First blood donation

July 2005
I've never donated blood before. Not only is the needle poked into your body but blood is drawn from it. I did a couple of body check ups and the first time the doctor actually poked me THREE times to get to my vein. Second time the doctor wasn't sure of poking me inside my elbow so she poked me on the back of my palm instead. People say it's more painful but I feel fine and after that I can bend my elbow, no problem. The point is that my vein is rarely visible which makes me unsure of letting others poking needle into my arm and drawing blood from me.

When I came to Adelaide to study, almost four years ago, I came with four friends. Two of them asked me to donate blood with them. I really want to but I'm just scared of getting poked more than once. I didn't know this but they told me that blood donors are the first priority to get blood transfusion if they're involved in an accident (or something like that). Also the Australian Red Cross used to give incentives for those blood donors, like first time donors get a key chain, second time get a pen, tenth time get this, and so on. It will at one point come to a gold coin.

It was not until two years after that that I got the courage to go make myself an appointment. They require you to drink a litre (or three glasses) of water or juice before the donation. Now that really is a tough thing for me because I'm not really much of a drinker. So I didn't actually drink the amount required when I went there. So they asked me to drink there and wait before they start the process. First they ask you to fill out a questionnaire about your health and then you must weigh yourself and write your weight at the top right of the questionnaire (embarrassing!). My weight is...TOO MUCH! (Had its reason which will be revealed)

The time has come. I was seated on a comfy reclined chair. A young lady came and had my arm tightened with a piece of cloth and started to look for my vein. She tried for a while on my left arm but failed so she changed side and tried my right arm instead. She wasn't really confident so she looked for a senior, more experienced person. He came, he started to look for my vein on my left arm. I remembered I told him, "It's very difficult to look for my vein," and he replied, "I'm not looking for it, I'm feeling for it," and felt my vein he did, within a minute and in the needle went. All I have to do now is wait. I forgot how long it took, but they got about 400+ml from me and it was over. And I thought, "That's it? That was easy."

I was then shown to another part of the building where there's a menu with a variety of snacks and drinks that I can choose from. My friends told me the hospital in KL only serve Milo and biscuits. Over here they have biscuits, yoghurt, muffins, sandwiches, Milo, Coke, juices, iced coffee/tea...etc. I had yoghurt and juice.

At the end of the day, I feel GOOD!