Needles
This qotw is already 23 pages long, so I presume somebody has already posted something about them, so I'll elaborate slightly to...um...satisfy my own ego.

I've always been okay with injections. I don't mind people putting stuff into my veins. It's when they're taking blood that I go weak at the knees for some reason.

A couple of years ago, following concerns about a rather irregular and inexplicable weight loss, I booked in for a blood test. It doesn't help that you've got to fast for 12 hours so they can get a cleaner sample.

So this very nice Eastern European nurse measured my blood pressure, put on a tourniquet and stuck that bloody great needle in my arm. I had been looking the other way since she put the tourniquet on, and I felt alright up until she put the little plaster on my elbow. Then I started to feel very faint.

"Okay," she said, "let's get you to the sick bay"
And so I staggered down the corridor to said sick bay, being led/supported by this nurse. To this day, I'm amazed how well she managed. I don't mean to sound patronising, but even after the weight loss I was a 12st, 6'2" dead weight that this very slight 5'4" woman had to prevent from toppling over.

So I got there, and lay on this bed while she took my new blood pressure. I didn't catch the numbers, but the worried "oh..." she let out as she compared the before and after didn't bode well. Still, she then decided I needed plenty of sugar so I spent the morning being given a shovel-load of tea and biscuits, all on the NHS. At least they're good for something.

The irony? A couple of years later, I was sharing a flat with a medical student who needed blood samples for her research project. I let her take my blood in our living room. Clearly, I never learn.

Apologies for length. At least it won't get any longer with my blood pressure that low.
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 14 Apr 2008, 9:50, Reply)