Forrey's Stories

How Embarrassing!

About a month or so ago, a few of my friends told me about a plasma donation center that had opened up here in Idaho Falls. We all decided that we wanted to go and make some cash (good paying cash by the way!) so we set up the appointments and went for it. I didn't make it past the tests because I am on some medication that had to have a doctor's approval. That process took forever! The center had to send a paper to the Doctor's office for them to sign and send it back...doesn't sound too hard right? Well, the office sent it back and it sat at the center for an additional 2 weeks (filled out incorrectly) waiting for the approval of the center Doctor who was on vacation in Hawaii.... to approve me as a donor. The Doctor returned from Hawaii and still couldn't approve me because the paper was filled out wrong. So it had to be sent back AGAIN to the doc's office and so on and so forth.

Anyway after all this stuff was worked out, I finally got to go in and make some cash today...HA! and here is how it went. I was a little nervous so I had butterflies in my tummy. I haven't donated before (not even blood) Apparently donating plasma is super hard on the body if you aren't up to par on your health, it causes all sorts of issues. My appointment was at 6 a.m. so that I could get it done while Abby was still sleeping (she woke up at 4 a.m.) so much for that..HA! Onto the next, so I went into the center and they got me all set up and going. Seriously the poke wasn't bad at all, I honestly hardly felt it... so that was nice. I was feeling great and doing the whole pumping my fist thing and moving along nicely and then it HIT me. I had practically passed out and was trying to get some words out for someone to help me. They finally rushed over after a few minutes to rescue me and they barely got there in time for the nurse to lift up the garbage can for me to empty the contents of my tummy into...my whole body hurt so bad I felt like I could barely breathe. They quickly turned the machine off and got the reverse cycle going again with some IV fluids and made me drink a bottle of Gatorade, water and eat a granola bar right away so rehydrate my super fast. I felt better almost instantly but my blood pressure kept dropping so I couldn't finish the donation! FUN HUH? So I finally get in there and this is what I get....a reaction is what they call it. I ended up having to stay for like 20 minutes until my vitals stabilized before they would let me drive myself home. This all happened when I was about finished anyway and I still got paid...YIPPEE!

So for those of you who donate plasma, there is a lesson to be learned from incident today. Be a little smarter than I was and eat bacon and eggs for breakfast before you donate and that won't happen to you, and you can save yourself some embarrassment...HA!