I average one tattoo session or more a year. They don’t want me.
The gay thing has been explained to me in several ways.
When I was in H/R I organized a few health fairs and asked. The Red Cross Nurse told me the “official” reason was that the HIV test isn’t 100%. So they can’t risk it. She told me “off the record,” gay people were using blood donations as a cheap way to get screend for HIV.
I have heard the same thing from two other nurses from Chicago hosptials, who helped organize the health fairs where I worked, where blood donation was part of it.
It seems, at least in the beginning, gay people were using the blood donation to get monthly screening for HIV.
All of the nurses also told me despite pleas for blood coming up from time to time, they never really “NEED” the blood, and if a national emergency would arise, they’d make an exception fast enough. Of course that is “just talking to me off the record.” So take it for what it was.
I used to donate all the time because I have B+ type. Then one day I went to donate and they asked me if I lived in Europe during the 80’s. I told them yes and they said I couldn’t donate anymore. Apparently there was some kind of Mad Cow problem stemming from that timeframe in Europe and I could now be a carrier.
It sucks because I can’t donate but it does give me an excuse for forgetting things. “Oh, gee. I missed Valentine’s Day? It must have been the Mad Cow.” Makes me feel like Denny Craine. 
Yep. They have the blood mobile here at work every eight weeks. I miss maybe one donation a year for one reason or another. I got my four gallon pin late last year!
I just tried to donate last week and this is what happened to me. You have to register 12.5 in iron and I was only a 12.1. I’m taking extra iron supplements this week and I’ll be eating a tuna fish sandwich before I go in again on Wednesday. Wish me luck.
That’s the thing that I do now. I hate the feeling of the stuff coming back in and I feel crappy for a couple of days afterward but they tell me that it does way more good than regular donation so I keep doing it.
Since I have started regular exercise, my resting pulse has dropped to the point that it is officially too low to be eligible about every other time. They’ll give a waiver for that if you claim to be “athletic.”
I used to pretty regularly. Now due to BP meds and almost yearly operations I cannot. But I hope to again some day.
I work at a hospital so they have a drive every 56 days. I’ll miss maybe one a year because of work load. There’s a two gallon pin around here somewhere.
I used to semi-regularly; pretty much when the blood bank remembered to remind me, which wasn’t an entirely perfect system. Sometimes I’d get there every couple months for a while; then there’d be a period of time when I didn’t hear from them, so I’d forget about it for a few months, until they remembered to remind me again.
Permanently deferred now due to having had a blood-related cancer, as of about 3 years ago.
I’m an O negative universal donor. They love my blood too. I voted for every 56 days but it’s really every 112 days because they always take a double from me. Bird in the hand and all that, I guess.
I did once, though it turns out I shouldn’t have been allowed to because I was too small. If you’re as short as I am, you basically need to be overweight for them to let you donate, even just plasma.
I had mono-hepatitis with liver damage many years ago, so I don’t know if the blood is safe to donate.
O positive. Just about every 8 weeks, whole blood. Coming really close to my third gallon donated at our local blood bank.
I’m a sucker for free Nutter Butters and cranberry juice. 
I donated three times when I was younger, but the last time, I almost fainted and I haven’t donated since. That was over a decade ago. I want to give and I know I should give, but the memory of that last time usually stops me.
I’d like to say THANK YOU to all the people who have donated. Blood donations have helped save my life, as well as the life of my brother during his surgery in October.
I’ve have my own 9 gallon pin around somewhere. I was giving very regularly then around 2003 I kept getting deferred for low hemoglobin, so I stopped trying except once a year – which was always defered. 2 years and 6 days ago I was holding two cantaloupes trying to figure out which to buy, then the next thing I knew there were all these people standing around and I was lying on the floor. I was told at the hospital my hemoglobin was 4.8, that’s why I passed out, and got a transfusion of 3 units. I had my pesky uterus taken out in June of that year and got 4 units. I donated 1 year and 1 day from my surgery, and have been donating regularly (4 times) since – no more anemic blood for me.
Did it once in high school. Never since. Afraid of needles :eek:
I picked the last option. I used to donate regularly, but the last few times I tried, it was just amazingly painful. I don’t know if it was just bad luck and I got a series of really incompetent bloodletters or what, but the pain during the donation itself, the achy arm for two days after, the giant bruises, plus the constant nagging from the blood bank to come back and try again, just put me off completely.
I try to give blood 2 times a year; my hemoglobin levels are usually so close to the cut-off point that more frequent donations aren’t possible. Right now I’m on a 4-month quarantine, though, because of some tattoo work and new sexual partners. Once April rolls around I’ll probably trade blood donation to going in for plasmapheresis - a friend of mine works at the Finnish Red Cross’s blood bank and she called me a while back to ask if I would be available since I’m B+, and apheresis doesn’t affect hemoglobin levels so it’s probably a better fit for me.
I’m somewhere between choice one and choice two. I don’t go every 56 days, because I end up anemic if I do that. But about every three months I make an appointment and go to the donor center - I don’t wait for a drive.
I also picked “Fool of a Took”. I gave regularly for years, Eventually got my three gallon pin and cup. Shortly after that, my veins crapped out. After the third time of leaving with a bruise the size of a softball on both arms and not having actually given any blood, I decided there were many younger people with better veins that can supply it now. They even have trouble getting a blood sample when I go for a physical now. Usually they end up taking it from the back of my hand. I hope I never need an IV.
That said, Kudos to everyone that gives blood, it is one of the most unselfish acts anyone can do nowadays. Kudos also to anyone that wants to give blood and is prevented by the restrictive policies. They are mostly there for protection of people needing blood. I know there’s prejudice against gays, I hope that goes away as society becomes more enlightened.