u/Capable_Barber_8387

today was my first time donating blood, my uncle (66M) had to do an endoscopic mucosal resection and an appendectomy so he needed at least 4 blood donors, so i volunteered alongside my 2 cousins and my friend to donate type B+ blood as he needed.

But when we went yesterday to the blood donation center, the guard told us something bizzare, "the blood bags were limited (50 bags)", and we had to arrive as early as 4:00 AM if we wanted to register our names. This is stupid and scandalous in my opinion. How can a blood donation center suffer from a crisis in something as simple as blood bags? No, and he dared to say something provocative like "you had to be up at 4:00 AM to register your name" when they don't even open to the public until 8:00 AM, Imagine if an innocent clueless human just wanted to donate blood only to be met with this bizzare "welcome", he'd obviously give up right away and would never think of blood donation ever again.

Anyway, my poor uncle volunteered to wake up at dawn to register our names, but his daughter refused, saying she would wake up early and come alone. his brother (63M) said he would take care of it, and indeed, he woke up at 4:00 AM and set off on a 14-kilometer journey to register our names, only to find that 26 people were ahead of him on the list, even though there were only 6 people outside. Anyway, he went home and took us to the center and we arrived at 8:00 AM.

When it was our turn, I felt a bit nervous. They measured my blood pressure and found it was slightly below normal but still sufficient for donation. The doctors had some trouble finding a suitable vein to draw blood from. Fear was evident in my trembling arm, but finally, the needle was inserted and the blood draw began. surprisingly It wasn't that painful, but after 4 minutes I started to feel dizzy. It worsened until I was on the verge of vomiting, and when They finished drawing blood, the moment they removed the needle from my arm, I felt like I was about to throw up and then immediately passed out. For 2 minutes he doctors revived me by raising my legs to get blood flowing to my brain and splashing me with cold water to bring me back to consciousness. It was a strange moment; I felt like I'd woken up at home. It took me a minute to collect myself and understand what had happened. maybe it happened because i didn't get enough sleep (slept for 5 hours) so maybe you should really take a good sleep before you donate your blood.

I think my cousin(20F) had the worse experience. They punctured her arm twice, on the right and left, because they hadn't punctured the correct vein. Her veins weren't clearly visible, and in the end, they didn't draw much blood and canceled the procedure midway because "her vein was slipping away from the needle", she felt sad and unsatisfied and she felt like she'll internally bleed (thank god that didn't happen)

but this bad service and the absurd shortage in something as simple yet necessary as blood bags (thanks to our smart president who currently banned 90% of importations) i don't think i'll be able donate blood again any time soon, not with the stupid shortage and importations ban.

In the end despite this bad service and that my arm still hurt when i expand it, both my uncle's surgery and our blood donation were a success!