I want to preface by saying I saw a post on here last night and thought to myself, “huh, I wonder when I’ll have something to post on here?” For the love of god, never be as foolish as I was.

This happened a couple hours ago.

I’m a healthy 25 year old guy currently in professional school. I’ve recently discovered the gem of donating plasma for some extra spending money. It helps me feel a little better considering my loans are astronomical. Anyway, I set my appointment for 9:00 today. I slept in until roughly 8:20 to give myself just enough time to get ready and then drive 20 minutes to the donation center.

Since my last drink of water was the night before, I made sure to chug the remainder of my water bottle to help my donation go faster. That was roughly 24 oz.

For those who are unfamiliar, the process of donating plasma takes around an hour and drinking water speeds up the process (being hydrated = juicy blood = less time to reach the goal volume). Importantly, once they put the needle in your arm, you’re pretty much stuck there until the donation ends.

For my very first donation, I didn’t pee before I got the needle in, and I ended up fighting for my life. It only takes one near-piss experience to remind you to pee beforehand in the future.

Today was no different, I peed right before I sat down to start the donation. She hooked me up, and I started watching the next episode of The Mandalorian; all was well. Until about 30-35 minutes later. I suddenly realized I would be having a repeat of the first time. I guess the 24 oz had started to reach my bladder; I must’ve only peed out what I had from last night. I tried my damndest to focus on the show and wiggle my feet to distract myself. The show ended and I was left to consider the gravity of my situation. I was around 2/3 through donating, so probably another 20 minutes. I had already been clenching my teeth for 15. I was struggling so bad I just sat there in silence and prayed I would have the bladder of a warrior today.

Now you ladies might not have ever considered that guys have a secret pee-proof technique—simply grab your penis and you can manually keep urine from leaking. The trade off is that the pressure builds up in your urethra rather than your bladder and is very painful. This is the last of last resorts. Once you do it, you’re guaranteeing that there will be some leakage once you finally release your grip and extreme pain until then. I knew I couldn’t endure that pain for the rest of my donation so I didn’t do it.

Desperation overcame me and I mustered the courage to ask my phlebotomist if I could pause the donation to go to the bathroom. She was very nice and said, “sure! We will just have to replace the fluids we’ve taken and then you can go.” Lovely, I have a closer end point, though unfortunately it’s still several minutes away. While I’m waiting, I have more time to think and discover that at some point my urethral sphincter couldn’t contain the floodwaters and I had pissed myself. It wasn’t enough to get the seat wet and happened gradually enough to where my clothing just soaked it up, creating a large wet spot. I imagine it looked similar to Adam Sandler in Billy Madison, for size reference. However I am so grateful that I decided to wear athletic shorts today instead of jeans. If I wore jeans, everyone would be able to tell I’m a big piss baby even out of the corner of their eye.

While we were waiting for the donation to finish, she asked me if I was going to make it. I can only imagine how pitiful I looked to her—wide eyed and wiggling in desperation. I thought for a moment and said, “… I don’t know.” I mean legitimately what do I say? Yeah I think I’ll make it because I already pissed? No I already didn’t make it? Who knows.

With the speed of a seasoned street vender, she pulled out the needle, wrapped my arm, and told me I was good to go. I discretely dashed to the bathroom and lo and behold, I didn’t have to pee that badly. Through the mirror, the spot was only mildly visible so maybe I escaped unnoticed. I went back to my station and the phlebotomist told me I’m done even though we stopped the donation early. I’m grateful for that, but I wish I had realized that before I made one final sweep through the building with my peepee pants.

To make matters worse, our washing machine shit the bed last week. Thankfully my neighbor was a saint and happily agreed to let me use hers. I’m already laughing (and cringing) at the memory of today. It’s a funny story to tell and I guess I can relate to my future kids by telling them I wasn’t potty trained until I was 25 years old.

TL;DR I drank a bunch of water before donating plasma and despite peeing right before it started, I pissed on myself and had to stop donating early. My washing machine is also broken so I’m having to use my neighbor’s.