Have you ever had to have an MRI? If you have ever experienced this claustrophobic ordeal you might relate!
Yesterday I had a neurology appointment that resulted in several tests being required over the next few weeks. The first medical test to be accomplished was my MRI. The MRI was to check out the median nerve which originates in the neck, travels down the arms, wrists, and terminates in the thumbs.
I called Atlanta to try to talk the captors of the “Amber Alert Blonde Lady”, better know as Karen, into letting me ask her a question or two. They obliged my request! Since she has been known to hang out around hospitals in her “senior years”, who best to explain to me what an MRI entails! She was only allowed a few minutes on the phone, so the explanation was brief.
I will try to give you a better idea of what the patient goes through! When I first walked into the room where the machine was located, I spied the microscopic hole that they were going to stuff me into! The sliding shelf that I was to lie down on looked to be as wide a tongue depressor! How am I going to be comfortable on this narrow sliding “tongue depressor” for the 30-40 minutes that the tests takes to accomplished! I was about to find out.
I was instructed to lie down and put my head into the contraption that was to keep my head and neck in position and completely immobile. I was about to find out if I am, in fact, claustrophobic! As I was about to be inserted in to this keyhole of an opening, the technician put into my hand a sphere that, if I squeezed it, would alert the technician that I was about to become “POSTAL”! That would trigger the technician to immediately stop this procedure.
Just prior to my final rights, I was told that, because the MRI was to observe the median nerve in my neck, I could not be given a headset to block out all the noise and have some soothing music in my ears…just ear plugs!!
The technician started up the machine and away I went into the dark hole of “claustrophobia”! As soon as my head was sucked inside the tube, I saw the roof of the tube just above my nose, I realized that the only way to keep my sanity was to close my eyes, and don’t open them!!
So here I am, no headset with music to calm my nerves, only ear plugs to try to drown out the horrendous noise that the machine is noted for reverberating in the tube! “How long is this going last”, kept running through my brain? Why couldn’t I have a little light and easy listening music of maybe ZZ Top, The Eagles, Electric Light Orchestra, Bob Seger, or Bon Jovi? How about some Alan Jackson, Brad Paisley, Kenny Chesney, or “The Boss”, Bruce Springsteen? Oh no, I had to listen the pounding of the MRI machine!
I was just about at my wits end when the technician started me out of the dark whole of claustrophobia! After 35 minutes the test was over! Hallalujah!!
Well I didn’t go POSTAL and I didn’t get fitted with a straight-jacket, either! That can only be viewed as a success story!!