giving blood

[lobolance]

I gave blood at the Red Cross on Saturday. For the first time, at the start of the questions, I was asked 'were you born biologically male or female?'. The admin clearly thought I was joking when she heard the answer. But I wasn't. As a note, I'm rather used to lying about who I have sex with, but, as usual, I didn't think to lie when asked a new direct question (I don't do much off-the-cuff lying ;-) ).

So, clueless what to do, the admin got her supervisor (who was a really cool person) who called their off-site supervisor after much debating of tactics (they did want to ensure my privacy). She came back with the info that I had to be entered as female (after years donating as male!) in order for the 'correct' questions to be had.

However, the upper supervisor personally guaranteed he would call whomever and get some kinda note made so no 'mistakes' would be made. I was already clear with myself that I would walk out and never come back if I had to deal with gender confusion from some telemarketer in the future on account of this. Of course, I can always just add lying about my birth sex to my standard answers to their questions (should I donate again). It's all rather tiresome.

With some misgivings, I agreed to go forward. ... I have rather rare blood, and it's useful for me to donate, as like many transmen, my red blood cell count can get a little high.

So, we'll see what happens next time I get called to donate blood.

I find I remain really rather angry. I worked so hard to get all 'f's removed from legal papers, and here one is again, entirely needlessly.

At least I had a good conversation with the local supervisor about how poor and unscientific much of their screening process is. And I really will call her (as well as the upper supervisor) if I have any problems (in order to say what happened and to take me off their call list).

It's worth noting that they had to ask the bio question... and had no plan for dealing with the answer!

Comments

[lobolance.livejournal.com]

huh. interesting. many people only know me post-transition. Identity is an interesting thing isn't it, no matter where you come at it.

[lisa-marli.livejournal.com]

Yep, that's why I've given up asking. I figure if someone comes on to me, we'll figure it out then. Until then, it doesn't really need to be asked.
Until then I have the Good People pile and the Not Nice People pile and that's enough.