Giving Blood

Well, at last I can write about it.

Almost a month ago, February 1st, Suzanne and I went to give blood at our friendly neighborhood blood bank, The Coffee Memorial Blood Center, which has everything you'd need including comfy chairs, friendly staff, and plenty of cookies and drinks.

On this particular day I was feeling perfectly fine, and I was making jokes and looking up random internet stuff on my phone. No sweat. It wasn't even windy, and for February in the Texas Panhandle, that's saying something (strike that - for every month here that's saying something).

Suzanne was in the chair next to me, and for the next 15 minutes or so we chatted away merrily as the blood drained away.

Once I had finished, I was about to get up and head for the cookies, but then a little weirdness struck me. "I'm a little dizzy," I said. The nurse said she'd tilt my head back for a bit.

And then the next thing I knew six people were surrounding me and someone was saying my name and slapping my face (the smelling salts didn't work). I came to, which was really hard because it was so difficult to focus on anything, and the strange world where I had drifted off to had given me all sorts of great new ideas - ideas that were amazing and earth-shattering. Too bad I can't remember any of them. All I do know is that I wanted my little notebook so I could write down these amazing thoughts, but when I asked for my notebook all that came out was, "Bapfluuuuggah Deurrrp!" Plus I was so tired. I mean, I was wiped out, and all I wanted to do was sleep. I tried to explain that, but I'm sure it came out unintelligible as well.

That's when my back started screaming at me. For some reason, I had this terrible, miserable, nasty back pain, the worst pain I had ever felt. I squirmed around in the chair, trying to get some relief, but it was no good. Oh, it was horrible. The blood center people tried to put pillows behind my back, but I'd have none of that. I just wanted to get out of that chair. That brutal chair from the Spanish Inquisition.

They finally brought a rolling cot over to me and I threw my body onto it. Then they wheeled me into a small room, everyone nervously pacing, Suzanne holding my hand, me making weird moaning noises.

Doctor T., the doc on call, showed up a couple of seconds later and gave me the skinny. Apparently I had had some freaky seizure while I was in the chair and that had tensed up my back muscles something fierce. The seizure lasted for a long while, and I know I stopped breathing (I overheard one of the nurses say that), and it really hosed up my back, bad enough that I couldn't sit up, turn around, turn over, or do anything more difficult than moan a little more.

The doc prescribed some muscle relaxers for me (the first prescription wasn't powerful enough, so she had to double the dose), and at five o'clock, they got me into a little chair with wheels and pushed me to the van, where Suzanne had moved the Girl Scout cookies to make room for me in the back. I rolled out of the chair and landed flat, stretched out, on the van's floor. Suzanne took me home, and two guys from the blood center followed her, helping me to the bedroom once we got to the house.

And there I stayed for a week, occasionally taking half an hour to move the ten feet to the bathroom (I could only walk with my hands on my knees, hunched over, and creeping sideways - standing up was impossible, as was coughing, sneezing, playing the Wii, or even considering opening my laptop). But I progressed, slowly, and measured my success by how much further I could crab-walk the next day and then the day after that. It was ugly though, and at some point I had pulled my neck so hard I couldn't lie down to sleep, so for a couple of nights I had to sleep on my knees next to the sofa, and that sleep only lasted an hour each night. Brutal.

By the end of the week, after a series of doctors and physical therapists, I was finally feeling almost human. But even now, almost a month later, sneezing is out of the question, and if the kids start making me laugh too hard it's horrible (yet I can't resist their corny jokes).

I've tried to discover what might have happened to me. It could have been a low blood sugar seizure. One of the docs said it was a tonic seizure (I thought at first he had said Teutonic Seizure, which I was sure had to be something really interesting), and he also said it's like I was in a bad car accident. He then said it'd take four to six months to get back to normal. Four to six months! From giving blood!

Oh, and I'm not supposed to give blood again or, as the doctor said none too gently, I could die. That means croaking, kicking the bucket, auf wiedersehen. So I need to steer clear of any blood centers from now on.

Through all this I didn't want to scare the kids, but they and Suzanne were great. The kids made a Get Well Soon sign for the bedroom door and they brought me meals in bed and then disappeared while I ate and peered through my toes at the TV to watch episode after episode of Monk.

So now I'm better and am back to work. I canceled a trip to Boston for next week because I can't summon the strength to strip down at an airport (honestly, who can?). But so far, so good.

And I still move like a 200 year old man, but I hear that's the hip new thing. So at last I'm cool.

And I'm digging it. Well, not with a shovel because that would really hurt. Really.