I had an hour long (ish, maybe a bit longer?) brain scan in an MRI for a control in a phd friend's study. I snoozed and the only notable thing was me sleepily snapping at her for waking me up to tell me what was happening...

The ear defender/headphones were pretty great

Same for me (and plenty of coworkers who took part in the same studies) -- hardest part of taking part in the fMRI experiments was staying awake through it.

To everyone reading: There is a cage on your head if you get a scan of your head. But if they are looking at your abdomen, you'll find a different sort of device over your midsection. I'm guessing that they have stuff for other parts as well.

I don't personally mind the cage, and a lot of models have a mirror so that your field of vision is greater than the tube. (I get regular MRIs due to MS and a pancreas cyst)

Apologies for not being precise :)

Huh this just made me realize I never keep my eyes open in the MRI machine. (I also have MS). Now I'm wondering which is more common.

I keep my eyes open as they put me in the tube, and close them when the test starts. I'm always afraid that I'll think something looks interesting and move my head while trying to see it. I might find an MRI relaxing, but I still don't wanna do it twice.

I hate when I have to do them twice. I twitch a lot. It's the worst, and I'm uncomfortable, and the tech is stressed because it screws up the scheduling and ugh it's just the worst.

Or when I have to pee in the middle.

Yes these are the coils used for excitation and reading. But really what you hear are the gradient coils inside the magnet assembly.

Psychedelics have caused heavy anxiety for me even when sitting next to a beautiful mountaib stream. I've had a panic attack in an MRI while sober. Couldn't imagine doing both at the same time.

Might just wipe those fears out of your mind if you were in the right mental space and coached through it. As I understand it, this is showing promise in treating the kind of panic attack/PTSD trauma you're describing. I only mention PTSD because it's been a problem for some of my friends and they are very interested in the positive news about psychedelics as treatment options.

From my perspective, a long acting treatment done via psychedelics and a guide, in a controlled environment, with no need to repeatedly take a drug and no day to day side effects of that drug (because, you're not taking one) is incredibly promising. Unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of treatment that the business behind medicine doesn't like, so I'm quite skeptical if it's ever brought to market.