ASU CI study - I'm a participant!

I received an email a few weeks ago from ASU research center about them obtaining information on my cochlear implant status for a study. Although I didn't qualify for the actual study they were reaching out to me for (because I don't wear a hearing aid in my non-implanted ear), I was told I do qualify for another study they've been conducting for a while. I told her I was all for it, and now I'm scheduled for that on July 11th.

The study is going to measure my heart rate and blood pressure while I listen to voices in noisy environments. The theory is that our heart rates increase. Which I can personally say, mine does. It does get much higher if I'm expected to repeat back what I heard. It's an anxiety thing though. The belief that if I don't understand the speech correctly, I'm going to fail, make my life harder,and make YOUR life harder. Although I'm doing much better at hearing people in noise with this CI, that anxiety is still there, but it's certainly not as bad as it was prior to the CI, where I'd go into an all-out anxiety mode of "OMG, someone is talking to me right now and I'm not going to know what they are saying and we're both going to hate me!" And most of the time, I still had no idea what they were saying, so it was pretty bad for me. But these days, "calm down, listen closely, you'll understand and make these the happiest people for the next 5 minutes," and frankly, I do quite well - 90% of the time.

I'll definitely provide an update on my actual experience with the study, if I'm allowed. I don't know how much of this stuff is suppose to be kept quiet. But I'm pretty excited to be a lab rat for the first time in ages. Oddly. Plus, getting paid close to $60 for 2 hours of my life, is a pretty sweet deal. Having to drive home from the study in Phoenix rush-hour traffic however, is making me second-guess this. Ha.