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Rest = Lying Down, Eyes Closed Because other parts of the program from England made sense, I decided to try resting every afternoon. After some experimentation, I determined that the most restorative rest resulted from lying down in a quiet place with my eyes closed. I was surprised at the results from taking a 15-minute rest in mid-afternoon. Even that short break seemed to help, reducing my symptoms, increasing my stamina and making my life more stable. After a while I added a similar rest in late morning. Over time, I came to believe that my scheduled rest was the most important strategy I used in my recovery. Resting everyday according to a fixed schedule, not just when I felt sick or tired, was part of a shift from living in response to symptoms to living a planned life. The experience showed me that rest could be used for more than recovering from doing too much; it could be employed as a preventive measure as well. In the terms suggested by someone in our self-help program, I learned the difference between recuperative rest and pre-emptive rest. Surprisingly, taking pre-emptive rests greatly reduced the time I spent in recuperative rest, because I was experiencing much less Post-Exertional Malaise. The result was that my total rest time was reduced.

sometimes like an idiot i assume everyone has read bruce campbell on resting/pacing to handle post-exertional malaise affiliated with chronic fatigue. that is obviously not true! anyway here's the hot guide, i linked straight to the "schedule in mandatory complete 15 min rest as part of your day and hopefully you will get to do less surprise many hours of rest to recover" section but the whole thing is laid out pretty clearly

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trying to use smaller hints to figure out how well the guys around here are doing

like the elder berry bush out front is pretty well known, usually loses its berries shortly after they ripen, but this year theyve stayed on the bush for much longer. its also been pretty wet and the bird feeders haven't been swarmed (theyre usually visited less in summer to begin with), so i suspect that it's been a pretty decent year food wise for a lot of the birds around here.

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i dont think the slew of mortons foot problems is solely (haha get it, sole as in shoes) on the whole big toe cant reach the ground angle, but also maybe on this sort of anxiety/anticipation related mechanism that sorta "winds up" the lower legs, possibly probably in relation to the whole ambush predator schtick that the neanderthals (which is where mortons neander foot comes from) have going on

in an earlier post i went into the dynamic between the tibialis anterior, tibialis posterior, and the fibularis muscles. in short, the fibularis pulls the foot outwards, which if it becomes chronic overstretches the t. posterior, which then involves the t. anterior to relieve the strain on the t. posterior, but without actually releasing the tension in the fibularis that started the whole cycle.

one reason this feedback cycle starts is because the big toe can't reach the ground for efficient walking, and the fibularis gets overworked in the first place trying to get that toe to reach. the cycle is then perpetuated by using the t. anterior, which again relieves the t. posterior but by doing so lifts the big toe off the ground again, thus forcing the fibularis to tighten further and perpetuating the cycle.

and its interesting to me that the lower leg can wind up like that to begin with, especially as ive been doing the work to unwind it, because when that wound up tension is released it's more or less a leaping motion. like as far as i can tell it's the biological equivalent to turning the lower legs into a spring, which is probably great for hunting.

but when we're talking adaptations that ambush predators might have there's this matter of timing the pounce too, which is where the theoretical anticipation mechanism comes in. so on top of the physical adaptations in the legs, im thinking there's a mental adaptation that prompts the legs to wind up in the first place, which outside of its intended context becomes the anxiety we all know and love.

so when these two factors intersect (i'd be willing to bet that some people have one but not the other) it breeds this vulnerability to stress, because stress also hits that anticipation button, and the winding of the legs without adequate release over time fucks the entire rest of the body resulting in stuff like arthritis and chronic health problems.

hence why cats seem to share a lot of those characteristics, because they're the quintessential ambush predators. maybe even why cheetahs in particular, whose entire body plan is designed for the go fast, are anxiety machines.

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hibiscus bloomed today 🥰

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hibiscus bloomed today 🥰

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every day i lie down and do my relaxation exercises thinking "surely im nearly done and there's no tension left needing release" and every day im fucking wrong.

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there are people in this neighbourhood who see that it's the hottest driest day of the week and think "ah yes Now is the time to mow the lawn"

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doing PT so I have to get serious about working through my mental block around exercise. a big part of it is that, like...the results aren't immediate, and in the case of the nerve glides and stuff I'm doing right now, it's not even supposed to feel like anything when I'm doing it. I was like, how am I supposed to motivate myself when I might as well be casting a fucking magic spell??

and THEN I was like. wait a minute. what if I pretend it is in fact a magic healing spell and these movements are a somatic ritual I am casting daily. I think this might be the move...peasant brain craves simple superstition....

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nothing funnier than seeing fanart of your mutuals blorbo and not recognizing him cus he's all dolled up and has abs. i dont go here but im pretty sure thats not him. my mutual says he's portly and middle aged and i trust them with my life.

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ITS POPPY TIME BABES

just a big pink blob amidst the ugly little strip of ground ive been rehabilitating

my poppy better bloom today goddammit

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so close 😭

my poppy better bloom today goddammit

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my poppy better bloom today goddammit

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when talking to healthcare professionals about what you can and can't do, always remember: if you can't do it without pain, then you can't do it.

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all that said, i want to ground this post on the fact that i live in a place that hasn't experienced the type of ecological destruction that many other places have. It's certainly not the bounty of diversity that it could be (that it will be!) but the animals that live here are relatively comfortable without me. comfortable enough that during the summers, the feeder will remain relatively untouched.

so context matters, too. it's easier to build a mutual relationship with other animals when both parties involved are comfortable. this fact can change wildly for people living in scarcer regions, where a food source that suddenly goes dry can trigger panic, and panic can trigger aggression. in those cases it would be even more important to start small and establish boundaries early, while also keeping in mind the circumstances a new friend is living under.

i like to feed the squirrels and ive been thinking about what goes wrong in human-animal interactions and honestly i think it really just comes down to the same things that go wrong in human-human relationships--boundaries and the ability to say no.

something i tell my housemates or anyone who wants to meet the guys i know is that every once in awhile you have to cut them off.

im personally very picky about the animals i build relationships with, so generally speaking ive stuck to feeding one squirrel, the female that denned in the tree beside the house.

she comes just about daily now, but early in the relationship i would cut her off and refuse to give her peanuts for the rest of the day using a shooing motion to help make my point. i would especially do this if she was being pushy or if i wasn't interested in her company she would get frustrated, but she quickly figured out that no means no. then, if i ran out of peanuts i could say no and she would understand. same routine with the new guy ive decided to befriend, which is especially important because he's way pushier than my first lady.

and importantly, the reverse also has to be true, and i know when they're not into me. my lady can be very flinchy, so i've gotten into the habit of freezing every time she flinches. i've also been caught trying to pull sticks out of her fur just by reflex, but she pulls away or chatters her teeth and i let her.

and same thing i tell people who want to meet my guys--when they do this, that's their way of saying no. and i feel like our relationships with all the guys that live nearby are stronger for it.

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i like to feed the squirrels and ive been thinking about what goes wrong in human-animal interactions and honestly i think it really just comes down to the same things that go wrong in human-human relationships--boundaries and the ability to say no.

something i tell my housemates or anyone who wants to meet the guys i know is that every once in awhile you have to cut them off.

im personally very picky about the animals i build relationships with, so generally speaking ive stuck to feeding one squirrel, the female that denned in the tree beside the house.

she comes just about daily now, but early in the relationship i would cut her off and refuse to give her peanuts for the rest of the day using a shooing motion to help make my point. i would especially do this if she was being pushy or if i wasn't interested in her company she would get frustrated, but she quickly figured out that no means no. then, if i ran out of peanuts i could say no and she would understand. same routine with the new guy ive decided to befriend, which is especially important because he's way pushier than my first lady.

and importantly, the reverse also has to be true, and i know when they're not into me. my lady can be very flinchy, so i've gotten into the habit of freezing every time she flinches. i've also been caught trying to pull sticks out of her fur just by reflex, but she pulls away or chatters her teeth and i let her.

and same thing i tell people who want to meet my guys--when they do this, that's their way of saying no. and i feel like our relationships with all the guys that live nearby are stronger for it.

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Designing some megafauna...

[fatal-blow]

Designing some megafauna...