The Humble Vet Tech

Just a regular girl, living in a vet tech world

I know that I said my next post would be more positive… — December 30, 2019

I know that I said my next post would be more positive…

/The Humble Vet Tech/1 Comment

…and maybe the next one will be. Sunshine and rainbows, people. Suuuuunshine and rainboooooows.

A mere hour after last nights post I did end up getting called into work. It was for a real emergency with a Bengal cat that likely wouldn’t have made it through the night without myself and my vet. Sometimes when I get called in to work the emergency isn’t a true emergency and is more of an urgent care scenario (ie a dog hit by a car vs an acute vomiting/diarrhea dog). So that felt good, to save that cat’s life. I got home around 12:30 am and was back at work for my regular shift eight hours later.

We hit the ground running this morning with the phones ringing constantly in the background for the first hour and a half of the day. We had a couple euthanasias, one of them was a really hard one. To wrap up the morning, the last appointment before lunch was a recheck exam on a kitty with a chronic disease that she is medicated for. Kitty took a downhill turn over the past week so we did some diagnostics. Since her last exam she has developed some health issues secondary to her chronic disease – now making her terminal. There is now nothing else we can do for her other than keep her comfortable.

When cashing out the kitty’s owner, I asked her if she wanted her receipt/invoice from the visit. A lot of people take them for their records at home, pet insurance reasons, etc. Kitty’s owner looked me straight in the eye and said “No thank-you, I don’t need a receipt. It’s not like I can return her diagnosis.”

Those words really stuck with me. That was a humbling moment for your friendly neighbourhood vet tech. Hug your pets a little tighter tonight, friends.

Christmas Time Vet Tech-ing — December 29, 2019

Christmas Time Vet Tech-ing

/The Humble Vet Tech/Leave a comment

First of all, Merry Christmas/Happy New Year/Happy Holidays.. etc etc. I’m not feeling particularly festive this year however I feel like that is directly related to my job. The weeks surrounding Christmas are always a whirl wind for those in the veterinary medicine world. I’m willing to wager I know that this time of year is chaotic for anyone in any type of health related field. So go you, health professional, for making it through another holiday season.

The main reason my job puts a damper on my festiveness is because Christmas gives people a sense of entitlement when it comes to their pet. If someone has to pay $350 for diagnostics for their pet any other time of year, most are understanding of that. Medicine and healthcare are not cheap – that includes for animals. However if it is around Christmas time, we as professionals are “gouging” the owner of the pet. “Don’t you have a conscience?” “People aren’t made of money, you know” “Don’t you have any Christmas spirit?”. Well yeah, I did, asshole. Up until about 30 seconds ago when you started shitting on me like I’m the one person in the entire world that decides every veterinary cost everywhere. Don’t get me wrong, I understand that money doesn’t grow on trees. A dollar these days sure as shit does not go as far as a dollar did even ten years ago. As a vet tech I am not a stranger to financial worry – I make a measly $20/hour. In a lot of US states, there are vet techs that make half of that. Most vet techs and veterinary support staff (heck even some vets) are not exactly rolling in coin.

Another work related damper are the euthanasias that we see around this time of year. There is usually a rush of death of old pets in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Some people do it because we’re heading towards cold weather if we haven’t gotten it already (-30 C before wind chill) and know that the cold will be hard on them. Horses are usually done earlier, around late fall, so that their owner can bury them properly in a deep enough hole. This year we had a longer fall so we had a rush of horses in the past weeks leading up to the first week of December. Supposedly some people bring in their old, sometimes decrepit pet before Christmas so that the new family puppy/kitten can be given as a Christmas present without too much gloom. I can honestly say that I personally have never had a client verbalize that reasoning to me, but others have. What a bummer.

I’m twitchy typing this because I’m on call as well, yet another reason why I’m not feeling very cheery. I do not mind the on call aspect of my job, but it is definitely a downer that I’m on call the week of Christmas. I had to be limited in my wine drinking (probably for the best) and I couldn’t fully relax during visiting as I kept expecting the phone to ring. Some vet techs are paid to be on call, however you hear of that more commonly in larger centres with larger veterinary facilities. I am not paid to be on call, I am not reimbursed with gas money (I am a 20 minute drive each way to and from). I am paid a minimum of two hours OT which is great, but at $20/hr that doesn’t go very far. Especially when I am called in for a midnight c-section on a dog. Then I drive mach-chicken with my eyes half open to get to the clinic as fast as I can (Picture a tired looking Cruella Deville with blonde hair and you’ve got a pretty clear mental image).

Why do I do it? Why am I working this job if I sound so bitter about it? I’m not bitter, I’m tired. But I love my job. I still love it, just tiredly. I’ll continue doing this job until I no longer love it. When I wake up one day and think to myself “I’m just tired” … that’ll be when I start to consider a career change. But for now, I love it.

Next time I promise a more positive blog entry. I didn’t start doing this to be radiating a false sense of positivity. I did this to be real.

It’s been too long — December 15, 2019

It’s been too long

/The Humble Vet Tech/Leave a comment

Hello, followers. And by followers I mean the five of you that seem to like what I have to say.

I’m going to come out and be honest with you – I’m a wee bit inebriated. I’m not much of a drinker anymore, so a generous half glass of wine has me seeing sounds and hearing colors.

Loss, or rather, impending loss, is a funny thing. I see loss of pets (which to some people, are family members) every single day. But the impending loss of a human family member is something completely different. It is a whoooooole ‘nother ball game. An in-law of mine is dying – cancer is a nasty thing. I have helped diagnose pets with cancer… that is hard enough in itself. I have never really been close to the loss of a human life. I have been “lucky” in that sense. I lost my grandfather on my mom’s side 20 years ago and that is pretty much it. My husband is so devastated by this impending loss and I don’t quite know what to do for him. I always know what to do for people with the loss of their pet, their “fur baby”, but I do not know what to do for my husband.

The outcome of this cancer is bleak – a month left to live would be generous. It’s more like weeks to live. How does one support someone who is watching their loved one die? I know what to do when it’s a dog, cat, or horse that’s dying. I do not know what to do when it is a human.

I give huge props to human nurses. It takes a special kind of person to support someone that is dying. It takes a special kind of person to be there, to be the liason between doctor, patient and family of the patient. I couldn’t do it. People often compare human nurses to vet techs and quite frankly, they’re not the same thing. Not even remotely close.

Human nurses, I salute you. I dread the day that I have to suffer a close family loss. Losing an in-law will be hard enough.

Late night thoughts of a Vet Tech — November 25, 2019

Late night thoughts of a Vet Tech

/The Humble Vet Tech/2 Comments

It’s past my bed time. A whole nine minutes past, to be exact. My husband is in the other room snoring, sounding like a bear in heat. For the record, I consider myself very lucky to not know what a bear in heat actually sounds like.

Some week nights whether it’s once, twice or more, I think about tomorrows work day. What surgeries I’ll be a part of, what cases myself and the DVM (Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, i.e a vet, not to be confused with DMV, Department of Motor Vehicles) I am assigned to will see. One of my main jobs as a vet tech is to run anesthesia for my DVM while they are performing surgery. Yes, vets are great and amazing, but they cannot do it all – Enter, vet techs. I usually catch myself thinking about tomorrows patients.

“Are any of our patients poor surgical candidates?” Sure, I may know the answer to this based off of what we already know about the patient. But what about the stuff we don’t know? What if my “healthy” patient from three weeks ago has since developed a disease process and is not yet showing clinical signs? Depending on what could be going on, my patient may be at high risk for anesthetic death. Heck, even the unexpected could happen and while all my patients are clinically “healthy”, someone still may die. Yes, the DVM has to do the surgery, but I have to keep the patient alive during surgery. I am the one that makes sure they come out of anesthesia a-okay. One of my instructors once called anesthesia “controlled death” in a lecture and that really hit home for me.

I’m yet to lose a patient under anesthesia. That is with the exception of one guinea pig with a lump that we tried to remove that was bigger than him – this was a Hail Mary for an 8 year old girl. Other than the guinea pig, I have not yet lost one. I think this leads to the low level anxiety that I sometimes feel towards anesthetic cases. Fear of the inevitable, so to speak. I will end up losing my first patient one day… not a matter of if, a matter of when. One of my attending vets says that “a little bit of fear is always a good thing”. Yeah well, tell that to my 25 year old wrinkles and graying (ie. maybe two hairs every month) hair.

Because of writing this post, I’ll probably fall asleep tonight thinking things like: “How can I prepare for tomorrow?” ” What can I do to make things go smooth?” “What if something goes wrong, what will be my plan of attack?”. I like to clean to de-stress and take my mind off of work. I’m going to start doing yoga again soon to help find some peace from my mind in the evenings. I’m starting to find these worried/anxious thoughts are more limited to the morning of surgery, with the night before thoughts creeping in a lot less frequently.

To keep myself humble as I progress in my career, I always remind myself that these animals belong to clients. This animal is someones pet, their whole world, their “fur baby” as one may call it. I always keep it at the back of my mind that no matter how anxious I may be for the pet’s surgery, guaranteed their owner will be a lot more worried than I am. I owe it to my clients to put on my big girl panties, swallow the fear of the inevitable, and get the job done. Everyone is counting on me – whether they know it or not.

Hello, World — November 24, 2019

Hello, World

/The Humble Vet Tech/2 Comments

Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

Full disclosure: the quote above came with this layout. It felt appropriate so I decided to keep it around for the time being. I’m sure you wonder who I am, what this blog entails and why I’m even doing it in the first place.

For the sake of anonymity – I am a 25 year old female that lives near the west coast of North America (woah, specific right?). I am a vet tech – a registered/certified/licensed veterinary technician. In simplest terms, I am basically a nurse for animals. I can hear the vet techs in the back screaming *noooo we’re so much more than that*. While I agree, for sake of ease I am going to leave it at that for now.

Lately I’ve found myself feeling unfulfilled in my career. I’m so sick of the typical Monday to Friday nine to five work week. I have a lot to say about a lot of different things, some of it related to my job, some of it not related at all. I have always liked to talk (ask anyone that grew up in my household) and feel like now is a good time to start putting my thoughts to paper. Well, keyboard. With this blog I’m hoping to reach out to fellow vet techs, other women, anyone needing inspiration or even someone just looking for a laugh. I’ve been told a time or two that I’m funny – I’ll let you all be the judge of that.

I’m excited to see how this blog develops and where it goes. Whether I have one subscriber or one hundred subscribers, I’ll be humbled by the fact that there are people out there that want to hear (read) what I have to say.

Let’s do this.

Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started