Holiday Giving - You Might Get More Than You Bargained For.

On December 3, this intrepid reporter went undercover at Biolife, on Coldwater Road in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Ok, actually, it’s Christmastime and I need money. I thought maybe it was a way to earn some extra cash for presents and help out at the same time. It’s not easy obtaining an appointment at Biolife. I originally had the idea to donate years ago, and at that point you had to call to set up a time to do so. It was impossible to first of all get through, and secondly to schedule an appointment. The staff was incredibly rude, telling you to call back the next day and hang up on you. A few months ago I tried again, walking into the office, and discovering that you can now schedule an appointment online by setting up a username, profile and password. After having a time to donate on three separate occasions and being forced to cancel them due to emergencies, I finally made it through the door yesterday. The woman next to me was asked what she had eaten right before arriving. When the woman’s answer wasn’t satisfactory, she was chastised and sent away, being told that she was informed in an email what to eat. As a fellow potential donor, I knew this to be false. You receive an email telling you to eat a meal high in protein the night before, not the day of. The employee of Biolife was extremely rude to this woman, and sent her away in near tears. No one, it seems, is at Biolife out of the goodness of their hearts. They are there because they are desperate for cash. When asked what I ate, I decided to fib. “Scrambled eggs,” I told the same rude employee. “And toast.” Again this seemed not be good enough, but she gave me a bottle of water, told me it was the first of three I would have to drink before I could donate, and instructed me to sit in the waiting area. That’s where I sat for forty-five minutes without acknowledgement. I watched the other people ahead of me being assessed for donation, because they do that right out in the open. Blood pressure and weight is measured (oh, the horrors!) and an initial blood sample is taken by poking the forefinger, much like when a diabetes patient tests their blood. I watched one employee trying to get a blood sample from the forefinger of a young woman. I say trying because after piercing the forefinger of the girl with the lancet and not being able to draw blood, she told her, “This happens all the time,” and proceeded to stick the lancet back in and roll it around in her finger pad, causing the girl to look ill and grab her forehead. I felt nauseous watching this. I’m no wimp when it comes to pain. I sustained a back injury years ago, and live with pain everyday. But the sight of this girl being tortured by an incompetent twenty-something in a lab coat was too much for me to bear. I started talking to the others in the waiting area with me. “How much will I get today?” I asked. I had received an email stating that I might get up to $75, but was informed by the others it would more than likely only be $20 on my first visit. “How long will this take?” Hours, was the answer. They only have one person giving physicals, so the originally stated time of two hours would more than likely be four. I decided to leave, but realized that they had kept my drivers license and social security card at check in. It dawned on me that this was to keep people from bolting. I sat there at least another fifteen minutes trying to screw up the courage to ask for my ID from the snotty staff. In that time I watched the people coming and going, and wondered how safe of a product is Biolife churning out. When my father was going through cancer treatments, he had to be infused with a couple of bags of plasma. This is part of the reason I wanted to give, to help others like him. But now I have to wonder if those people in need are being infested with something even worse after observing actual donors. One woman in particular caught my eye and ear. I say woman now, because at first her sex was not easy to pin down. Her hair was chopped, her features lifeless and her pallor as gray as window putty. She sat down to be assessed, rolled up her sleeves and the staff found needle tracks. At this, she finally showed signs of life. “I haven’t used in a while,” she protested. The staff was satisfied with her obvious false answer, and she was okayed for donation. This amazed and sickened me, because this woman, an IV drug user, was questioned less about her fitness to donate than the woman who didn’t eat a lumberjack sized breakfast. That was all I needed to propel me out of my seat. I got my identification back, and promptly went to the nearby Dunkin Donuts. A Christmas tree shaped pieced of fried dough with a hidden pocket of vanilla pudding helped set me right and calm my quavering nerves. Christmas is coming, I still need money. But I will find another way to get it, maybe even make gifts, rather than return to Biolife. The sight of the desperate and ill, subjecting themselves to physical pain and rough treatment for money drove home some big points - there are so many worse off than me, and yes, Virginia, there is still a recession and high unemployment.