I go for my weekly this afternoon even though we're shutting things down for a couple weeks. There is one tech or nurse at the site I go to who is brutal, the others are gentler. Luck of the draw.

Announcenment: Hello all

End trans

Gah! Good luck. It's like with phlebotomists; some of them will carve you up real nice for a green card and others are like the tooth fairy.

re the phlebotomists, how hard can it be? I would think after half a dozen, you would have it down.

Maybe they are sadists? I've heard horror stories from people with "difficult to find veins" - finally they call in the one nurse who is the vein whisperer and she gets it in one. Makes you wonder why they don't just call her first in when they see the victim has "difficult to find veins."

My veins are so easy they all salivate when they see them... and yet sometimes they still fuck it up so badly I look like a dalmation for weeks!

That's a good one. As my favorite vampire would say.

Techniques, skill level and needle size have all improved the process over the years.
Attitude, both theirs and yours, help a lot.

I have to admit that, when asked which arm I prefer, I point to theirs.

Both Minifob and I have difficult veins (Minifobette, it seems, was spared.) They once stuck me 7 times trying to find a vein. The difficult qualities, aside from being smaller and deeper than normal, also apparently include "rolling," i.e. being so loose under the skin that they slide away from underneath the tip of the needle, and "blowing out," i.e. being so delicate that the introduction of a needle puncture causes the whole thing to tear apart. This also accounts for our easy bruising tendencies.

It doesn't bother me at all, but I do have to look away otherwise I invariably move my arm to try and "help" them. My favorite (of course) is when they say "show me your finger" for the blood ox thingy ..... :D .....every time.