I can't give'r

Had another bloodletting today. Because of my "I'm gonna faint" problem, they can either hook me up to an IV while taking the blood, or just take less. Since I'm not on the verge of dying (normal ferritin levels for women are up to 200, and I'm in the 200s right now - men with serious hemo. have levels in the 800s or more) they just took half a bag instead of a whole bag. And even then, just when she was reaching the end of the half bag, I started getting That Prickly Sensation.

It's like my body doesn't want me to be an academic--it's all "oh she doesn't need blood in her head, let's take it from there first."

It sucks. I'm a bad blood giver-er. I drank two Nalgene bottles of water between 6 AM and my treatment around 9, and still... still! The passing outness. And I have small veins too--my vein was very uncooperative today, she had to squeeze the line to make it flow. And then they make you wait around cause they're afraid you'll leave and pass out somewhere in the street, your head stuck in a cold, wet snowbank...

So all in all this hospital trip took 6 hours out of my day. That's almost an entire Harlequin novel. (Between bus rides, waiting around, laying around being phlobotomized, I read almost the whole Jennifer Crusie book I started that morning.)

I'm a blood failure. I feel so ashamed.

[Today's needle spot and tape marks.]