Other.
I’ve got Restless Legs Syndrome, and one thing they say is that we have to protect our body’s iron stores. RLSers who’ve given regularly have had nasty nasty flareups.
Plus, it’s quite possible that with all the meds I take (all legal, and none of 'em any fun, dammit), they wouldn’t want me anyway. Oh well.
I gave when I was younger and still could, at least.
Can’t. Lived in the Land of Mad Cowage.
I’m not actually excluded but I’m really close to the weight limit and the one time I did donate it took me a couple of days to recover. So I decided not to do it again barring emergency (like for a family member) but did it once, so I passed on the one unit I got from somebody else in 1986 (in surgery).
So I checked “other.”
Can’t on blood thinners.
Used to go and give very regularly, I think I topped 5 gallons, then Mad Cow Disease came along and the fact that I had lived in the UK for a year through mid-1980 put me on the permanently rejected list. If they ever change that I’ll start going back.
I don’t give blood. I had a bad experience the first time and won’t do it again. I also don’t appreciate being hustled for my blood by blood bank employees every time I go to the library.
No, because I have a blood borne disease. I enjoy the tasty snacks of braainnss…
I’ve always been excluded for some reason or other. Been to the UK, lived in Korea (apparently we still have malaria kicking around here somewhere), don’t weigh enough, etc.
The three times I’ve gone they’ve decided they don’t want me- I didn’t weigh enough, I was anaemic and I had been to a malaria endemic area.
I think technically I’m permanently excluded because an ex back in the day was bisexual, but since I am screened for blood bourne diseases for work and I’m fine I don’t actually think that should count.
Currently- it is less than a year since I’ve given birth and I still don’t weigh enough.
I’d be more than happy to give, but clearly it is never going to happen.
I should donate more. I HATE when the Red Cross calls me constantly to conribute blood though. I keep telling them to take me off their call list, and they keep at it anyways. Their calling a lot me doesn’t make me want to give blood any more than I already do, it makes me want to stop so they’ll stop.
With that said, I think today’s a good day to give blood.
Have done for years, as often as they ask. (Here in the UK it’s all run by a part of the Health Service and they ask you to give blood when they want you).
Never think twice about it, and can’t understand people who don’t, excepting those few with legitimate reasons. One of the nurses told me once that roughly just 5% of those who could donate blood actually do so.
In Canada, being the sexual partner of someone who has participated in “high-risk activities” will result in a temporary deferral. Canada’s policies are in line with many other countries, so you may not be permanently excluded on the basis of having had a bisexual ex-boyfriend.
Doesn’t apply to you, of course, but some blood banks over here are actually run for profit, and there’s a huge to-do at the moment over the Central Florida Blood Bank because some of their directors were essentially taking bribes from companies they own to provide them with blood first and so on.
I used to give blood very regularly - and once even became borderline-anemic, so my doctor suggested I do so a little less frequently. It was a simple way to help other people, and it made me feel good. Then the American Red Cross, fearing Mad Cow Disease in the blood supply, banned anyone who’d spent more than a cumulative six months in the UK. That was me.
Now I hear about blood emergencies and crisis levels in the local blood supply from time to time, and can’t help out. Looks unlikely the ban will be lifted anytime soon, either. Pisses me off. :mad:
I donate about every 56 days plus -=- I don’t do 56 days like clockwork, but I do donate a lot more often than “whenever a blood drive rolls around”. I get reminding postcards and phone calls, and generally go to the Red Cross Donating Center, rather than waiting for a convenient drive.
I tried to a couple of months ago, and was then informed that I was temporarily excluded for a reason I’d never heard of.
Vaguely TMI:Apparently you can’t have had sex with someone while she was on her period within…I think it was nine months of donating. The bitter part of that being that it was one of the last times I had sex with my wife before we split up.
I’ve ginven blood many times, at least 50. I haven’t done it regularly lately because of things like dentistry. I’ve also given platelets quite a few times.
How the hairy heck did that come up?
SO that was you! 
I’m sorry… I didn’t recognize you. [sub]Bloody face blindness…[/sub]
It was actually one of the secondary screening questions. They had a setup where you answered a somewhat lengthy quiz on a computer touch screen. I got to that one and stopped to asked the nurse a clarifying question about it, and she said that my answer to the question had to be “yes,” and as such, I was ruled out. I was floored. Especially since I’d scheduled the appointment two months beforehand and had give up my lunch break for the opportunity to donate. I didn’t leave very happy.
ETA: Swallowed, I just thought about it some more after typing this, and I now recall that the question on the screening actually waswhether or not I’d come into contact with anyone’s blood in any way. So I explained to the nurse the manner in which I had, thinking that surely THAT didn’t count. But it turns out that it did.