Suzie Blood Donor

Yesterday I donated blood. I hadn’t donated since 2004, but still trotted along my little paper blood donor card to proudly announce that I was O-.

I have constantly been harassed by blood bank phone calls at home. Everyone’s after my O- blood. They always try to sucker me into making an appointment to donate by telling me sad little stories about kids who need blood. Then they mention I’ll get a free t-shirt. I politely say that I’m busy and go back to watching The Real World and eating Funyuns. The next time they call, they up it a t-shirt and a coupon for a free car wash. OK, now I’m listening. I’m sure the kids are cute and everything, but I was looking for maybe a free lunch and a massage? Could that be arranged?

But after negotiations between myself and Helga, the blood center caller, looked like they were going nowhere, I conceded and agreed to make an appointment just out of the goodness of my heart. And the promise of a free bag of cookies.

So I took Dan with me to my appointment. I have donated a few times before, but Dan was a newbie. I was taken into the room by the nurse who went through the medical questions and she noticed in the computer that I was O-. I think this lady was secretly as a little grandma who reads children’s books aloud at the library during story time moonlighting as a nurse, because she had a soft little voice and felt the need to dumb down everything she was saying. I told her I didn’t like the part where your finger gets pricked with a needle to test your iron. She said “Oh don’t worry sweetie, we changed it, now it’s not bad.” As she pulled out the little needle pricker. I was like “Uh, really? It changed? Because it appears to still involve a needle.” I got stuck with needle just like last time. Apparently little grandma nurse thought I was four and that I would fall for that.

But then she pointed out that since I’m O-, they were going to run a special test on my blood. She then said “If you blood is all good and clean and pretty then they can use your blood for newborn babies!”
“Really?!”
“Yes. We will just run a test to see if you have this very common virus. And if you don’t, you’re a baby donor! And next time you come, I’ll say ‘Oh it’s Miss Baby O Negative‘ and I’ll use a special baby sized bag for your blood. Isn’t that exciting?!”

It was very exciting. I skipped out of the little booth over to the donating chair, quite proud that I am single-handedly going to save the baby population. Dan came and sat in the chair next to me.
“Hey. Psst. Danny. Guess what? I’m going to save babies.”
I explained the whole story to him.
“Wait, what virus are they checking for that’s so common?”
“Huh? Oh. I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? You didn’t ask?”
“Um.. Danny…. Did you not hear the part about the babies?!”

Then I noticed that Dan had a giant sticker on his shirt. It said “First time blood donor.” “What the..” I yelled. “I didn’t get a sticker!” Then I noticed that nice little grandma nurse was tending to HIM and not me! I somehow got lost in the shuffle and got Olga the evil nurse. She stuck me with a needle and ditched me to go count cotton swabs or something. But Dan got the royal treatment. The nurse put an ice pack behind his head because he said he felt tired. He got juice and cookies brought to him. And he had that damn sticker.

After we were done donating, Dan stayed in his chair and relaxed. My nurse yanked the needle out of my arm (no more talk about babies) and said “Thank you.” And asked me to vacate the chair. I had to go root out my own Dixie cup of warm apple juice and all the was left were the crumbs from the cookie jar. The system is so biased.

I will let you know how many babies I save.