Quick (and Depressing) Brain Dump

I cannot say this aloud to the people I want to say it to, so I’m going to splash it here.  But quickly, bc I have a lot to do.

So a little boy in Jack’s class has leukemia.  It’s the “good” kind of leukemia – as in, the kind that is more like a chronic illness, and is still very health-depleting and scary and awful, but gives him a really good prognosis for a long life.  There is another kind that is more of a death sentence.  The latter is the kind of leukemia that killed my wee cousin Mary Beth when she was just a kid.  So, the goodish news for Benny is that he will very likely survive into adulthood, and though he’ll have a cloud over his head his whole life, with lots of extra checkups and what-have-you, he very likely will have a life.

However, Benny needs some marrow transplants and lots and lots and lots of blood donations to get him through the first year of so of this illness.  I cannot donate blood anymore, which is unfortunate because I have a very rare type – the same type as little Benny – and my blood could do a lot in the world.  My having lived in England for a year (aka mad cow disease country) keeps me from donating, though – some blood donation decision-making authority wants to isolate mad cow disease, and thus has put a blanket restriction disallowing donations from people who lived in England a year or more during certain periods of time.  So I organized a blood drive here at school in lieu of donating myself.  It will occur next week.  And here’s where the pissy brain dump comes in – dumped on you readers without all of the hedging diplomacy that I normally would employ, but am foregoing because I’m too pressed for time to be tactful.

As I advertise and cajole and notify as many people as possible about this blood drive, I’d say 90% of the responses I’ve gotten are “I don’t donate because I’m afraid of needles.”  And this is PISSING ME OFF, perhaps more than it should.  So here is what I want to say to these people.*

OK, I understand you don’t like needles.  There is probably a tiny proportion of the population who gets off on having needles stuck in their arm, but I think, for the most part, nobody likes needles.  I myself get the shakes and the sweats when I have needles stuck in my arm.  Saying the word “blood” kind of skeeves me out.  I am with you.  But what I need to tell you is to SUCK IT UP for heaven’s sake.  You’re afraid of needles?  You want to know what real fear is?  Real fear is being afraid of needles, and then getting cancer and having to get stuck with them fifty zillion times a day.  Real fear is having cancer at all, and having to face the possibility of dying much sooner (and more painfully) than you’d hoped or believed was your fate.  Real fear is watching your baby boy, your little two year old sweetheart, get stuck full of needles and wires and catheters, and knowing that his body is trying to kill him, and that his body is an enemy, this little body you created and nurture and love.  Real fear is laying on the fucking hospital bed next to him while poison gets pumped into his veins that kills his immune system dead, so that nothing can enter his hospital room that hasn’t been doused in bleach and bacteria killing solution first – not even his favorite stuffed animal, not a blanket, not even a book.  Real fear is laying in there with him in isolation for four long weeks, night and day, hour in and hour out, holding his damn hand and hoping that the chemo works this time so you don’t have to do it again and again.  Real fear is forcing your five year old to undergo a painful and scary bone marrow transplant, because he is the closest match to his little brother, and feeling guilty over forcing him to do something that he’s not old enough to meaningfully consent to.  Real fear is feeling guilty and terrible that you are the one who caused this – it’s all your fault, your genes or the way you fed him as a baby or what you ate when you were pregnant or nursing or the gas fumes that spewed out of the car you drove or the lead in the soil under the house you bought or any of a million other things that you did.  Real fear is facing the very real possibility of having to outlive your child, of having to live for decades without  him, of having to pretend you could ever be happy again when you know that there is no happiness or light in the world that doesn’t have him in it.

You’re afraid of needles, for god’s sake?  Grit  your teeth and get the hell over it.  Wear a blindfold, sing a song, hold a friend’s hand.  Something like 85% of the population is healthy enough to donate blood, and something like 5% of the population does.  You’d better hope that when it’s your turn to have a need – because it will be, either you or your mom or your sister or your kid or your spouse or you best friend – that there are people in the world braver than you, who underwent the tiny, miniscule little bit of physical and mental discomfort that is rolling up your sleeve and getting stuck for a couple of minutes.  You or someone you love will need blood one day, and when they do, you’ll know what real fear is, and your little nervousness about giving blood will pale in comparison.

I don’t usually do the Fear/Pain Olympics thing, but this time I’m making an exception.  This is a fear, ok, and it’s legitimate, but it’s also something that, I’d wager, most of the people in this law school could overcome if they exerted just the tiniest bit of mental effort.  None of them are willing to exert that effort, and that makes my blood boil.  If you’ll pardon the pun.

Now, having dumped that furious rant, I have to go outline Constitutional Criminal Procedure.  Carry on with your day, people, carry on.

*I realize that you, reader, may be one of those people.  I’m sorry.  I would never say this to you in person.  But I  guess I’m admitting now that I would THINK it at you, and that’s just the way it is.