“I met Joe yesterday. He said, ‘I will kill … him’,” Henry shouted.
I remember him saying ‘… kill … him’.
As a 36-year-old man with a family of my own, I wanted to do something meaningful that would make a difference to someone else.
I have always heard about the importance of blood donation but had never taken the time to do it. That all changed when I took the leap of faith and donated blood for the first time at the Blood Bank of Sarawak General Hospital on Tuesday (January 31).
It is inspiring to me a fellow donor, Wong Ngie Hook, who is far older than me, has been doing it for many years. It was when I interviewed him for a story recently that I found out that he is one of the selfless individuals who religiously give blood.
“I do it because I can … I’m healthy, so why not?” he shrugged. “And I know that I’m directly helping someone. So how good is that?”
For him, it’s just a small thing to give, something I can easily emulate. That was when I decided to become a donor.
Upon arriving at the donation centre, I was nervous as I did not know what to expect. However, the ‘bankers’ were friendly and made the process easy and comfortable.
They took me through the process step by step, and answered all my questions while filling out forms and having a mini-physical checkup.
Before the donation could proceed, they needed to know my blood type and hemoglobin (HB) levels. A doctor recommended a simple blood test.
After the test was completed, I was told that the results would be out in a few minutes.
It turned out that my hemoglobin levels were normal which meant that I was eligible to donate blood.
My blood type was B, that is, my blood can be given to people with B’s and AB’s blood types in times of need.
So I lay back in a reclining chair, bared my arm and waited to give a pint (450 ml) of blood for the first time. So as not to see the needle, I closed eyes.
“Are you okay?” asked the attending nurse, not unkindly.
“Just squeamish,” I said.
“I understand. Sometimes it can feel a little scary doing a good thing,” she said.
All I felt was a slight prick in my arm and the next moment my blood was flowing into a bag attached to a regulator machine that also measured the volume collected.
When the desired volume is reached, the machine beeps to signal that the process is complete.
I was in the main room, the same place where I sourced a story the other day for an article. Unbidden, thoughts about voting in an election came to mind which, I must say, is quite odd considering where I was. It occurred to me that in an election I usually Ngie Hook said) I don’t get to choose who uses what I donated. It’s for a stranger who I may never meet.
As I thought about the sick people who receive donated blood from strangers, memories of an ex-university mate came to the fore. His name was Jim Harper. I say “was” because he went to be with his maker a few years ago. I studied macroeconomics with him in a university in the USA years ago. He was a brilliant student and how I wished I was as smart as him.
At the time I did not know that he was suffering from a condition which stops the body from creating new blood cells.
A month or two later I saw his obituary in the college newspaper. Another friend asked me if he was somebody to me and I said, “No, I barely knew him.”
Be that as it may, I reached out to Jim’s younger sister, Susan, and asked what she remembered about her brother. She still missed him terribly.
She also recalled the way people came together to help, which taught her about community and society as a whole.
I, too, am grateful to learn about the attempts to save him. Like I said earlier, I barely knew him, but the experience of spending a brief time with him and then hearing heart-warming stories told by the sister taught me about the complexities of life and good will among people.
As I lay there on the reclining chair and recalled the sad event, I became teary-eyed.
“Does it hurt?” asked the nurse, perhaps thinking that I was in distress. “Are you in pain?”
I told her that some sad old memories had just crossed my mind.
The donation process only took about 10 minutes, and once the collection has been completed, the needle was removed and a dressing was applied to compress the hole to prevent more bleeding.
After that, I was given a snack and a drink. I didn’t know what the purpose was, but they tasted nice and made me calm down.
Just for fun, I imagined that the donated blood would be sent all over the country, and perhaps the relevant authorities would write to us to tell us which hospital or patient use the blood.
After that first donation, I am now determined to make it a regular part of my life.
The nurse who attended to me was right. Sometimes doing a good thing is a little scary.
Ask yourself if there is anything you can do in a single hour that can save another person’s life for real.
I am not just talking about the donation and the recipient of my blood per se. It’s beyond that. That’s why right now I am filled with a feeling that I never had before. I think it has something to do with grace, which is the spontaneous, unmerited gift of giving favour to save others whom we may or may not know.
Sure, I’ve lost a pint. But I’ve gained a thing rarer and more precious than blood.
