The latest thing for my hand is an MRI. Even though they just need a picture of the one hand, the whole body gets a ride in the tube. They put me in tummy down, Superman style, with a fluffly pillow under my head and one under my shins. The offended hand rested in a plastic clamp; the other hand clutched the alarm bulb. They said it would be loud and gave me earplugs and an abundance of comforting talk through a tiny speaker installed somewhere in the plastic.

With the earplugs in and in full Superman, they slid me in and flicked on the thing, which rattled, clanked, and ground unbelievably. I felt like I was at an avant-garde electronic music show.

I hear that people feel claustrophic during MRIs and many people expressed sorrow at my having to endure it. But I snoozed through most of the experience and was generally fascinated by the whole process.

Most of the way done, a man entered and injected bonded barium into my arm. Contrast, it's called. I asked him if I could set off metal detectors and such, but he said no. He said it would flow right through, and I wasn't sure whether to believe him. Even more, it’s not like you really have choice, with your hand clamped into a plastic box and the rest of you Supermanned to the table.

It was a hand specialist who ordered the MRI. He said X-rays often don't reveal small fractures in the small bones of the hand. Certainly, X-rays don't show anomolies in the surrounding tissues. Hence the MRI.

At the hand specialists office, I had to sign a form exonerating my insurance company from paying for the visit and collateral services if it could be determined that any other entity was responsible for the costs. This is for L&I, of course. At first I declined to fill out the form citing uncertainty as to the cause. I said I didn't want to sign anything legally binding when I was unsure. I was told that I could not see the doctor unless I signed the form, so I signed the form. I put "I don't know" for every question.

Bastards. I'm not the customer; I am the means. I despise it.

The MRI came back sparkling and meaty. I loved seeing the anatomy, my perfect white bones and ultrawhite veins. The good news: no fractures or cysts. The bad news: no obvious culprit to explain the pain.

The prescription: Wait four weeks and call if it still hurts.

He said, "You know, it could be that the ulnar nerve is just a little irritated. It might recover on its own. Nerves aren’t like other tissues—they don't heal as quickly. It could take weeks for it to heal."

This is what I learned on the Web before I visited my GP the first time, information that I shared with her. I know that the diagnostic tests were needed to close the door on more serious issues, but the time and cost wasted just to return to the beginning is a profound disappointment. I'm dreading the bill.

In the meantime, no pressure on the palm—no riding, no downward dog, etc.

When did doctors cease to be consultants and become simply data points in solo health management? I hate that along with all the other stuff I need to know, I must also be a medical case manager. While it makes sense that I would be the only one qualified to provide the context of my experience, it makes no sense to me that doctors are unwilling to listen to the whole story. At the other extreme, holistic practitioners are clueless about specifics. I mean that my GP and hand specialist will not look any further than the exact spot in my palm where the pain is acute. Nevermind that I keep telling them that I've had pain in my back, shoulder, elbow, and sometimes my forearm. The hand specialist, when I told him about the arm stuff the second time, said, "That's not ringing a bell." Fine. He can help me with the hand. I'll figure out something else for the rest of it. But what if instead of ignoring it completely one of my doctors took me seriously and helped me decide who to see that might be able to investigate what I think is true?

Recently I had a sports massage. The therapist was all over the holistic idea. "Of course all this is connected." He said that we tend to carry our stress on the left side. He buried his hands in my back where it hurts the worst, this single spot which aches when I move my left arm—the arm connected to the palm where the nerve pain is. But when I asked him what he meant when he said my palm felt "gravelly" he said he didn't know what caused that.

Somewhere in between these extreme points of view is an answer. I know that there's some kind of larger problem. All the structural problems reside in the left side: knee and hip pain, and now the back, shoulder, elbow and palm. What a hassle to have to research a path through various providers to find something that will address the cause and not the symptoms. I hate that it's going to be a pricey trial and error.