First, a bit of background. I was born with a birth defect called spina bifida. Spina bifida is a defect of the neural tube, causing paralysis of the legs, as well as bowel/bladder issues. Most people with spina bifida also have hydrocephalus, commonly called fluid on the brain. This causes damage to the frontal lobe of the brain, which causes problems with memory and cognitive function. SB also causes the body to age faster. I belong to a spina bifida support group on Facebook, and someone mentioned the "spoon theory". I was intrigued, and thought it was a great analogy. I wondered how I could sum it up in a photo. This isn't exactly what I envisioned, but I think it gets the point across. Postwork in CS5. Thanks for looking. Spoon theory From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The spoon theory is an analogy originally used by some people with a disability and people with chronic illness to describe their everyday living experience when their disability or illness (physical or mental) presents in a reduced amount of energy available for productive tasks. Spoons are an intangible unit of measurement used to track how much energy a person has throughout a given day. Each activity "costs" a certain number of spoons, which will only slowly be replaced as the person "recharges" through rest or other activities that do not require (or even refill) spoons. A person who runs out of spoons loses the ability to do anything other than rest. One of the tenets of the spoon theory is that people with disabilities, chronic illness, or mental illness must plan their daily activities to conserve their "spoons," while healthy, able-bodied, and/or neurotypical people have a "never-ending supply of spoons" and thus have never needed to worry about running out.[1] Because healthy people do not feel the impact of spending spoons for mundane tasks such as bathing and getting dressed, they may not realize the amount of energy that chronically ill or disabled people may have to get through the day.[2] Spoons are widely discussed within the autoimmune, disabled and other communities,[3][4] but the concept of spoons is otherwise considered a neologism.