Tuesday, January 25, 2005

The MRI Day

MRI Day has finally arrived, didn't sleep very well last night worrying about how things were going to go today. My biggest dread, Michael having to have a general anaesthetic, and ending up back on 02. Michael thinks he's going to the Dentist, his dentist is at GOS, and no matter how hard we tried to explain, he still thinks we're going to the Dentist.

We were at the station for 8.20 this morning, we have been on a train so many times with Michael before with no problems, he loves the train, this morning, no...he threw a tantrum, too many people at that time of the morning for him I think....the train that arrived was the wrong colour, it was purple, he was expecting Thomas the Tank Engine. So we were almost nervous wrecks before we'd even got on the train.


But once on, he was fine, spent the trip to London, looking out of the window.
When we arrived in London, it is a fairly short walk to GOSH, finding the ward was another matter, ok who left me in charge of the map!!
But when we did eventually get to the right place having been through 3 different wards all starting with the same name, we found the day ward! We still managed to be early!!
At 10.30 Michael was taken for an EEG, they attached electrodes or "Dots" as Michael called them all over his face, and then passed a small electrical current through his eyebrows to make him blink. Can't say he was overly impressed particularly when the small electric current wasn't so small!!
Once they'd done this the probe was changed for a very fine needle, which was placed in the skin, just under his chin, and again an electric current passed into the muscle, the volume was turned up on the machine, and you could hear the noise being made by Michael's muscles.
Not a happy boy!!
But I have to say it was all over and done pretty quick, and Michael was convinced that this was the dentist he was seeing, who was looking at his chin!
Once this was done, it was back to the ward, we weren't given any idea as to how that had gone, the Consultant needed to study the results before he could then discuss them with the Neurologist. So I can't say if they were ok or not, although he did say something to his collegue about no movement at F2, what ever that means!!
When we got back to the ward we were down in the playroom, Michael was a little star, he found a blow up shark, and was doing impressions, have you seen Finding Nemo??? There is a shark in there called Bruce, the first thing he says is "hello, names Bruce."
One of the Nurses was Australian, I think she thought it was hysterical, watching Michael running around with a blow up shark, repeating "Hello, names Bruce".
The MRI didn't happen until 3pm, by this time DH and I were both convinced that there was no way we were going to be bringing Michael home tonight, not after a general, takes him too long to get over them. Whilst down in MRI I jokingly asked for a copy of the MRI, and much to my amazement was told that we could have a copy, for a small donation. Turns out you need to have permission from the Consultant too, but will order a copy tomorrow.
Anyway, Michael was back on the ward by 4pm....I think perhaps we were sedated as opposed to a general.
He's got over it too quickly.

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