In other news...
I went to get blood drawn this morning, since I go to see the endo next week. Normally, on my worst day, they have to dig around a bit for a vein in my left arm. What can I say--I'm a chubby girl with deep veins, covered by an extra layer of fat. But it's genetic, too. My mom also has shitty veins--the one in her arm actually goes sideways instead of length-wise in the crook of her elbow. We're freaks.
Anyway. Today the guy goes after my left arm. Nothing. Right arm. Still nothing. Takes a look at the backs of my hands, which I kid you not, are vein-free to the naked eye. The poor phlebotomist must've been a bit of a noob (though he did compliment me on my perfume--BPAL, natch--so he wasn't all bad), so he balks and goes for backup. Rather than get Leslie, who could, in my opinion, get blood out of a fucking stone, he gets a little Hispanic woman I've never seen before and whose name escapes me at the moment. He then leaves, and with him went any chance for my visit to be ok, apparently.
Because this little woman pulls out the whole needle plus tube apparatus, which normally means she's gonna go for a hand. Okay, this I can handle (pun not intended)--it hurts, and I normally bruise, but it's only 2 of the big vials today, so yeah, no problem. She pops on the tourniquet around my left forearm, and then...
...flips my hand over...
You guessed it. She went for my fucking wrist. I have never, in my years of regular visits for blood tests (I go on average at least 5-6 times per year) had a phlebotomist decide to do this. It hurt like mad, though I guess I should be thankful she got it on the first try and didn't have to prod around. So I watch, cuz I'm sick like that, and she does the two vials in no time. Awesome.
Then, she goes to pull the needle out, only the dumbass still has the end of the tube in the sample vial, so she's trying to juggle this shit while pulling the needle out and get some gauze on my arm. And in the process, she pulls the needle out and there's about a three second gap between needle-out and gauze-on, during which time my wrist starts pumping blood all over the fucking place. Like out of a mother-fucking horror movie, kids. She clucks and slaps some gauze on and instructs me to hold down very hard to stop the bleeding. Her gloves are now covered, so she ditches them and snaps on a new pair before putting the vials down and wrapping me up.
She tells me then, that she doesn't like to do the wrist, because it's so close to the skin, that even a little tear can cause major problems. Ya think?! It dribbled blood for over an hour, has been sore all day, and is bruising up quite nicely.
So remember--if your blood lab chick starts looking for something other than your arm, let 'em dig around in your hands--the wrist thing is NOT so much with the happy-fun-times, k?
K.