Medical tests

Friends,

Several of you have asked questions about the medical tests that I will undergo during the NASA study. As a healthy young person, I haven't spent much time with doctors and nurses in my life, but considering that I'll be moving into a hospital for four months, I figured it would do me some good to figure out a little bit of what is coming.

Pillownaut, the young lady from Texas who did the study last year, has a great site of her own that includes just about everything you could want to know about the program. I've already linked the menu from her site to mine, and now, for your education and entertainment, I'll link up the descriptions of the medical tests. (Warning: Some of the descriptions are so detailed you might start to sweat.)

It's sobering to think about putting nitroglycerin into a healthy body, inserting catheters into foot and hand veins, and being strapped to a bed to prevent motion during painful procedures, but hey, you're only young once!

On a serious note, the doctors and nurses are some of the finest in the country. I'm already going to be at the hospital in case anything should go wrong, and what kind of story will this make if they just feed me jello and let me watch movies?

I don't think that Nietzsche is totally correct about things that don't kill us automatically making us stronger, since I'm expected to lose bone density and muscle mass. But when I'm finished with NASA, there's not going to be much of anything I won't be able to overcome.

Add that mental victory to the relationships I start and foster, the boost in the bank account, and the physical gratification of getting back what I lose, and I see this as the adventure of a lifetime!

P.S. You may think I'm nuts, but remember, I've already passed the psychological tests!