Donating Blood

I think the last time I donated blood was perhaps 25 years ago. Art’s last donation was probably about 15 years ago. He’d had a bad experience then and wasn’t inclined to repeat it. 

However, the news recently spotlighted the crucial shortage of blood supply in Hawaii so we decided it was probably time for us to step up again. 

My first blood donation experience in Illinois was successful. However the 2nd time I volunteered was during a school blood drive. They looked at me skeptically and asked what I weighed. I said 115. The cut off is 110. They were still unconvinced and brought out a scale which proved I was indeed 115. However, that still didn’t reassure them and I never got to donate my blood then. I gave up after that although (ahem) I did gain more weight since.

Our daughter, Tiffany has been donating blood every 6 months (even though I think she’s at the border of 110) since Illinois has been struggling with their blood supply also. She’s been texting us photos of her arm as she donated her blood. Eventually, it motivated us to join her in this cause.

I checked online for the Blood Bank of Hawaii and signed us up. 

I then looked online to see if there was anything that might disqualify us from donating our blood. 

One website mentioned osteoporosis and its treatment which could disqualify me. It also said we needed to drink a lot of water and eat healthy meals which we tried to do.

As it turned out, they never asked me those questions. I asked about the osteoporosis and the Reclast Infusion I was given. He said he thought it was OK. They never asked specific questions about what medications we were given either.

I guess they must be really desperate or there must be a way to filter out medication from our blood.

I was surprised that it really was an easy draw. It wasn’t very painful at all and I’m squeamish. You know I’m squeamish because when they took my normally low blood pressure reading prior to the blood draw it was 140/92! I was shocked. Art who has high blood pressure was 94/52!!! I told the attendant that they now knew who was the gutless one.

We went to Mountain Magic after the blood draw as our reward. They have one of the smoothest shave ice on the island and it hit the spot.

We were feeling quite good, but when we got home... tiredness set in.

The following morning, Art was perfectly fine and did our morning walk on his own.

Not me.

I was very lethargic for almost the entire day following the blood draw, but was fine and back to normal by the evening.

Then I read online that you shouldn't have fatty foods before a blood draw because they might discard your blood donation. What? What? 

Could this be true? We did a quick peanut butter, apple and potato chip lunch before heading out for the Bloodmobile. I hope that wasn't too fatty. Doggone it! I wish they'd give us more information before we go in.

I'm certainly going to ask more questions the next time, before I even consider doing this again. I'm just hoping the pandemic will be an endemic before the year is out. 🤞

POSTSCRIPT:

I was just checking my Spam File and found messages from the Blood Bank. I have no idea why it should have gone into my Spam File.

Anyway... there was information about medications.

As for weight requirements, there appears to be a cut off if you are under 18. I think that's what it means.

OK... I'm older than 18. However although I'm perhaps 1/8" of an inch shorter than 5'3", I weigh between 115 to 120 depending on the time of day and my daughter is a lot lighter than that.

Ah well... I didn't see anything about peanut butter sandwiches so I guess I'm OK.