I try not to complain on line, I really do. I think we all have enough problems in our life; keeping positive is difficult. Having to read about everyone elses problems on facebook etc. tends to bring me down. Some folks-all they do is complain. It really bothers me! BETH STOP. Ok. Whew. Had to stop myself before I started complaining ABOUT the complainers! Oh the irony.
Where was I? Oh yes-I don't normally complain but I'm going to today. It was one of those 'how can all these bad things happen today? It's a Friday & this is the sort of crap I'd never expect from a Friday. A Monday of course, or perhaps a disgruntled Tuesday but sheesh!' kind of days.
And I blame my husband for the whole rotten thing! Let me explain why everything is his fault. (and if you're a woman perhaps you've made a similar lists detailing why everything that went wrong on a particular day was your husband/boyfriend's fault. If so, feel free to nod in agreement while reading the rest of this entry. If not, you've just not been together long enough darlin, give it time.
I need focus!
(attention kind, not Ford kind).
So today I had an appointment to donate plasma. I do this twice a week. I'm compensated for my time/gas-and it does take me an hour to drive there and an hour to drive home again, so I'd call this a fair trade. One day I'm sure I'll do an entire entry on how giving plasma makes me feel like one of the humans in the machines on the Matrix-I have this gut feeling that the staff are aliens and they're using my plasma to fuel their alien craft or for some other creepy, yet totally possible, scenario. But hey, they pay for my gas so I'm happy to help them out so long as they only probe me with the one needle at a time and only in the arm, thank you very much.
So today on the way to my appointment I ask Scott to send a text to my sister asking if she'd like to meet for coffee after. I said 'Say I'm giving blood, should be done at 2 and will head straight to Jewels(our coffee hang-out).' So he types away and then sits in silence and I assume he's done exactly what I have asked. NEVER assume that your man has done exactly as you've asked! I learned this lesson a while ago and as I sat in the car I could hear the little voice in my head saying 'Are you SURE you want to assume this?' Of course not.
So I ask... 'What did you say?'
He says 'I told her you were giving blood and you'd text her when you were done.'
(insert smacking forehead sound here)
'Why would you say that?! I'll be driving and won't be able to text back and forth while driving.'
And here's where it all went wrong....
He says: 'What if you're not done at 2? What if there are complications?' at which point I should have just turned around and driven all the way home again... Of course, that'd be quite a boring story and not very 'blog-worthy' so you KNOW that's not what happened.
I tried to reason with him. 'I've done this quite a few times before, there's never complicatins. I'm very good at bleeding. It takes me 40 minutes and I'm done every time.'
except today.... because he HAD to say 'but what if blah blah blah.'
After dropping Scott and B off to go swimming I arrive, I scan my finger in, answer the millions of questions you have to answer & sit and wait for the dreaded prick.
The finger prick that is.
You see they have to test your blood-iron and protien-before they let you donate. They do this every time. I don't know what they use to prick my finger but this time it felt like whatever it was went in one side of my finger and came out the other side. I didn't watch as they did it, but I did check my fingernail for puncture wounds after just in case.
So my captured blood spins around in this alien machine, determining if my plasma is suitable to run their space crafts, and then they say 'Right-up on the scales, and no-don't take your shoes off.'
GREAT!
After trying, unsuccessfully, to convince them that I had my 20lb flip flops on they let me step down. (note to self, next time wear swimsuit only!)
Ok so I've been pricked and weighed, sounds like a good time to take my blood pressure and heart rate. (idiots!)
Of course my heart rate is a bit high so I said 'Well, you just stabbed me in the finger and then told me how fat I am, it was bound to happen!' This resulted in my having to sit on what I can only assume was a time out seat for 5 minutes, after which they'd check my heart rate again. 5 minutes later, when I'm called back, I though "ok, that was only a minor complication, I can still make it to coffee on time and won't even tell Scott that this ever happened! As far as he knows-everything went as normal."
ya right
'Um, you have been deferred and have to see the nurse, please go back to your time out chair and wait til we say you can get up'.
So I go back to the naughty seat. By this point I've already decided it's all Scott's fault, he jinxed me.... but it was only the beginning. If you know Scott at all you know he doesn't do things by halves. If he's gonna jinx me he's gonna do it good and proper!
So finally nurse Ratchet calls me over and asks if I have a bruise on my arm? She says it in a 'Have you been shooting up crack, you freak?' sort of way so I explained I DID have a bruise, from where they mercilessly stabbed me the last time to extract my plasma based alien fuel. Apparently this was the right answer because I was not sent back to the time out chair.
Off to the probing table!
So, finger still slightly dripping, I climb up onto the table, get situated and wait. Arm cuff goes on, iodine rubbed on for 45 minutes(or maybe it was only 30 minutes but I swear I'm covered just about elbow to wrist in it!) then the probe.
I was told on my first visit to always mention if anything felt strange, so when I lost all feeling in my arm I felt it best to mention this in case it was important...
'Do you think the cuff is too tight?' the staff member asks.
'I'm not sure really.' I said-looking at my hand which, at this point was looking more like hamburger meat than human skin. I wanted to add that-had I been able to feel my arm at all I might have known if the cuff was too tight, but thought it best not to since she had a whole cart of needles there. Never smart off to the needle lady!
So she messed with things and slowly feeling (and color) returned to my arm. Whew-complication over.
Or not so much!
If you've ever given plasma you know what happens-they take your blood out, separate the plasma from the red cells and then give you the red cells back. So they took out the first cycle of blood and when it came time to give the red cells back my arm started to swell like a balloon at the injection site and the staff ran over and said 'Right, you're done!'
What!?!
Thus the title of the blog-it seems today I can't even bleed right! Apparently the needle was touching my vein and so the blood couldn't go back in and decided to congregate at my elbow instead.
Staff members put on appropriate hazmat gear before considering removing the needle and releasing pressure. Not knowing where all of this blood was going to go once she pulled out the needle that was plugging the massive hole in my arm, I had visions of Mt. St Helens in my head. Fortunately it wasn't that bad. I was bandaged up (with ice back strapped to arm) given 2 full glasses of water to drink (cause lets face it-water's basically the same as blood so when you lose too much you should just drink water and you'll be ok) and was told to ice/heat/repeat and get the $%^^& outta there!
COMPLICATIONS! grr.
Now I was going to be WAY too early for coffee so I went to the book store in the mall. I nearly fell over at one point but no one saw, so that was ok. By the time I found something remotely interesting to buy, and walked to the til, I have to say I was not feeling well at all. The lady at the cash register asked me if I was ok and I said 'Yes... I think so.... but maybe not.' and I briefly explained what happened and this started a discussion which she felt required the involvement of the other cashiers as well.
Fun times. . .
Anyway on the way out she said 'I hope you get better soon.' to which I replied 'Don't worry, it's just blood-it'll grow back.'
And if it doesn't I will just have a glass of water, right?
All this (and more-I didn't even tell you about the flat tire!) just because he HAD to say 'What if there are complications... I love Scott to bits but sometimes I think he needs a smack!
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