Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Guinea Pig

I am not up at 4:55AM because of my one year old, or rowdy neighbors, or insomnia. I am up because I would rate the pain level in my shoulder at 99 out of 100. As many of you may know, I am a sucker for giving back to science via being a guinea pig for research trials involving humans...and a sucker for the cash it pays. Among others, I have earned $300 for taking one dose of a diabetic medication (I am not diabetic) that had not yet been tested on humans, or a placebo. $200 for taking laxatives, or a placebo. $1,000 for going a month without and vitamin B6 and eating only bagels, jello, buttered pasta, and egg burritos for the whole month. And now I am being paid $160 to take part in a shoulder pain study. Day one they run me through these pain tolerance tests, and then have me work out my dominant shoulder until it is totally fatigued. Then the next four days I do the same pain tolerance tests. It turns out somewhere between 36 and 48 hours after the shoulder workout you experience the worst muscle soreness you've ever felt. And that's saying a lot considering I had rabdomyolysis about 2 months ago from trying to keep up with my brothers-in-law in a workout of push-ups and pull-ups. So, now I am awake because the pain is keeping me up. Did I mention I can't stretch or take any anti-inflamatories?
Sorry for the griping. I had to tell someone, and I didn't want to wake up Val. The good news is that I have been in the control group for all of these studies, which means I don't have diabetes, constipation, a B6 deficiency, or shoulder surgery.

1 comment:

kimberly said...

thank goodness for good news!