Blood draw

[trigger warning: blood]

I had my first blood draw in 13 years yesterday. The lengthy gap is not random. My last blood draw had gone horribly wrong.

The last time

That previous visit had been for a fasting blood draw. Until then, I'd never had issues with blood draw before. Nurses always complimented me on my veins. One of them said that I had "veins like a garden hose, they are impossible to miss." So, I felt zero fear/anxiety for the procedure. But I think I made the mistake of looking at the syringe. My blood flows fast, and blood draw goes twice as quickly for me than for my wife. I saw my bright red blood enthusiastically gushing the syringe. That was the last thing I remember. 

Then came nothing. It was the void, and after an indeterminate time, came the reboot. 

I literally experienced my brain booting up like an old Intel 488 computer booting up DOS. First the BIOS kicked in, it checked for available memory, scanned disk to locate the operating system, and started loading it. Then it felt like I was coming back up from void pitch black back up to the surface. When I regained full consciousness, I found myself pounding the blood draw chair with my fist. I then started hearing people. I stopped. By then several nurses had rushed into the room, and my wife looked terrified.

She later described what happened: my eyes had rolled back in their sockets, and I started thrashing violently! It lasted less then a minute, but it was so alarming that my wife thought I was dying. She began shouting and collapsed, and the nurses had to pick her up floor the floor. 

After researching the incident, I believe what I experienced was vasovagal syncope, specifically convulsive syncope. I found this old German research video, and I think this is what it must have looked like. This is what happens when the blood pressure drops suddenly and significantly reduces blood flow to your brain, 

Yesterday's return

Fast forward 13 years, I finally had returned to my primary physician for a well visit, which prescribed me the fasting blood work. I was procrastinating on getting it done, but as my wife also needed blood work, we scheduled back-to-back appointments through the Quest app for 9:50 AM on Friday.

I felt surprisingly calm. No anxiety the night before or that morning. Maybe because of my computer science training, I'm good at compartmentalizing. Why worry before the event? This is a 9:50am problem.

In the waiting room, I googled how to prevent fainting during blood draw. I had already learned about not watching my blood gushing into the tube from the previous episode. The other recommendations included using a reclined chair, breathing deeply, and crossing and tensing leg muscles to maintain blood flow to the brain.

I informed the phlebotomist that I fainted before, and we arranged for a reclined chair. I offered my left arm to the phlebotomist, and my wife held my right hand. Honestly, she seemed more nervous than I was, as I remained detached from the situation. I don't think I have a needle phobia; it's specifically seeing blood while fasting that triggers me. Ironically, I find it more distressing to watch my wife get blood drawn than to undergo it myself.

Ok, the plastic wraps on my left arm, and I make a fist. The needle goes in with a slight pinch. No problemo! But uh, oh. The phlebotomist gives up after 10 seconds, saying she missed the vein. She decided to try my right arm instead, and also said she will use a butterfly this time, because my veins did not manifest well. Wait what? I thought I had garden hose for veins. Checking later, I noticed my veins were barely visible, but they became quite prominent by evening time. Apparently, I was having a bad vein morning. 

Ok, they reposition around me. Now my wife clutched to my left hand with both her hands and she is feeling panicked. I again remain calm, feeling more curious than worried. The needle goes in, this time it hurts more, so I know it hit the vein. Good, I check myself, and I feel OK. Three tubes later, we are done. My wife suggested I stay seated, but I felt fine and stood up immediately.

That's it. Fortunately it is an anticlimactic ending to a story, but that probably wasn't worth your last few minutes. I don't think there is much point to this post, I just thought this was interesting. Oh, also I still feel sad thinking about the waiting room at the lab. It was mostly elderly patients, some having a hard time walking. This made me uncomfortably aware that I'll likely be visiting these labs more frequently in my later years, when I'm weak and less steady on my feet. This is definitely not my happy place.

On the one hand, I am very optimistic for the next 30 years, looking forward to how distributed systems, machine learning, space exploration, bio-exploration, sub-atomic exploration advances. On the other hand, I do not look forward to getting any older. I have middle-aged!