The Daily Hailey

Husband time! 

This is Brady stepping in for a hubsby post. Hailey asked me to write about my experience in the MRI machine last night. So here you go.

I was originally booked to go in Monday the 8th in the evening but Hailey and I both felt like that was so long to just sit and wait so she suggested on Tuesday morning that I call to see if any time slot open up. Guess what, they had one! So we went in last night for 10:30pm. Apparently the MRI clinic at our hospital is open til 12am every day. They must be a busy place. 

They had asked me to wear clothes that didn’t have any metal on them if possible so I donned my Daddyplushy-for-around-the-house outfit and Hailey and I headed in for a quick subway supper before my oddly late appointment. 

Thanks be to Cher for finishing up bedtime with the kids so we could go in a little early!

We weren’t sure if Hailey would be allowed to come into the clinic with me to wait so she opted to wait in the van and occupy herself with scrolling on her phone and crocheting.

Turns out she could’ve come and waited inside because I saw a lady waiting for her husband in there. His pants and coat neatly folded on her lap while she scrolled on her phone. The guy definitely came out of his appointment in a T shirt and long johns.

Long johns in public. What has this pandemic done to us? 

I was shortly lead into the back waiting area where I was given and locker to leave my belongings in and then sit and wait in a second waiting room. With no phone! I am way too dependant on my phone to pass the time because I really only had to wait about 15 minutes but I was SO bored. *facepalm* In typical contractor fashion I was looking around analyzing the workmanship of room I was waiting in. Hahaha!

I was briefly joined by a very chatty gentleman who apparently was scheduled for the exact same time that I was, however, he did not arrive in the window they asked him to arrive in and was made to wait longer. 

I was brought further back around 10:10pm and I was asked to switch out my mask for a mask without wire and sanitize my hands. Makes sense. 

I mentioned to the tech that I had been a welder in the past and that I’d had an orbital X-ray done recently to confirm that I didn’t have any metal flecks in my eyes, and I hadn’t received the results. She made a quick check of my chart to confirm that I had been cleared for the MRI and I was. I don’t know about the rest of you but I wanted to make darn sure I wasn’t gonna be stuck to the inside of that thing.

I was then ushered through and door with a big, bright ‘DANGER’ sign on it and I knew I was headed to the show. And it was a show. I felt very important to be brought in for a scan in such an extravagant machine. I was told to lay down with my head in the cradle and given headphones to protect my ears from the noise. I would liken the cage they placed over my head to being made into a human trouble light. Thoughtfully, a mirror was added within my eye-line so that I could see my own feet and the mirrored glass was behind which sat the tech at her computer. It was at this point she told me that my scan would be roughly an hour. 

Yikes!

With some 70s soft rock as my soundtrack I slowly glided in about waste deep. The close proximity of the machine was a small adjustment for but I was prepared for it and it wasn’t an issue for me. The tech then warned me there would be some louder noises which was followed by what a noise that I would describe as shoving your head into a dot matrix printer while it’s printing. 

I was slowly moved further and further into the machine as it was ‘getting the lay of the land’. After being slid in as far as my shins it stopped trying to be a printer and instead decided to warn me that my space ship was about to self destruct. Imagine being onboard Apollo 13 when everything went to poop and thats about how it felt to be in that machine in that moment. Not the panic, just the sights and sounds.

I was then pummelled with a barrage of sounds I can only describe as a super distorted synthesizer  turned up to 11. And controlled by an annoying sibling. I was also able to pick out some metal drummer style blast beats and variant timings. An alternating 9/8 to 7/8 time signature was a groove that was hard for the metal head in me to resist. I found it to be an oddly musical machine. 

I quickly came to enjoy the solitude and the abundance of sensory input gave me a sense of what its like to be in a sensory deprivation tank. Perhaps a sensory overload tank. Has anyone copyrighted that idea yet? Maybe I should. Hahaha

At 20 minutes in the tech stopped the machine and asked me how I was doing. I responded that I was doing well but that my face was itchy. I heard a ‘You can take care of that now’, and managed to find a way through the trouble light cage to scratch my face vigourously. 

The next 20 minutes were pretty low key and the tech’s periodical ‘The table will move now’ was a singsongy break from the deep distorted synth monotony. And after another 20 minutes she stopped to check on me again. Itches had come and gone without being scratched and I was good to keep going.

The last 20-30 minutes probably went the quickest. By this time I was well accustomed to the noise and the occasional table movements. It was soothing, and I had been up since 6:20. 

And then I dosed off. During the MRI. It was nice.

I’d wake up every minute or two when the table would move and then slowly drift off again. I have no idea if the tech could see me face or not, she could probably tell that I fell asleep a couple times. But I didn’t mind. 

Eventually the synth stopped and the tech chimed in that we were done and she was coming to get me out. I was slowly brought out of the machine like a life size 3D printed Brady and brought to life. She informed me that the scans would be looked at the next day and passed along to my doctors on Friday and she ushered me out.

The MRI clinic was eerily quiet and abandoned. I’m pretty sure the tech and I were the last two people in the clinic. I quickly grabbed my stuff out of my assigned locker and made my way out of the hospital to find my wife waiting in the van.

In true Hailey fashion, she was helping a stranger in need. Another guy in the same parking lot had a dead battery and she was attempting to give him a boost. Unfortunately, our van requires a very specific method to boost another car. Luckily, I arrived just as they were attempting to figure it out and I was able to help and get the guy’s SUV running within a minute or two. A fun activity to end an eventful evening.

So that’s the story of my MRI last night. I weirdly enjoyed it. And I hope my retelling has been enjoyable. 🙂

Have a good evening folks!