Blood and tears...

I gave blood today. I expected to feel very good about the whole situation. After all, people need blood. It keeps them alive. It's kind of necessary. And, you know, I have more than I need. So what's a little needle on my side with a life on theirs? After a long discussion with myself over my discomfort with the idea of having my blood sucked out of my body (I actually had to tell one girl who was telling me all about the good things about it that I needed to not discuss it any further or I'd lose my nerve), I decided to do the right thing and donate. Plus, the law school was competing with firms in the city to see who'd give the most, so I thought I'd ride the competitive bandwagon and initiate myself into the rite of giving blood at the same time.

So I went. If you haven't given blood before, there's kind of a four-step process where you register, then get a form with your personal information, which you complete to let them know if you've done anything risky in regards to your blood, then you go into a secret cubicle with a nurse who questions you about strangely amusing things like whether you've had sex for money or drugs, and then you actually go lie down and give blood. Lisa and I were both a little uncomfortable about the whole process, but we were pretty sure that it would be alright. The first sign that things might not go as planned was when I went to get my finger pricked for the blood sample (for testing purposes) and the nurse had to tell me to relax and let my hand rest on the table. The second and much more glaring indicator that all was not well was when I burst into hysterical tears when the lance pricked me. But I laughed and dried my tears and blew my nose and the nurse laughed with me and I figured that had been my outlet for hysteria and I'd be fine.

Little did I know...

When I was laying there on the cot with my arm resting on the trolley, I was doing okay at not thinking about what was going to happen. However, when she came and stabbed me (and it hurt, although they tell me that's not normal), I started crying again. It was humiliating. I am definitely not a big girl. It didn't help that they couldn't seem to get the needle positioned properly so it felt like the inside of my vein was being perpetually stabbed, but in general I just seem to have some deep-seated psychological issue that hasn't yet been worked out. I spent the full 16 minutes of the blood-taking either trying not to cry or failing, shivering all the while. I'm shivering now, thinking about it. And I didn't regain control until the needle was gone and I was pressing down on the gauze and the nurse was telling me that they'd be able to help three people with that bag of my blood. All I can say is, they'd better. I'd better not have some random condition that makes my blood unfit to use.

So that was my strangely traumatic experience of the day. For the record, Lisa felt fine until she was suddenly nauseated and just about fainted. She said she couldn't figure out why the nurses weren't making anyone else lift their legs in the air. We are officially the two worst blood donors ever.