The Blood Bank of Delmarva has seen a wonderful phenomenon develop during the second half of this year – a number of mother-daughter duos have donated together.
It’s a familial form of the “donate with a buddy” system that works for some folks, a lifesaving example of the ties that bind.
The most recent example came on Tuesday, September 17 when Kristin Armstrong and her daughter Delaney donated together. Delaney’s friend Natalie Martin, a fellow student at the University of Delaware, accompanied them and donated for the first time.
“It’s such an easy thing to not do,” Kristin said, commenting on low donor turnouts. “The plan is to try to do it at the same time [every eight weeks]. Once they start calling me, I try to get it done. I mean, it’s necessary.”
Incidentally, Delaney takes after her mother’s blood type; both are O positive, the most common in America. What’s more, Delaney donated as a pink dot donor, which means her blood was sent to Nemour’s Children’s Hospital.
As for Natalie, she appreciated getting through the donation process with friends, and she plans to come back.
This past summer, August 8 saw Ashley Malinowski donate with her mom Cheryl. Ashley also donated as a pink dot, O positive donor for the first time.
“That was an extra bonus,” Ashley said. “There’s always people in need at the hospitals, and it’s just a nice thing for the community to do. It’s something easy that you can do. I feel like since Covid, people haven’t been donating as much.”
As for her mother, Ashley got Cheryl into donating blood, despite her trepidation.
“Once she knew I was donating here, it was easy to convince her,” she said.
That same afternoon, not too long after the Malinowski family donated in the morning, Ali Rosenthal and her mother Kate donated together. Coincidentally, they were also O positive donors as well.
“I’ve been donating for a long time,” Kate said. “My parents were both blood donors. In and around my pregnancies and when these guys were little, I would donate blood.”
That tradition of donating blood was handed down to Ali as soon as she turned 17 years old and donated blood at the periodic Sanford School blood drive.
“I was really excited, because I would always watch my mom do it as a kid and come back with the bandage [on her arm],” she said. “And I felt like, it was really cool. It’s an easy way to help a lot of people and save lives.”
And, now they donate together.
“It’s a nice way to do something positive together, and a good excuse to go out for a nice meal,” Kate said.
