Post #97: I'll be the girl in the tube

Said no nurse to me, ever. 

Haha, nurse wood. 

So: mission MRE, completed. The hospital where I had the procedure just completed a fancy schmancy upgrade of their Radiology unit, which means the MRI suite was pretty posh. Soothing, back-lit pictures of verdant fields on the ceiling. Shiny new MRI machine. Slick wood floors, un-scuffed walls, that new car smell (well not really, but no antiseptic hospital smell either). Not that it mattered, really, as I was inside a loud whirring tube for the better part of an hour, but the upgrade increased the hospital's capacity by a lot (more machines! whooooo) so there was less waiting around after I finished my barium juice. 

Getting an MRI and a CT scan are two very different animals (I had a lot of time to think in the tube). When I get a CT, I feel like the blood in my body swirls and sweeps and rushes up and down in a current, like a half empty bottle of soda that has been forgotten under the driver's seat and rolls back and forth while you drive (just me?). An MRI feels like the cells in your body are being excited, like pasta just as the water starts to boil. For whatever reason, it feels a little like being simmered. You can feel your body heating up. 

It's not painful, or even unpleasant, but like so many medical procedures it can just be followed under WEIRD. It's a weird and unnatural feeling. When they inject the contrast, and your mouth fills with the taste of what the nurse has accurately described as a combination of paint thinner/nail polish? WEIRD. The fact that they have to strap what looks like a teenage mutant ninja turtle shell onto your stomach to get a better picture of your intestines? WEIRD. The fact that you are being shuttled in and out of a giant magnetic machine, easy listening being piped into your headphones, while a nurse gives you breathing instructions (STOP BREATHING NOW)? WEIRD. The whole thing is just weird. Amazing, and weird. 

As I was being slid into the tube, I had a momentary freak out, which I think is natural when they strap down your arms, cover you with a weird turtle shell thing, tell you not to move, and shoe-horn you into a loud, enclosed plastic cylinder. The give you a panic button (which the nurse let me squeeze-it sounded like an old-timey car horn, like on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang), but after a few seconds I realized that for the next 45 minutes or so, someone else was taking over my Crohn's. All I had to do was lay there and breathe. My bowels were coated; they injected something to slow them down; my IV was in (good job veiny!); I didn't have to worry or wait or think about it in any way. So I took the break, and it was nice. 

Then I came home, the bowel-slowing-down drug wore off, and I had explosive diarrhea all afternoon. But it was nice while it lasted. 

I meet with my doctor next week to discuss next steps. I am full of drugs (so many drugs!) and side effects and anxiety, but mainly I just want a plan. As I said before, I am worn down with waiting. It's not even a questions of losing patience; that isn't a concept that really applies here. I am worn down to the point where I  am afraid to have expectations. 

Whatever happens next week, I hope that I at least find some momentum. And, you know, a better solution for this whole Crohn's problem. And maybe a puppy. FYI: I would totally settle for the first two.