500 blood and plasma donations later, this man says he did it all for his brother

Paul Shea of St. John's marked the week before Christmas by doing a different kind of giving.

He's done this kind of giving for a long time, though, and just notched his 500th donation of blood and plasma to Canadian Blood Services on Wednesday.

Shea has donated since 1980, when he did his first donation on the campus of Memorial University.

"We competed for a cup, a trophy called the red shield. We often encouraged everybody to get out and participate, and we generally won the cup each year," Shea told CBC News. 

"I don't like to brag about myself in any way, except I will brag about the fact that I give blood."

But while he knows he's helped a lot of people with his donations over the years, he said there's one person who is always on his mind.

Shea's brother, Peter, was diagnosed with leukemia in 1981 at just 22 years old. Peter lived with the cancer for 16 years and beat it, but died due to an illness after the treatment destroyed his immune system.

Paul, who remembers his brother fighting until the very end, says being able to help people like Peter in their own treatment is a big part of his 500 donations.

"It really sucks in my life to go into a hospital and be carrying in bananas or fruit or flowers, when really they need blood in there somewhere. So I feel like I'm helping out without having to go in. So when I do go in, I have a conscience that I've helped someone in here," he said.

"[It takes] around 20 or 30 minutes … but you think about how long you'll be in the hospital visiting someone if they were sick, and you could spend that time, on either a weekly or monthly basis, giving that time in advance."

Shea hopes others can make the time to give blood, saying the welcoming staff make things easy and effortless.

"Here's how you can help someone out without any skills whatsoever," he said.

"All you have to do is breathe."

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