Rest-Activity Pacing

Two things that help me focus when I am having a bad brain fog day but I know I need to get something done:

My first rec would be to treat yourself the same way you would treat a child— gently take care of yourself, listen to your body, give yourself water and nourishing food, take your meds, scedule rest, and be willing to break tasks up into smaller chunks of time.

That leads me into my second recommendation: rest-activity pacing. You scedule rest, then do the activity for a scheduled amount of time, then rest some more (then repeat the process). Depending on your energy (physically, mentally, and/or emotionally) it could look anywhere from 1 hour of rest then 30 minutes of work, 20 min of rest then 20 min of work, or even 1 hour of rest then 2 hours of work. It just depends on how you’re feeling and what works for you, so you really have to be in tune and not push yourself (I usually have to set a timer for tasks to have a firm cutoff or else I will overdo it and then the rest-activity pacing doesn’t work). Then when it comes time to the resting period (for however long that may look for you), make sure it’s actually restful. So since you’re in the middle of a migraine, maybe closing your eyes during your break and relaxing your muscles, or walking into a different room to look away from your computer screen may be helpful. Something else that usually helps my brain fog is keeping in mind what time of day is usually your “lagging hour” and try to schedule rest then too if possible.

This rest-activity pacing technique helps me pace myself rather than trying to knock out a series of tasks all together then getting burnt out and having to take longer to recover in the end. If you totally ignore how you’re feeling, then you may end up accomplishing less and feeling even worse in the grand scheme of things.