In Which the Author Donates Blood, and Lives to Tell About It

(Note: prepare for rapid-fire. I've got some blog catching-up to do, and I'm listening to The Sword, which makes me type 150% harder than usual.)

Last Wednesday I gave blood. I've never donated blood before, I've only sold my plasma back when I was a college student. The last time I sold plasma, it was a bit embarrassing; I got light-headed after I was done, and had to sit in a chair for a half hour drinking a ginger ale before I was allowed to leave.

Anyway, my wife is a member of the Champlin Moms Club, and they organized a blood drive. My wife and I showed up for our appointments; we were among the first of the morning. After answering the exhaustive question list and getting my red blood count checked to make sure it was high enough, I was moved to the reclining chair apparatus. The nurse found a vein, tapped into it, and started filling up the blood bag. She was very nice, and even commented about my blood's nice bright red color.

The supervisor there was a small, thin, man of fifty-something years with a thick eastern European accent. That just shouldn't be allowed. I couldn't shake the feeling that he was a vampire. I kept my eyes on him. For a while, anyway.

I remember thinking about the frigid air conditioning, the annoyingly bland music they had playing in the speaker right next to my ear, and the faint sanitized smell in the air.

That's when I lost consciousness.

The next thing I knew, I was waking up...everything was dark and I heard voices saying my name very loudly. I was completely disoriented; I had no idea where I was, how I got there, or what I was doing...and it was scary. Eventually memory returned, and I realized what was going on. Luckily I had warned the staff about my previous plasma experience, just in case, so they were keeping an eye on me. Apparently I was extremely pale and shaking a little before they got me awake again. They had me drink a couple bottles of juice which had such a high sugar content that they immediately gave me nausea. I didn't retch, but my gut certainly didn't feel right.

I ended up taking a sick day from work and sleeping about six hours that day. I assume my body was hard at work replacing the blood that had been taken. I wasn't back to normal until the next morning. I'm glad to know that the pint of blood I gave will do someone good, but from now on the only pints I'll be dealing with are beer going into my body. No more donating blood for me.