Sunday, August 16, 2009

Memory: Modeling the Latest in Hypertonic Arm Posture

This is me at four, modeling the latest in hypertonic arm posture. Hypertonia is the opposite of hypotonia: it means it's easier to flex your muscles than it is to extend them. If you fingers curl just a bit when you relax them -- well, that's hypertonia's 'normal cousin'. When my arms dangle, it can feel like they have weights attached to them; that sense of weightedness disappears when my forearms are supported or angled upwards. Ah, but across my life, many people have interpreted as fear what is a matter of muscle tone!