MRI … want out of this thing!

Picture stuffing LeBron James into a cigar tube. It’s pretty much like that.

Last week I went to St. Joe’s Hospital for an MRI.

Despite the ravings of Donald Trump, I did not wait 17 years to get the test. In fact, I had two tests booked faster than you can say “repeal Obamacare”.

I was getting an MRI because I have a very sore shoulder. This somehow led to a very sore neck. My wife who is extremely sensitive, greeted this news with the following observation, “So ironic. You have always been a pain in the neck and now you have a pain in the neck. We should call Alanis Morissette.”

It’s this kind of support that makes a good marriage.

Anyway, I wish I had a manly, athletic story about my shoulder problem, but I don’t. The best I could come up with was that I had injured it from years of “vigorous typing.” The truth is it just kind of wore out, like youthful charm, hair follicles and that one good joke you have.

Now, several of you may be wondering what is an MRI? It stands for Magnetic Resonance Imaging. I will attempt to explain how it works. Remember that experiment in high school science class where you took a magnet and then sprinkled iron filings on a piece of paper and they formed a pattern? Me too! I have no idea how this relates to an MRI, but I just thought I would mention it.

To get these pictures you actually have to get inside the MRI machine. If you are scheduled to have your first MRI, I strongly suggest laying off the Twinkies. Before you are squeezed into the machine though, you have to take off all your clothes. Even if the MRI is for your hand or some body part that has nothing to do with being naked, you still have to take off your clothes. The medical reason for this is that the technicians think it’s funny.

The nice woman at the clinic told me to put on, not one, but two hospital gowns. “One on the front and one on the back. It doesn’t matter which one you put on first,” she added.

This is an odd thing to say because if you put the gown on your back, your um, “frontal equipment” is showing. If you put it on your front, your bum is showing. Once you get both gowns on you are relatively covered up — for a guy wearing two aprons. If we can plan a manned mission to Mars, can’t someone figure out how to invent ONE gown that safely covers your bum? Maybe we should call NASA.

Next, a nice woman named Toni took me in. She gives me ear plugs and says, “Put these in.” Then she gives me instructions which, of course, I cannot hear. I laid down on a narrow stretcher and they strapped me in with pads on my sides.

Then they ask, “Are you comfortable?” at least I think they asked that because I had ear plugs in. I assume this is another joke, because you couldn’t be more uncomfortable unless you were wrapped in duct tape and stuffed into the baggage hold of a Greyhound bus.

I don’t want to scare anybody, but what happens next is that she hands you a rubber ball on a wire and says “Squeeze this if there’s a problem and we’ll stop the test”. She does not indicate what “the problem” might be. Then she says, “Close your eyes”. She says this twice so I know she means it.

In the next second, you are inserted into the MRI machine. The best I can say is that this is like stuffing LeBron James into a cigar tube. If you are dumb enough to open your eyes (like me), you will discover that the inside of an MRI machine makes a coffin look like a two-storey condo.

Then the noise starts. Toni had warned me that, “It might get a little loud in there.”

This is like saying that sleeping next to a jack hammer might be a “bit noisy”. Luckily, I have a vivid imagination and simply pictured myself on a beach — encased in Saran Wrap beside a working blacksmith. A mere 30 minutes later, a voice said, “We’re all done”.

All in all, I would say the whole experience is somewhere between a root canal and watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2.

I’ll take the MRI.