MRI POWER/HAIL TO THE WHITE NOISE

WOW. Yet another lazy day... I'm terrible! I think I'm nocturnal. I stayed up all night writing, listening to music and playing on my Nintendo DS. It was great fun, though. I love being alone at night. I read somewhere that when the sun goes down, a hormone is released in our bodies to make us sleepy. I think this is probably why I feel creative, dazed and reflective at night. My symptoms are also much better at night too, but I don't know why that is! You may have noticed that I publish most of these entries way after midnight.

At night it's dark and there's no one to disturb me and if I want to, I can have complete silence, except for the furnace. I think the furnace would bother me if the air came out in perpetual "whooshes," or if the sound of the furnace was inconsistent -- some "whooshes" being louder and lasting longer than others. Well, maybe that wouldn't bother me. I like the sound of waves rushing to the shore and that sound IS a "whoosh" sound and also very inconsistent! Why are some sounds more relaxing than others? Why are some people bothered by certain sounds and others are not?

I'm reminded of the MRI I had this week. It was relaxing BECAUSE of the "clunking" sound of the machine and the loud beeping sounds it made while the machine took the pictures. I remembered enjoying previous MRI's I'd had before, so I put myself into the same head space I'd been in during the previous scans:

I closed my eyes and concentrated on the background clunking. Gradually it became white noise and I started to fall asleep. Then the beeping started -- well, actually it's more like "honking". The first couple of "honks" annoyed me, but I concentrated on them also and they too became white noise. The honking created this buzz in my head that I liked. The machine wasn't vibrating; the buzz was caused by the loud volume of the "honking."

My head was secured in a brace with padding on the sides and a strap over my forehead to keep my head from shifting. The technician had also tucked me in tightly with a blanket. These constraints, combined with the restriction of being a tunnel, made me even more comfortable. A lot of people get claustrophobic during MRI's, but I always enjoy the privacy and coziness of it. The technician had put an emergency button in my hand to squeeze if I needed her, but I wanted to throw it onto the floor. I couldn't possibly panic in this situation. Plus, my bladder was empty. Yep, I had no reason to get out of that thing and I was disappointed when, after about twenty minutes to half an hour, it was over. Perhaps I especially enjoyed the experience because I wasn't wondering about what the results would be. I'm going to seek help regardless.