As part of preparing for the journey, we wanted to know our blood groups and put a sticker on the helmets stating these blood groups…just in case we’ll have an accident and it comes in handy.

For testing, we needed a little detour as our GP doesn’t do it, so we had to get it done at the lab. Turns out I am AB+ which is quite a rare blood group and renders my blood generally useless as I can only donate to my own blood group. On the other hand this blood group is known as the ‘universal receiver’. Any other blood group is compatible to mine. In other words: Flo will be able to donate blood for me if push comes to shove, I won’t be able to return the favour.

Reading up on my blood group though was good. I don’t need to feel bad for not donating blood for the reason stated above. However, I should seriously think about donating plasma. For plasma, things are turned upside down: I am the ‘universal donator’. Because I have A and B in my blood, my plasma does not contain any kind of antibodies and is thus usable by every blood type while I can only received plasma donations from my own blood group.

I might have to look into this a bit more in the future.