happyone ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To Give Blood or Not to Give Blood, that is the question Yeah, so...I'm never giving blood again! This past Wednesday, the blood people were at my school and me and some friends signed up. So, we had appointments for 11:00, but all these people who were walk-ins kept going ahead of us. Finally I got to go and some lady asked me a million questions ("In the past 12 months, have you been to the Congo?") that I answered "no" to, and then I finally got to the six waiting chairs to give blood. While I was waiting, I met this guy who was a friend of one of my friends that I was with, and he was so cool! He's a senior and he's such a good singer! He was singing some songs, and I thought, dang he's good! He told me later that he's in Honors Choir and Showstoppers. He also told me all about his collection fetish. He collects everything from movies like The Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter. He said he has certified replicas of the swords from those three movies. He also has all the McDonald's toys ever made of those movies. Anyways, he sang some songs from the Phantom of the Opera soundtrack and Josh Groban's You Raise Me Up, and he is an AMAZING singer! He actually inspired me to go to the Showstoppers show this Thursday. He was like, "you have to go! I've seen your face and now you have to go and I'll be looking for you!". I still need to buy tickets... So anyway, at 1:15, I finally got in a chair to give blood, and the lady I had was really nice and funny. It didn't even hurt when the needle went in or anything. I was mostly worried about feeling sick afterwards because I've had my blood drawn at the doctor's before, and I felt awful. But my bag started filling up with blood, and I felt fine. When my bag was almost full was when I started feeling weird. I started getting really hot and my vision started going. Like seriously, black was coming in from both sides until I could only see a little bit in front of me. I was feeling light headed too. I remember just sitting there blinking, trying to get my vision back. I remember seeing my lady out of the corner of my eye, and I was like "I'm starting to feel really weird". So she reclined my chair and put a cold cloth on my head and gave me a Sprite to drink. Then I felt normal just laying there like that. But then she got me to sit up again and I felt sick again, so she let me lay down for a little while. I laid there talking to my friends who had already finished and were standing beside me. Then the lady had me sit up again, and I felt fine, so I got up and went to the snack table to get something to eat because since it had taken so long, I had missed my lunch. I still wasn't feeling perfectly back to normal because there were these squiggly lines out of the corner of my right eye that kept vibrating. Yeah, that isn't too normal. So then I heaved my bookbag (which was a million pounds) on my back and trudged all the way across the school into the new wing and up the stairs to Chemistry (bleh!). I was embarrassed because when I walked into the classroom, everyone just burst out "oh Ashley, you're my hero" "you gave blood, wow!" "oh man, I never could of done that!" and stuff. Yeah, that was weird. So I sat down and started doing my work, and like, maybe 15 minutes later, I started getting hot again. I was like, oh no! I can't get sick in here! So I asked my teacher if I could go to the bathroom. When I got into the bathroom, I started feeling really weird! At first I felt like I was going to throw up, but then just this incredible feeling of being drained and feeling heavy came over me, and I just sat down on the toilet and leaned against the wall of the stall and closed me eyes. I remember being so hot-I was like sweating. I don't know if I fell asleep or what, but I remember coming to and I was like, oh dang, how long have I been in here?? I was still feeling sick, so I just left and went to the nurse, which happened to be on the other side of the school. I don't know how I made it there-I remember I just kept walking. When I got there the lady kept trying to take my blood pressure but kept having to do it over, and I was about to pass out or something, so I was like, I need to lay down! So I laid down and I was just feeling so weird! When the lady asked me if I had eaten anything, and I told her I had eaten some peanut butter crackers and cheetos, she tried to get me to eat more of those peanut butter crackers since I hadn't had lunch. Cause you're supposed to eat after you give blood. So I started chewing one, and my mouth was just so dry. The cracker just got stuck all in my teeth. Then I felt like barfing having that nasty dry cracker in my teeth. So I did! Yep, I threw up my crackers and Sprite. Eww, it was a nasty orange color. I felt a little better after that. So, I was laying there trying to just rest or whatever, when all these freshmen and sophmores came in the health room and started filming something for our school news. Then I threw up again, right in front of them! The nurse finally made them get out, but geez! The nurse gave me a peppermint to wash away the barf taste, but that only made me barf again. By then, all I had left to barf up was my peppermint colored spit. Then I just had the dry heaves, which hurt. Since I was throwing up, and obviously couldn't continue my school day, they called my mom and she came and got me. The nurse told my mom my blood pressure was low (which is why she kept trying to take it again, b/c it was giving a low reading), which isn't normal after you've given blood. Then we were in the attendance office waiting for my sister to get there from her class (my mom picked her up too because with me sick and unable to drive, she couldn't have gotten home), and I started feeling barfy again. The attendance lady told me I would have to go back to the nurse, but to someone who is about to throw up, that was a long way away! I told my mom I wasn't going to make it, so she grabbed their trash can and I threw up in it. Threw up what, I don't know! Stomach acid, I guess. I don't think the attendance lady liked that too much. Oh well. So I got home and propped up my feet on the couch with a nice squishy blanket, and I went to sleep while my mom went to get me a nice big juicy burger from Rush's with a nice cold chocolate milkshake. When you've just given blood and have thrown up everything you've eaten, you need something meaty to eat. When I finally ate my juicy burger, I felt a lot better. But that was just the worst I've ever felt! Hey, I tried to save some lives by giving blood, but NEVER AGAIN! My sister's birthday is on Tuesday, and she's going to be 15! Since she loves everything Spanish, she wanted a quincenera party, so we got her all kinds of bright, hot, festive fiesta looking decorations! Right after school on Tuesday, she's going to go get her PERMIT! I just can't believe she is going to be driving! She's just always been in the backseat while me and my mom drive...it's going to be so bizzaro having her drive! Ahh! Oh DANG! It's now 1:00 AM and I've got school tomorrow! I hate this! 12:25 a.m. - March 20, 2006 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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