Donating Blood

A few weeks ago in relief society, they passed around a sign-up sheet for donating blood. When it got to me, I signed up and was very excited. I had always wanted to donate blood, but never really had the chance. The next day, I got ready and headed to the WILK at 11:15. My appointment was scheduled for noon, but I got there a little early and filled out all of the necessary papers and read the required materials since it was my first time. After waiting for a couple of minutes, they took me back to where they had everything set up. I got my finger pricked to check my iron level and I also got my blood pressure checked and had to answer quite a few questions concerning my health on the computer. Then they took me to a chair where they put needle and tube into my arm. I was given a ball to squeeze and I began filling up my bag by squeezing the ball. It only took me 4 minutes and 46 seconds to fill my bag up with blood. This random kid came up and talked to me the whole time, so it seemed like it went by fairly fast. When the needle was removed from my arm, I only had ten minutes to get to my Book of Mormon class that was in the Talmage Building.

I got up, and felt perfectly fine. They had me go to the snack table to get some cookies and water. I already had a water bottle filled with water, so I grabbed some cookies and headed off to my class. As I went outside, I started feeling weird. By the time I was almost to the library, blackness started at the edge of my eyes and was getting bigger, creating just a little tunnel that I could see through and my legs were getting weak. But somehow I made it into the library. There was a handrail almost right inside the second door that I was going to grab onto and rest for a little while. Well I stuck my arm out to grab it, but I couldn't find it because my depth perception was off! I kept grabbing for it, but all I was getting was a handful of air. (I wouldn't have been surprised if people thought that I was drunk!!) Once I finally got a hold of it, I leaned on it and closed my eyes.

I was slowly falling to the ground when a boy and girl walking by, came up to me and asked me if I was alright. They saw the bandage on my arm and knew that I had just donated blood. They told me that I looked really pale and asked if there was anything they could do for me. While the girl went to get some more cookies, the boy sat down with me right by the entrance to the library. I was like cold sweating and just felt awful! As we both sat there, we got so many weird looks from people walking by. After sitting there for a while, eating more cookies, and drinking lots of cold water, I began to get my strength back. As I stood up and was ready to head to my class (even though I was not 15 minutes late), the nice boy and girl walked me to my class just to be sure I was ok. Although the experience was a little embarrassing, I am glad that I was able to donate my blood and that someone will benefit from it!