6/7/26 – Long Trip Back
Okay, I heard mom say in the distance, “they’re going thru Richmond” and that was my queue to wake up! Look at my watch, it’s barely 8:00am, oof! Better get moving!! John and Jill are coming over, and they are bringing the little ones!! Always fun to see what they are up to! And there’s a new one to meet!
Family visits are always great over here at my parent’s house! Glad John and Jill were able to come and bring Jesse over too for me to meet him! What a special little guy! He really is growing so fast!! Same with Julia! She’s talking so much!
Long drive back to Michigan as always! Goodness! Crazy I was able to do all this in one weekend on my own! Slowly but surely I’m crossing things off the list and doing more and more! It’s been a long day, not much else to report on. Got in the standing frame to round things out!
6/8/26 – Unsure What To Do
When I woke up this morning, I was wondering why my head was so much closer to the wall than usual? And interestingly enough, I had felt my legs doing something, alternating… my legs and feet were alternately pushing into my heels, and I could feel my head slowly start to inch towards the wall??!?! As my legs are pushing more and more into extension, I’m thinking my body is slowly also moving up towards the wall in the bed!?!
I think I went to sleep at about 8pm last night. Goodness, these past 3 days have been brutal on my body! Just super busy and full! I woke up this AM, and I’m still very tired! Goodness!
Feet are changing drastically, ankles, and glutes are working to try to move towards extension more and more!
Weekend was long, can’t believe I made that trip on my own! Goodness! Learning a lot about my bowel and bladder, what sensations are real and not, and what I can sometimes to adjust how everything is going. It’s crazy, waking up sometimes. Filled with hope and despair. This might be a sign to me that I’m tired… oof!
What are all the foundational movements? What are they for infants working towards walking? Or animals? Can I do most of them? What do I still need to work on? Hmm?
Honestly I was exhausted today. My body sure needed an easy day.
6/9/26 – ‘Time’
Wow, my body is making the changes! Low back, hips, glutes are firing up and staying online more and more!! My knees are sore???!? Quads are feeling alive!?! And my feet are always on the change these days as well! Sleeping thru the night has been a welcome change!! Man oh man, is there a lot to do on the daily, I’ll tell ya that!
So, ‘Time’. Me and time seem to have an interesting relationship. It’s always moving, always changing, and I seem to always want to fit as much as I can in a day. It’s tough these days because everything takes me so much longer. Instead of getting ready for work in 20min or whatever, I now take over 1 – 1 1/2hrs! Ugh, the worst! Just not what you always what you want to spend your time doing! And then the bathroom….. ugh….. so much time. And the feeling of so much time wasted. It’s brutal.
I’m trying to work on this, not quite really sure what I need to do just yet, but it’s a hard time when having to face a reality like this. I feel like my mind is working better than ever, and a body that is playing catch up. It’s hard. It’s almost like watching your life pass before your eyes, in real time. It’s not fun. I am not sure what to do about all this. Ugh. For now though, it’s time to get up!!
Okay, for some reason, while up in the standing frame in the afternoon at work, I could feel my low back and glutes firing consistently! They were really working! It was crazy! I don’t know what did it?!? Only thing, I can even think, is my attitude today?
I felt….. different than I usually do? Almost like closer to my real self? Like my actual self and actual personality? I didn’t wear a hoodie today too! This was almost like my first time at work I think…. Ever?!?
Such an incredible leap today! I’m not sure why or how even my body is able to do it? Sometimes it doesn’t all make sense? Just each day, I know he’s getting better!
6/10/26 – Neural Fatigue & Body Changes
They’re getting stronger?! I can feel the night time changes!? why is it that I get so sad sometimes??
It’s so interesting, so many things throughout my life all seemed so close, I could do them later, and now they all seem so far away. It’s odd how this has transpired? Why is it this way? Why does it have to be this way?
The stress and angst that comes from the lack of doing things is sometimes the oddest part of what is happening in my body? How do I change or fix this? Happy seated, happy standing? Is that part of it?
I feel lost for words right now. So much sensation thru my low back and glutes, quads, knees, shins, and feet!!! Do I let my body do what it wants, and work my body in ways that I want? It’s just tricky to balance. Last night had to be up a bit later to try and pack!
Neurological fatigue, it’s almost like I am becoming more and more in sync and in touch with this sensation when it is happening, more and more. It’s interesting because my heart rate is low, but my ‘body stress’ is high? I need to look into what Garmin is going to calculate body stress, because it’s interesting when that is happening to me, and I’m trying to manage it in real time? Neural fatigue. In my body and my mind? It’s weird too, how leaning back with feet on floor in the chair, my feet start to stomp? It’s something about the pelvis and hip being extended?
Good walk today! My pants and bladder didn’t like it though…
6/11/26 – Cognitive / Mental Overload
Man oh man! This tight left side! I don’t know why he’s gotta be such a menace!! These legs are waking up like crazy! Who would have thought that if you just didn’t take spasm medications, neurological pain killers, exercised, worked them, wrote, that sensation and activation would continually improve like in my situation? I know it’s not the case for everyone, but why me?
I didn’t want to get Botox either, it was interesting talking to the PT student, and how both the quads and the hamstrings cross two joints. They help with hip flexion/extension and knee flexion/ extension. It’s odd sometimes how our body works, but if I’m getting reflexive and voluntary contractions back, why would I want to stifle that progress? Interesting too, how cardio and reciprocal motion is also really helping!
It’s just an every day thing though. If I can fit movement in, stretching, and some down time in extended positions, it really helps!
I turned off the alarm and got a few extra Z’s. I better get moving! the apartment is getting packed up and that day is getting closer and closer! It’s kinda wild it’s happening! It will be great to get this done, and then I can continue to keep up my progress in my body!
Also, I wonder what the best walker / collapsible walker will be to take for travel?! I need to start looking!
Lower outer legs and feet are off the charts! Knees are feeling wild too! It’s all filling in!
It’s just tough! Where do you find time to fit everything in! Relationships, work, house renovations, exercise, time to eat, packing, sleep?!? Ugh.
I simultaneously feel so overwhelmed and equally so stinkin busy. I don’t know where I fit it all in, or where I fit in, in the world. Just such a liminal state for so many reasons.
I’m also “pre-missing” the apartment already. I’ve noticed that I’ve traded views of the lake, with sounds of the birds in the distance. Interesting too, how I can pick out the 5-6 songbirds in the distance, all singing their own unique songs. It’s so different than what was by the lake apartment we were at.
I still don’t get enough movement in these days, and it’s making my body and mind sad. It’s hard when your body is in such a state as mine, and I’m required and trying to do so much here simultaneously.
I can feel how my body is still working daily on these nervous system connections. The brain fog, heady lifting-ness, and also needing to try to keep my head above water. It’s tough. There is so much happening, I don’t want to slow down my body progress. I want the rest of the world to catch up so I can focus in on my body.
My eyes-head can’t focus. I fell asleep in the car at 3:52pm. I don’t even exactly know how that happened? And so quickly? Everything is squeezing so hard. I don’t know what is going on. I’m sad. I feel deflated. Like the front top half of my head is going to just lift off and float away?
My body is full of angst. And not the teenage kind. I don’t ‘want’ to do anything. I like, I don’t want to learn life in this chair. I don’t want to exist in it. I don’t feel good in my skin. I feel sad-broken. With every next word feeling like it’s going to make some large revelation from the last. I’m tired. I feel so conflagrated. I don’t know if that’s the right word, but that’s what comes to mind?
6/12/26 – Let It Ride
Wow!! Hip stepping in place?! Hip rotation? Quad activation? Feet feeling softer / cooler? I can feel how my glutes and posterior side is wanting to get me in extension, but I can definitely feel the stretch and tightness coming from my obliques, all the way thru my hip flexors, and now this is turning into quad activation! My legs are rhythmically stepping in bed, and I just let it ride! I try to just let my body feel it, experience it, and allow it to happen. Almost like walking normally? You don’t think about it, you just get up, and let it happen?
So weird! This pelvis (the bowl) is so intertwined into this movement! I’ve been watching at work other folks walking around, and I can see the twist, rotation, and initiation of stepping, and it all definitely comes from that bowl on top of our legs! I take a deep breath in, I feel the tightness in my low abs, the activation in my core, quads, glutes, outer legs and feet, and then they start to try to move!
I keep my head up, my chin held high, and I try to engage that whole posterior chain. There’s this whole symphony of muscles that are working to play in sync with one another. Who’s the director of this orchestra? It feels like that director is a lot less silent than we think? Is that the spinal cord working silently behind the scenes, helping direct, but never showing his face?
The amount of muscles from our trunk to our toes has to be a pretty high number, on the order of 10+ muscle groups with the amount of individual muscle bellies somewhere greater than that? I guess that’s something I’m trying to figure out, the balance between volitional and reflexive? How to train the reflexive CPG’s? It feels like it’s not exactly the same as “strength” training? Exposure to repetition? High reps? Less thinking?
I get motivated, try to work on ideas, and then the busy life gets ahead of me. (Sigh). Working on getting that all taken care of so that I can redirect my energy and time! There’s only so much you can do in a day, and I think I’m finding out my maximum’s for activities. Now just need to continue to focus and go from there!
Why is it that a deep deep breath into my low abdomen starts or initiates some kicking? That oxygen has to be important here, makes me almost think that signals to muscles can’t be completed without a fresh oxygen supply? Without the oxygen, what are the muscles to actually do with the signal? Is this why the cardio is so important for waking up dormant muscle groups? Because I’m feeling the carryover from all this cardio and it’s just really making me think, is all!
Don’t look down. Look up! Keep that head up! Would you rather be able to see your feet, or feel your feet? I feel like I can hear almost every coach in my head telling my to keep my head up! To just let my legs do the work, let me feel them do the work, don’t overload our brain with all the visuals, just let our body work it out? Another idea I’m messing around with!
Time to start the day! I like where my mind is at, let’s continue to try to focus! Happy seated, happy standing, trusting our body, having hope where you want your energy directed. Just small steps today, Joe. You got this.
What’s crazy is how busy these days are. I get close to the end of the day, and I still feel like I haven’t done enough. Why? Why am I always trying to feel like I need to optimize?
6/13/26 – Big Move
Yesterday flew by?! It came and it went! Today I hope isn’t too too much in the chair, because I’ve had too many days of them! It’s been busy!
Today is the big move day, I need to get up and get moving!
Busy, busy day. It’s a shame how defeated I feel, moving towards the end of the day. I wonder if that’s how the Zulu warriors felt, as they were constantly battling the British and losing out on their land? Random thought, I know, but there is a Zulu warrior painted on the wall we drive by in Bayview and I looked him up finally? Interesting!
Just now, in a figure 4 stretched position, at 10:55pm, I’m noticing something. That when I inhale deeply while holding the stretch for 4-10s, then relax on the exhale, my lower left abdomen is relaxing, tremendously, as it typically sits so tight throughout the day! And then the signals appear to be more smooth and clearer down to my toes, because they then start wiggling too!?
Legs don’t get sweaty either in this position with the deep breathing + stretching routine! I also feel my lower back engaging a ton more, as well as my feet and legs!
It was interesting, this girl today while I was helping load up the trucks with the guys, walked up to me and said to me, “you know, your attitude is honestly really cool! Don’t take this the wrong way, but some people I have seen in wheelchairs aren’t so happy, and I see you with such a positive attitude! And then that’s when she goes in and says she wants to pray for me! I said, yeah sure! So she said a quick prayer, and we went on our way! How kind!
My legs honestly started to feel… different? It was really interesting to note! My body really wants to get up, I feel like the connection we have with others does something to us, but I have no idea why?
My legs right now after stretching these hip adductor muscles, are honestly really straight for only stretching these hips!!
BUSY DAY! We’re tired!! First night in the bed in the new house! We made it!!! Callie and I need some rest! It’s been a heckuva day, and I’m so glad my buddies and Addie were able to come and help us with this move! This was so huge to have all the help!! Good friends really make quite the difference! Thanks guys!
The Astronaut on Earth 
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