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Rating the week's tasks heavy, medium or light, giving each day a budget, and spreading the load with rest blocks and a buffer day.
Paper packet. Every task here also exists on screen, where it is checked automatically; answers written on paper are not assessed by Nydus. When you are back at a device, enter your answers there.
You will rate a week's tasks from a log, add up each day against a budget, and move, share or drop tasks so that heavy days are spread out, with a rest on every day and a buffer day kept free.
You can write a routine on a card and notes that make sense later. This lesson steps back to the whole week, because a routine only works if the days around it leave room for it. The ratings and points here belong to invented people and are a planning tool, not a measurement. If a therapist has given you an energy or activity plan of your own, follow theirs. This is optional practice alongside your own care, not treatment and not a measure of recovery. If anything about your memory, speech, energy or thinking is new or changing, tell your own clinicians.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Planning points | A number from 1 to 3 you give a task from your own experience of it. |
| Budget | The points an ordinary day comfortably holds, taken from your own log. |
| Heavy task | A task that last time left you needing to lie down: 3 points. |
| Rest block | A rest written into the day before any task, such as 1:30 to 2:00, feet up. |
| Buffer day | A day with little planned, kept for the week's surprises. |
| Three Ps | Plan, prioritise and pace: the occupational therapists' summary of energy management. |
The support is a week planner on a single page: the seven days side by side, each task written on its day with its points in the margin, the day's total at the bottom, and a line for the budget. A pencil matters here, because a plan is made to be moved around.
Two things go in before any task: a rest block on every day, such as 1:30 to 2:00, feet up, and one buffer day with little planned, for the week's surprises.
Fatigue is one of the most common after-effects of stroke. A 2016 review and meta-analysis (Cumming and colleagues) pooled studies using one fatigue questionnaire and estimated that about half of stroke survivors reported significant fatigue, with individual studies ranging from 25% to 85%. It is common after other injuries and illnesses too. A week planned around it is not a lesser week; it is one that can be kept.
The method has four parts. Rate each task from your own experience: heavy (3 points), medium (2) or light (1). Set a budget: the points an ordinary day comfortably holds, found from your own log. Spread: at most one heavy task a day, a lighter day after a heavy one, a rest block on every day and a buffer day in the week. Move, share or drop whatever does not fit.
The Royal College of Occupational Therapists, the professional body for occupational therapists in the United Kingdom, teaches energy management as the three Ps: plan the week ahead, prioritise what matters, and pace each task. The points are simply a way to do the planning on paper.
Another way: picture
Christine Miserandino's spoon theory (2003) pictures each day's energy as a handful of spoons. Every task costs some: a shower one, a trip to the store several. Spend them all on Monday and Tuesday starts with fewer. The planning points in this lesson are spoons written down.
Another way: steps
A task's rating is yours, and it comes from what happened afterwards, not from how the task sounds:
| What the log says afterwards | Rating | Points |
|---|---|---|
| needed to lie down | heavy | 3 |
| needed to sit down for a while | medium | 2 |
| carried on as normal | light | 1 |
A grocery shop may be heavy for one person and light for another, and heavy in a crowded store but medium early on a weekday morning. When a rating changes, change the number. The budget comes from the same log: add up the points on a few days that went well, and use about that.
When a day is over budget, three moves fix it. Move a task to a lighter day, ideally one without a heavy task already. Share it: a neighbor carries the recycling, a relative drives to the pharmacy counter, groceries are delivered. Drop it this week: the windows will still be there.
Before moving anything, sort the list by two questions. Does it have to happen this week? Does it have to be me? A task with a deadline stays; a task someone else could do is a candidate for sharing; a task with neither is a candidate for next week.
The three Ps come from ordinary occupational-therapy advice on managing energy, and they are easiest to see in a week with something special in it. Grace, a fictional grandmother, has a budget of about 6 points a day. Her grandson is visiting on Saturday afternoon, which she rates heavy (3), and she also wants to bake for it (2) and do the grocery shop (3).
Written on Saturday together, that is 8 points: over budget before the visit even starts. Using the three Ps, she plans the baking for Friday morning, where the day holds only laundry and a phone call (3 points, so 5 with the baking). She prioritises: the grocery shop matters, but her daughter can bring the groceries with the grandson, so it is shared. Saturday now holds just the visit, and Sunday stays light with church and a short walk. The visit gets her best afternoon instead of her last one.
Pack the good days full. A good day spent completely often costs the next one or two. Spreading the load keeps more days usable.
Rest only counts when I am tired. A rest written in advance happens before the tiredness does; that is what makes it work.
The points show how well I am doing. They are a pencil tool for arranging a week. They are never compared with anyone else's, and a lower budget this month is information for planning, not a grade.
Rate each task and write its points beside it.
grocery shop 3 · vacuuming 3 · laundry 2 · library trip 2 · phone call 1
Ratings come from Lou's own log of what happened afterwards.
Add up Monday.
Mon: grocery shop 3 + laundry 2 + phone call 1 → 6
The budget is 6, so Monday is full but fits.
Add up Tuesday.
Tue: vacuuming 3 + laundry 2 + library trip 2 + phone call 1 → 8
Two points over budget, so Tuesday must change.
Check the rules as well as the totals.
one heavy task each on Mon and Tue · no light day between them
Even within budget, two heavy days in a row is worth moving if possible.
Find a lighter day for the extra points.
Wed: phone call 1 + short walk 1 → 2 points
Wednesday has room and no heavy task.
Move one medium task from Tuesday to Wednesday.
library trip (2): Tue 8 → 6 · Wed 2 → 4
Both days now fit the budget.
Share or drop what is left over.
second laundry load → next Monday
Moving a task to next week is part of the plan.
Write in the rest blocks and the buffer day.
1:30–2:00 feet up, every day · Thursday: buffer, nothing heavy
Rests go in before tasks, and the buffer absorbs whatever goes wrong.
List Thursday's tasks with their points.
bank trip 2 · cook a batch of soup 3 · water the plants 1
Each rating comes from the log.
Add them up.
2 + 3 + 1 → 6
The total is compared with the budget of 6.
Decide whether Thursday fits.
Rosa has three heavy jobs this week: the grocery shop, cleaning the bathroom, and a trip to the county clerk's office. Which fictional plan is balanced?
Lou's fictional Tuesday holds 8 points against a budget of 6, and Wednesday holds 2. Lou moves the library trip, a medium task, to Wednesday. Complete the check.
Give the moved task its points.
library trip, medium → a points
A medium task is worth two planning points.
Take it off Tuesday.
8 − two points → b points on Tuesday
Tuesday now sits exactly on its budget, which fits.
Add it to Wednesday.
Wednesday's light load plus the trip → c points on Wednesday
Wednesday stays under budget, so the move works for both days.
Sort Rosa's fictional tasks for the week before she plans the days.
| Must do this week | Could share with someone | Can wait for another week | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Renew the car registration (due Friday) | |||
| Carry the heavy recycling to the curb | |||
| Sort the box of old photos | |||
| Wash the outside of the windows |
Lou's fictional log says what happened after each task last week. Rate each task heavy, medium or light, and give its planning points.
| Rating | Points | |
|---|---|---|
| Grocery shop: lay down for an hour after. | ||
| Laundry: sat down for 15 minutes after. | ||
| Phone call to the bank: carried on as normal. | ||
| Vacuuming the house: lay down after. |
Lou's fictional budget is 6 points a day. Monday: grocery shop (3), laundry (2), phone call (1). Tuesday: vacuuming (3), laundry (2), library trip (2), phone call (1). Wednesday: phone call (1), short walk (1). Give each day's total and the number of days over budget.
Monday a, Tuesday b, Wednesday c. Days over budget: d.
A fictional budget of 7 points a day. Thursday already holds 3 points of fixed tasks, and 1 point is kept spare as a buffer. How many extra points of tasks could go on Thursday?
This task has no paper form; do it on a device.
Grace's grandson visits for a fictional afternoon on Saturday (heavy, 3 points). Her budget is 6 points a day. Fill in each day's total and whether it fits.
| Total points | Against the budget | |
|---|---|---|
| Friday: laundry (2), phone call (1) | ||
| Saturday: visit (3), baking for it (2), grocery shop (3) | ||
| Sunday: church (2), short walk (1) |
Lesson test: one question per skill, one attempt each, no hints. Your answers are checked when you submit.
Plan three fictional days with a budget of 6 points each. Already fixed: Monday 2, Tuesday 3, Wednesday 1. Place four tasks: grocery shop (3), laundry (2), bank trip (2) and a call to your sister (1). No day may go over 6.
This task has no paper form; do it on a device.
Draw next week on one page. Write in a rest block on every day and choose a buffer day before you add a single task. Next: breaking one unfamiliar job into a checklist. This is optional practice alongside your own care, not treatment and not a measure of recovery. If anything about your memory, speech, energy or thinking is new or changing, tell your own clinicians. You can stop at any point: close the page, and it reopens where you left it.
12. Your turn: Thursday's total, step 3
6 = 6 → it fits, with one heavy task only
Exactly on budget fits, and the one-heavy-task rule holds.