pawpawdoc

a vet on rant.

[anordinaryseal]

[scrupulosity-et-al]

not everything is your fault. anything you have no control over can never, logically, be your fault. you shouldn’t feel guilty over something that was out of your hands.

some things are your fault. sometimes you screw up. that’s okay, we’re all human. most mistakes just need an apology, and a promise not to repeat that action.

learn to let go of the things you weren’t to blame for, and to forgive yourself for the things that you are to blame for. living your life in shame doesn’t benefit anyone, least of all the people you want to do good for.

[smpfm]

[pawpawdoc]

me as a 25 yo

[incendavery]

cat-sitting comix

[thingsisaidweredumb]

Something I’ve noticed….. 

The veterinary community is VERY tightknit and VERY adverse to criticism. Vets will band together and defend each other almost blindly. The idea that we, pet parents, know more about our animals and their specific conditions more than some random vet does is seen as ridiculous. Asking questions and demanding a second opinion… Or even just a reason and explanation for an existing opinion… is deemed “wrong,” “bad,” “annoying,” “rude.” 

A few weeks ago, a vet told me to put my cat down when she came in for an emergency visit. She implied I was selfish for saying no. Two hours later, my cat’s condition had improved ON HER OWN so much that she was comfortable discharging her to come home. She was sent home with dewormer. When I asked “do we have any reason to think she has worms?” I was met with frustration at the question and I was told “this will help.” I asked “How?” I was met with more frustration and again told “this will help.” 

I was asking because this particular cat had gone through MANY rounds of dewormer when I first got her this past August and she is an indoor only cat. Her having worms would be a) very concerning and b) I would like to know what I need to do to ensure that we ACTUALLY kill the worms this time. The vet, however, didn’t care. She didn’t want to answer my questions. She wanted me to be a good little pet owner and take the meds home and do what she said. 

I was just reading on @ask-a-vetblr and their rules state that they will not “engage in vet-bashing,” whatever the hell that means, in their FIRST FAQ point which is about questioning a vet or wanting a second opinion. I have had a vet I feel was actually and fully medically neglectful to my cat – which resulted in the death of that cat. A pet parent dealing with that is terrified and doesn’t know what to do. They need guidance and compassion. Not anger and defensiveness.

I think we need to understand that vets are doctors. And doctors are not immune to mistakes. It is healthy and should be encouraged to ask your doctor questions. You are prescribed a medication and you SHOULDN’T be shamed or made to feel bad for asking basic questions like “What is this medication for?” “How does this medication work?” “What can I do to change my diet/behavior/environment/life to ensure this health problem doesn’t reoccur?” Most people will agree these questions shouldn’t be responded to defensively or negatively and a doctor responding to these negatively is a HUGE redflag of a potentially abusive or neglectful doctor. All of these are questions I’ve seen, personally, vets get very angry and upset hearing. And by that I mean most vets I’ve seen asked these questions have reacted poorly enough that if they were my own human doctor, I’d have left the appointment without paying and called my insurance company to block payment immediately.

Blogs like ask-a-vetblr should be teaching people how to navigate disagreeing or questioning their vets. Vets online should be providing us with resources to advocate best for our non-human loved ones. Instead, there’s a power play of dismissiveness and defensiveness that I feel really needs to be addressed. This imagined “war” between “pet parents” and “vets” shouldn’t exist! 

And you can see vet resentment of pet parents in other places too. When covid first started, I saw so many vets online posting about how happy they were they got to do their jobs with the sick pets while the “annoying people” waited outside. I’ve known people in vet school who said their classmates frequently talk about how they are becoming vets because they “hate people” or “animals are so much better than people.” I heard one vet student a few years ago say she was becoming a vet because she wanted to “protect animals from their owners.” 

Pet parents want what’s best for their pets too. We’re all out here doing our best. And yeah, there’s shitty pet parents who don’t care. And yeah, there’s a lot of excuses about non-human animal neglect. And yeah, there’s very little consensus on what IS neglect of our non-human animals. But none of that excuses this power play abusive dynamic between vets and pet parents. We SHOULD be able to challenge you and you SHOULD welcome that. A pet parent who is observant and attentive enough to their pets and their needs to ask you questions and challenge you on certain things should be WELCOME and ENCOURAGED! You should WANT to explain everything to us so we can better understand. The goal is “fewer sick pets.” We, also, share that goal!!! We are not your enemy! 

I just find this dynamic truly abusive and awful and almost no one speaks about it. Medical abuse isn’t just a human problem. It is not socially acceptable for human doctors to act like this anymore and it shouldn’t be socially acceptable for vets either. NO medical professional should behave this way. No matter what species they serve. 

*NOTE: I tagged ask-a-vetblr for a quick easy link to an example of what I’m talking about NOT because I want to fight anyone. That blog is not the only place I’ve seen it – its just the post that inspired me to make this post and, therefore, a quick and easy link. 

[ask-a-vetblr]

From the ask-a-vetblr team:

First off, we are all truly sorry to hear that you had a bad experience with your cat and your vet. You are welcome to have your opinions and choose to switch vets or whatever would make you more comfortable. It sounds like there is some communication that is definitely lacking between you. But since you tagged us, we would like to address what you said because I think there is a huge misunderstanding here in terms of what our blog actually is and it is not fair for you to take out your frustration on us. We do this for fun and to educate people. We’re not professional bloggers or social media activists or whatever. We’re just some nerds who like talking about our jobs and talking about animals.

1. We won’t engage in vet bashing because it’s unprofessional, and we don’t have the full side of the story. We have no way to know if the information we are given is factual. We don’t know any of you, nor do we have any proof that what is being said is true and not misunderstood/misremembered. Also, we literally have to deal with people yelling at us on a daily basis for things that we have no control over. Personally, I want a break from that. It is also extremely harmful to the client-doctor relationship and animal care when vets trash talk each other in the real world, so we aren’t going to do it here.

2. We are not a second opinion service. That does not mean it’s wrong to seek a second opinion, but it can’t be from us! We cannot legally provide any of you with medical advice. Not only do we not have a client-doctor relationship with any of you, we may not be licensed in your state, or even your country. It is straight up illegal for us to give you medical advice. It’s also dangerous to your animal as we cannot make a diagnosis properly without doing a hands on exam and diagnostics. Plus, it’s honestly really disrespectful to ask a group of volunteers to do their jobs for free while we are at home sitting on our couches and blogging for fun. Like I said, we all do this as a hobby. It is honestly extremely stressful for us to get medical asks because we don’t know when exactly that ask came or if that animal received the help it needs. If you want a second opinion, by all means, get one! But choose someone that is licensed in your area. Not us.

3. We answer the questions we get. If people want to as us about the concerns you brought up, then they can! While some of us may have some ideas for educational posts, we mostly just answer asks. So if this is something people are really concerned about, we’re not seeing it in our inbox. By all means, ask. Anon is on for a reason. Just be polite; we don’t enjoy being yelled at.

4. Many of us were happy about not having clients in the building because if someone yells at you on the phone, we can hang up. We can’t do that if someone is yelling at us in person. And honestly, the flow is nice. But ultimately this is a profession for owners as much as it is for animals. You can’t actually hate people and do well in this profession.

5. Of course owners know their own pets best, we would never dispute that. Owners see them every day and notice changes that we may not. There are certainly keepers/owners that are very knowledgeable about their breed/species and could teach us about them. But for every 1 of those people, there’s probably 10 who are on the opposite end of the spectrum. And without fail they are the ones that think they’re super knowledgeable. We, on a daily basis, deal with animals that have compromised health or welfare because an owner feels that they know better than us. That won’t listen to us or trust our 8+ years of school. The well-being of our patients suffers regularly because people listen to misinformation from their breeders or the internet or their cousin that was a vet assistant in 1985. So yes, we might get a little jaded sometimes, and be wary when owners try to tell us they’re right, rather than converse with us. Because we want conversation! We want people to bring up what they’ve heard about how they should care for their pet; we just also want them to listen when we explain why we agree or disagree.

I would also like to remind everyone that while we try to be courteous and respectful as much as possible, we are also not under any obligation to be professionals 100% of the time on this website. We all made our blogs for fun, and to connect with other people in our profession. We are not running social medias for our clinic, we’re just having fun and trying to help people as much as we can. We are allowed to be emotional or frustrated about our jobs or the asks we receive. We try to portray a realistic view of this profession, frustrations and all. It doesn’t mean we don’t love our clients or our jobs, it just means we’re humans that don’t want to be in public service mode all the time. Please respect that.

[drferox]

So I have been fairly inactive for a while as my life falls apart but I feel like you misunderstand what we do. 

If “Asking questions and demanding a second opinion… Or even just a reason and explanation for an existing opinion… is deemed “wrong” “bad, “annoying,” “rude”” is about my or this blog’s reluctance and refusal to approach such asks, I implore you to understand that approaching such asks when we have no first hand knowledge of the case is nearly impossible to do well, exhausting, and borderline unprofessional. All owners think they know their animal well, and many do, but for every one that actually does there are ten more that don’t or don’t understand what they’ve been told and will relay the case to us incorrectly. 

If you would like to know “What the hell vet bashing means” then it comes in two types. 

Broad statements bashing our profession, eg “Vets don’t learn nutrition”, “Vets overvaccinate”, “Vets are money grubbing” etc. We don’t intend to give these repetitive views a voice.

Specific bashing of veterinarians who are not public figures, eg Shirley Koshi, who was basically bullied to suicide by an internet mob.

It’s fine to criticize other members of the profession if you’re certain of what’s going on, and the fact is that tumblr blogs are a wholly inappropriate place to seek a second opinion because information provided in an ask has no guarantee of accuracy and we do not want our speculations (and they would be only speculations) to be used in any sort of legal pursuit or online harassment campaign. If anybody needs a second opinion a vet blog is not an appropriate avenue. We can neither examine the animal nor review its history. 

While I don’t have all my past posts to hand, I think I’ve been pretty open and encouraging about encouraging people to get second opinions and not defensive about the idea at all. (one) (two) (three) (four)

And I’m sure I’ve talked about pet owners and vets needing to be on the same team for managing a pet’s health but Tumblr being what it is, I can’t find it. Just as I can’t find multiple posts going over how you should feel comfortable asking your vet questions and discussing things. The catch phrase for the blog for the longest time was Call YOUR Vet. And I have definitely blogged about “If you ONLY love animals, don’t be a vet”.

Partly I’m saddened at myself because all the things you sound like you want from a veterinary blog are things I used to be able to do… but it was simply unsustainable. I could not keep up with such a demand, I overextended and became exhausted. I took on mods to manage the questions that were inappropriate, repetitive, or impossible, and that includes second opinions. I was occasionally chastised by the internet for  not providing more ‘help’ for emergency questions that should never have been sent to a blog (see the Mexical Chocolate circles debacle). But I used to give it my all and I think I did more right than wrong, but I could not keep up. But it was consuming too much of myself and I burnt out. I have needed to put more of myself into my family, my health and my headspace. 

I used to be able to provide all the things you’re saying we should do, but I don’t know how to keep that going and the group blog with these rules was the best way I could think of to even try. 

[emmelyy]

But we cannot simply sit and stare at our wounds forever.

[emmelyy]

I know you are scared, but you can handle this.

[notexactlyjuliet]

[pawpawdoc]

me for hundred times this months

[emmelyy]

Mental health problems don’t define who you are. They are something you experience. You walk in the rain and you feel the rain, but, importantly, you are not the rain.

[recoveryaware]

[pawpawdoc]

my boss is bout to drop arguments if I took this words 👀

[love-notes-to-survivors]

You are not “behind” in life. Your journey is just different.

[pawpawdoc]

being 'broken'

today I have a monthly evaluation sit down with HR.

It was.... not bad yet not nice.

all and all, it was mostly about me being a slow and passive learner. as a trainee. and also about how I get sick quite often.

getting into a job that's notorious for being mentally exhausting is a choice I take fully knowing I'd be crush somehow with my anxiety problem and all. And yep, it did crush me.

I go to therapist when I need to. as a safety net and precaution. I know the bottom of my dark side and I'm not planning to back into it. I did take meds when I need to, when my body tells me enough is enough.

Yet some people at work who knows think, going to a therapist is a momentarily solution. I know that. But also, it keeps my life intact.

I've been there, people telling me that going to therapist is only a waste of time and money. because it's all in me to be better and to get out of it.

I've been trying to get out of it for years, its hard to come to an acceptance that maybe this will going for the rest of my life. I need to life with it side by side and get along with it somehow.

I don't blame that they think its something I drag myself into. because I passed that stage where I try so hard to explain that, no, I don't want this yet somehow I'm going in circle.

I talked about with my closed friend once. when I refuse to go back to therapy because these people from work telling me that it's not worth to go to.

she said, 'its the same when you know you catch cold and you need to check and treat it to get better'.

I guess I should stop telling them that I go to therapy so that they stop treating me like I can't hold my own shit.

I mean, I'd rather spends money not to be an asshole who ransacks everyone in sight when their mood roller-coaster-ing.

adulting. I choose to fix myself in way that works for me. no matter what people say.

[pawpawdoc]

back in this web after ages. used to be a ranting student, now as vet in training with a whole bunch of rants and sappy story. watta start.

[soft-lovely]

black cat appreciation