’s no where for them to go, and it turns it into a hot tingly mess. I, feel, like.. I feel like I’m on to something with this. I can still breathe deeply thru my diaphragm with my abs contracted, still try to reciprocally contract my leg muscles, but now, it’s feeling that much more connected! I’m feeling how my deep thigh, inner thigh, upper glute, upper thigh areas are so much more prevalent when I’m doing this. And, the other thing too, is the “urge to pee” is changing. I think what was happening was previously, that area of my body would get all aggravated because of a lack of contraction, and it turned up as an urge to pee? Which, I guess makes sense? I don’t know, I’ll think more about this later.
I’m still hung up on how Tolkien describes sadness. I can’t believe this isn’t a more prevalent topic in mainstream society! Huh, I’ll have to continue my research on this!
Workout with the pull up bar! Maybe a little too high? This was HARD. It sure got my shoulders and scapular through there range of motion, so that was helpful! My body was really trying, but I think it was too high to be as meaningful for my legs, so we will lower it tomorrow.
Summerfest! We made it! This was a wild day! It’s always a bit of a journey, heading out in the wild like this in the chair. It’s not exactly the most “festival friendly” way of getting around, because I’m so low and people have a harder time seeing you, but nonetheless we moved around pretty good! We saw a pretty cool band on the ULINE stage, called ‘Amble’ by a chance happening. We ended up staying and listening to most of their set! It was really good! Those guys from Ireland could really lay it down! Neither Callie nor I had heard of them before, and it turned out to be an amazing set!
Once we were out and about and took a seat to eat, we were all talking and having a good time, when, none other than the band we just got done seeing, sat down 3 tables down from us! So, after a little time discussing, Jeff and I go down to say hello! The guys were super friendly and down to earth! It was great being able to catch them and let them know they played a good set!
It was a long night, and it sure got the body tired. Better not be up too late! We have a lot to do still this weekend!
The Astronaut on Earth 
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