If you become a vet you will spend a lot of your time being angry, frustrated and upset. You will also spend a lot of time lamenting that you are not paid like a human doctor, despite having the same level of skills, whilst simultaneously being told by the animal owning public how much money you ‘must’ be making.
It certainly gets you down. By the time we’ve been in practice for 5 years, about a third of new vets will no longer be working in clinical practice. Lots of us leave.
Also, we are between 4 and 6 times more likely to take our own lives than the general public.
They’re not telling you these things, and I’m not telling you these things, in order to discourage you from becoming a vet. We tell you these things to forewarn you. If you are prepared and aware of the challenges you face, you will be better equipped to deal with them.
Veterinary medicine is a high stress, highly demanding career with a large emotional and moral burden and very unsociable hours. It’s not actually good for your brain, and it’s not right for everyone. I would prefer would-be vets walk into the profession knowing they might have to walk themselves out again.
And I would much rather somebody decide to give up on being a vet than give up on life.
“Becoming a Vet” should not be your end goal. That only takes a couple of years, not a lifetime, and then what are you going to do? You should look at other options, you should have other plans, escape routes if everything doesn’t work out.
As a profession we have a huge issue with mental health. We talk about these things because they’re important to us, and they’re real. As much as you don’t want to hear it to be ‘discouraged’, you shouldn’t ignore them. Consider them an opportunity to learn from someone else’s mistakes, including my own.
Now, I know it’s not something you wanted to here, but it’s something you needed to hear anyway. I’m not here to tell you it’s all puppies and kittens and rainbows. I’m here to tell you what you need to hear.
If veterinary medicine is what you’re heart is set on, then you will set out to do it regardless of what I or any other vet on the internet tell you. As it should be. The career certainly does have its rewards, but it also has many, many pitfalls.
We learn to cope, to varying extents, in different ways. I can only hope that you will learn to recognize those pitfalls before you fall into them.
First time I reblogged something of someone else on this blog, but this is so unbelievably important.
Even though this is a zookeeper blog, I know there are current or hopeful vets following as well. I hope this post can help and give insight to some of you.
So, yeah…this is what I’ve been doing for the last couple of hours during my sleepless night.
I’ve been watching Mark’s Try Not to Laugh and Try Not to Smile challenge videos and I haven’t been able to stop laughing!! Then I decided to screencap some of the videos to show @egomaniac1998 and it got even better!! 😂
so imagine april fool’s, like rickrolling, and on that subject, instantly recognizable and iconic songs.
It was data dump day, so the crew of the SV Quasar were gathered around their personal consoles. Da’lthar received a pleasant message from their mate, congratulating them on joining the Intergalactic Alliance, and warning them of the “Humans.” The majority of the Quasar was human, so Da’lthar looked around warily.
Captain Human Rosie was sending the various data packages out, and Da’lthar noticed Human Chris sitting in the corner, looking maliciously happy. Human Thomas opened his file with an expectant expression, then cried aloud in exasperation and ager as the image of a young orange-haired Human appeared, standing behind a long stick and in front of ornate portals. Notes pumped out of Human Thomas’ screen and those of all of the other Humans, accompanied by many groans and angry exclamations.
“Seriously, Chris?!” Human Thomas yelled at Human Chris, who was rolling in his seat and laughing uproariously.
It was a simple day aboard the Sorcia, and Rillo was simply gliding along the corridor beside their friend Human Lisa.
Around a corner, there came stifled laughter, then three male species of Human popped out, the one in the middle holding a sonic distributor. The two on the sides began moving their bodies in unison.
The one in the middle pressed a button and the small box emitted a sound like that of an Earth “saxophone,” along with a male Human voice. Human Lisa’s face reddened quickly, and she covered her face. The middle Human knelt before her.
“Lisa, will you come on shore leave with me?” He smiled winningly, and Human Lisa nodded.
Later, Rillo would learn that “Careless Whisper”, as Human Lisa called it, was regarded as a mating call by the Humans. Rillo was careful from then on to avoid the particular sonic patterns that might have netted them a Human mate.
One of the great things about conferences is getting to see examples of the tools used by zoos to manage their animals – often the ones that are in behind the scenes areas so I’m generally restricted from sharing photos of them. With that in mind, I wanted to show you guys this “squeeze” from LGL Animal Care Products care so you can see how they work.
Squeezes are holding areas used for immobilizing animals for examination or medical procedures. While zoos prefer to train animals to participate in all medical care voluntarily, there are times it is necessary to restrain an animal in order to treat it. Squeezes can be used, for example, to keep an animal still for injections or to allow vets to safely examine a body part the animal is not yet trained (or just isn’t inclined) to present.
Squeezes are, at most basic, a tunnel that is longer than the animal that contains a movable wall. Most of them are too narrow for the animal to turn around in, although some are not. They’re generally built into the design of a behind the scenes area so that the animal walks through them like any other shift space while moving through and between enclosures. (So rather than asking an animal to back out of a narrow squeeze after use, they can simply walk forward into another part of their space.) Having squeezes built into the normal transitional spaces means that animals also are used to passing through the squeeze regularly and don’t only associate being asked to enter that space with being restrained.
To use a squeeze, animals are generally trained to tolerate a series of things happening. When it’s all complete, the animal will “station” next to a keeper while standing inside it. While they’re rewarded for staying still, doors on each end of the squeeze are sealed off (the photos above show the stuffed animal tiger relaxing in a closed squeeze, but it is not yet restrained). The animal will then continue to station as the movable wall is slowly adjusted to restrict the space the animal has within the squeeze. (The movable wall is on the left in the first photo and the back in the second – if you look closely you can see the track it slides on). When whatever was occurring is compete, the movable wall is retracted and then the door is opened to allow the animal to leave. Later, the animal will generally be called into the squeeze and reinforced heavily for just spending time in there in order to keep them from forming a negative association with the space.
Squeezes exist for animals of all sizes and shapes. This example is built to accommodate a large cat, but they exist for a whole range of animals – even giraffe!
Squeezes are so important! They’re a way to work with animals close-up in a low risk manner (no anesthesia or sedation needed usually.) Technology like this is a great example of how the zoo field innovates and invents ways to better care for our animals.
Diana: Now that leads us into the question of, what do we
think the Tick is? Because it’s unclear if he’s just a hero with no backstory
or a hero that Arthur has somehow manifested. Because he’s obviously real, he
interacts with plenty of people, but he has no memories and he only functions
when Arthur is around.
Andrew: I think there is a possibility that the show is
going to go into an angle that Arthur has some kind of psychic power and he
manifests The Tick. I would like it better if the Tick just had no backstory on
purpose as a metaphor to say that in a story about vulnerable people the
invulnerable one doesn’t matter, but there is a possibility that they might be
building up to the fact that Arthur has created this character solely out of
nothing.
Diana: That would be interesting but at the same time I
wouldn’t like it because I do love this narrative of the main character being a
regular guy who has no powers in this world of superheroes. He’s this normal
dude trying to prove this great evil still exists and he’s going to make a huge
difference to the world, but if at the end of the day it’s like, oh he also had
powers, then as a viewer I’m like, well I can’t do anything to help the world!
I want to feel empowered as a viewer. As someone at home I want to feel like I
can do what Arthur’s doing and feel empowered and motivated but I can’t be him
if he ends up having powers.
Andrew: Yes. That perfectly encapsulates why that would be
disappointing.
Diana: Thank you. I pride myself on being perfectly
disappointing.
– The hosts of Talk From Superheroes on The Tick (2017)
A few people have said suggested this and I don’t know about how I feel about it but let me add this: if Arthur is psychically manifesting the Tick, there’s also the possibility that the Terror really was dead until Arthur brought him through the conspiracy theories.
Well that theory just made us say HOLY SHIT and is hereby dubbed amazing.
A Glitch Named Anti 