Blood

I’m saving three lives today. 

I’m a big promoter of donating blood. It’s sort of a family thing. When my sister was 14, she needed corrective jaw surgery. Since she knew about the surgery in advance, her doctor had her donate 3 pints of blood to be used (if needed) during the surgery. To make Karen less nervous, my mom also donated blood with her. I was 11 and I sat on the floor trying not to pass out as I watched the clear plastic bags swell with my family's blood. They were resting on a scale, and with each stream that ran down the tube, my stomach turned. That was a lot of blood.

During the surgery, Karen ended up needing 2 pints of blood to replace what she was losing. It saved her life.

My mom began donating regularly after that, my sister became an official donor when she turned 17. As a wimpy teenager with pale arms and no visible veins, I opted out of the tradition.

Until my freshman year of college. At the time, my mom was a Red Cross volunteer. She taught CPR classes, volunteered on the Community Emergency Response Team and the Disaster Action Team. She even did Sky Warn and was a certified storm spotter. And I needed an idea for my persuasive speech for SPCH 1001. My mom suggested blood donation.

I knew enough about it. I’d tagged along with my mom a few times when she’d donate in the fellowship hall of St. Joseph’s church or in the giant concrete Armory building. And I could never forget the scene in the doctor’s office of my sister’s blood bag.

But I’m a doer. I decided to suck it up and make my own trek to the Armory. It took about 20 minutes and 3 techs to get the needle in my translucent arm. And after half a pint, the blood stopped. The vein had collapsed and they couldn’t get any more blood out of it. My elbow was already bruising and no tech wanted to finish the pint. They fed me cookies and juice until it satisfied their conscience that the little pale girl wasn’t going to collapse.

Determined to conquer the blood donation process, I’ve been going ever since. It’s still usually a struggle to find a competent vein, but I manage. I squeeze the life out of the stress ball and try to raise my blood pressure above its struggling 90/50.

So I’ve chugged nearly a gallon of water today—because I thought it would make my donation time faster. Now I’m thinking water doesn’t have anything to do with that (despite the fact that water is pretty much shooting out my eyes since I’ve had so much). Does drinking water increase donation speed? Seriously, did I go to science class in high school? I mean, people remember me being there, right?  

Anyway, I’m about an hour from donation time and getting excited. I’ve been doing this for 6 years now, but it still makes me happy. I don’t have a lot of opportunities to save lives. 

But I’m working on saving 3 today.