Knitting with Fibro

LOL!

This is kind of in response to someone else who mentioned having fribromyalgia and how you have to knit for short periods rather than long stretches of time.

I too have fibro. I also have some problems with my memory, or at least I must have because I put my knitting down a few minutes ago after knitting for about two hours. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me, why I was so tired and ached all over. D'oh!

Half an hour, maybe an hour at a time is more than enough, especially when it's hobby knitting and not knitting for a deadline. ;-)

Murielle

Reply to
MSey
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I'd say that's more than enough for anyone at one time! After an hour it would be time to put the kettle on for a cuppa anyway, let alone give muscles a rest. :) Computer workers aren't recommended to work solidly for more than an hour without a decent break either.

VP

Reply to
Vintage Purls

I used to be able to knit for hours while watching TV. Maybe it's the fibro, maybe it's my age. Or, maybe, back then, it just seemed like hours. ;-))

Murielle

Reply to
MSey

Well...when one does medical transcription and needs to work between schlepping the kids to and from school and various other things, one works when one can. I pretty much type straight through from 10 AM until 2 PM, and again from about 4 PM until I'm done for the day, only taking breaks to make dinner and, if I'm particularly swamped, put the little one to bed. Any wonder my nerve damage has been showing itself lately???

And then what do I do if I have time after I'm finished typing to relax?? Knit, of course

The Other Kim kimagreenfieldatyahoodotcom

Reply to
The Other Kim

Exactly! Because knitting is relaxing. ;-)

Murielle

Reply to
MSey

Hi VP,

I've found when programming that doing exactly what you wrote actually _increases_ the speed of writing my plug-ins! - it somehow seems to expand my creativity and problem-solving. :-)

David

Reply to
David R. Sky

Indeed. Though this is a lesson that can't be taught to the average student in my experience, they equate "screen time" with productivity despite plenty of evidece to the contrary. It's a bit like trying to do a jigsaw puzzle, there is a point in one session where no matter how long you stare at the pieces you can't find the bit you want. Get up, do something else and come back to it - chances are good you'll spot the piece you want in the first minute.

I often solve problems as I drift off to sleep - my subconcious sorts the logic and I have an "ah ha" moment, if I'm really lucky I manage to scrawl a few notes before I drift off, otherwise I often realise I can't remember my "brilliant" solution the next morning. :)

VP

Reply to
Vintage Purls

I've solved many programming problems as I drifted off to sleep too - the way I remember them is to wake up enough to deliberately picture the program code in my mind plus generate a feeling of the solution. It doesn't make sense for me to try to explain the feeling - it means something to my mind at the time I'm in bed. :-)

I understand that Thomas Edison developed a strategy - when he was trying to figure out something, he'd put a tin plate on the floor underneath one of his hands as he sat in a comfortable chair, holding a piece of cutlery in the hand above the plate. As he drifted off to sleep and entered the so-called hypnagogic state you referred to, his hand relaxed enough to let the cutlery drop on the plate, which would wake him from the solution brewing in his mind.

David

Reply to
David R. Sky

Reply to
B Vaugha

For programming or anything else that requires serious thinking, that is certainly true. However, doing medical transcription, as Kim does, doesn't really require thinking, and actually I find that I can blaze away at those kinds of things if I get myself into a zone where I'm not much thinking at all. Taking a break requires time to get back to the zone.

Reply to
B Vaugha

Ah yes, we have strayed a little from the original topic. Althought the "mental" benefits may not be of concern, the physical benefits of not maintaining a repetative activity for long periods without a break are still important. I'll be the first to admit that I disregard my own advice regularly. But if I've just spent 3 solid hours typing or knitting and I'm feeling sore I think I can guess the cause of the effect. :)

Reply to
Vintage Purls

Uh, yeah, it does. You can't do medical transcription well with your brain parked in neutral. You have to be thinking about whether the doctor is saying that right thing, in some cases you have to be trying to undecipher the gibberish that you are hearing and make something intelligible about it, and in some cases you have to translate lousy English grammar into something grammatically correct.

Although I will concede that medical transcription not as cerebral of a profession as application programming, it has been the most cerebral of an occupation I could find ever since leaving application programming after having my first child.

Reply to
Melinda Meahan - take out TRAS

I sometimes have "dreams" of a solution then wake and try it, or write it down... the subconscious is a might fine thing.

Murielle

Reply to
MSey

That would be me! ;o)

I have more than Fibromyalgia... I also have arthritis which tends to bind up my fingers in pain if I overdo it.... not to mention the degenerative disks in my back and neck that SCREAM at me if I sit (or even lay) in just the wrong way for too long. I have a few other medical problems too that I won't go into... but they sure aren't pleasant to deal with either.

Yep, that would definitely be the Fibromyalgia. Keeps you on your toes wondering what new and *fun* (sarcasm inserted) things it will bring you each day, doesn't it? ;o)

Absolutely! Glad I don't, and didn't, knit for a living... I'd never make deadlines. ;o)

*hugs* Gemini
Reply to
Not Likely

Absolutely! Some of my best poems and story ideas came to me while I was in a deep sleep. My overactive mind woke me up enough for me to reach out in the dark (I hate lights when I first wake up) and grab a pen or pencil and write it on the back of an envelope, or whatever piece of paper that happened to be on my bedside table. Deciphering it in the morning, with all the lines going through each other, was a treat... but I managed. I still jot things down in the middle of the night, even if it is just an idea that happened to pop in my head about something I had been trying to remember earlier... something we need in groceries... or whatever seemingly unimportant thing it may be. If it really is unimportant enough, I will just discard it in the light of day... otherwise it gets transferred to a notebook for safekeeping in case it should come in handy in future. ;o)

*hugs* Gemini
Reply to
Not Likely

It's a great idea to keep a notebook by your bedside to jot down the things that come to us in the night. :-)

Murielle

Reply to
MSey

I knew it was someone! ;-))

What was it Shakespeare said? ... Sorrows come not single spies but in batallions ... something like that. We could replace the word "sorrows" with Fibro, could we? As if it's not enough to deal with.

So much "fun"! LOL!

One of my mother's friends used to do that ... poor woman would be up all night finishing a sweater or suit. And it wasn't that lucrative. I don't know how she did it.

Hugs, Murielle

Reply to
MSey

Ooh, what a nice, gussied-up way to say, "It never rains but it pours" for sad things! I have to remember this one.

Reply to
Melinda Meahan - take out TRAS

Definitely! I learned that years ago, after doing the whole back of the envelope thing once too often. Now I have a notepad beside the bed with a pen, and another pad and pen in the drawer in case the one on top was moved at some point during the day and was forgotten about. ;o)

*hugs* Gemini
Reply to
Not Likely

I was just thinking the same thing. I love Shakespeare, and I somehow doubt that he would take offense to his words being played with just a bit to make it about Fibromyalgia (or whatever other annoyance we have to deal with). I wouldn't be surprised (although they wouldn't know it back then, as it's fairly recent) if Shakespeare actually had Fibromyalgia himself, and that could very well be the "sorrows" he was referring to! ;o)

*hugs* Gemini
Reply to
Not Likely

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