What's going on guys happy Monday this is your somewhat well somewhat toxic most of the time doing her best kindness you are bringing you another episode of Wellisch today we're gonna be talking with doctor of veterinary medicine Elizabeth Dale about the truth of what goes on inside the mind of a vet or more realistically the truth of what goes on inside the mind of somebody who's achieved their dream job while combating the intrusive thoughts that present themselves daily from struggling through perfectionism and imposter syndrome to what it really takes to achieve your dream job to the mind blowing ways some pet owners treat their pet and vet Dr. Dale is a great example of how you can be absolutely great at what you do and still struggle through limiting beliefs and consistently work to overcome them Liz go ahead and give me a whole Lotta OK so I I went to Virginia tech received my bachelor of science in a multiple tree sciences with emphasis in land animal in companion animal at four years later from Virginia Tech I graduated with doctor of veterinary medicine and I now practice for one of the largest margin general and practices in America yeah OK wow thank you so much for being so excited to talk to you that is so cool did you not know that it was the one I knew I knew it big and I knew we were pretty much everywhere but I didn't know we were yeah I know I was like reading me about when I was like looking up or you Arkansas shit that's brave well can you break down exactly what it is you do for us so I'm basically if you have a pet they get sick on their doctor but unlike human doctors we're a little bit of everything like I'm anesthesiology Geologist I'm a pharmacist I'm a radiologist I'm a surgeon I'm in general like family doctor practitioner like I do medication surgeries in a physical exams the whole 9 yards what is a Day in the life kinda look like so it depends we have some days where I do mostly surgery so I like in Spain neuter mass removals dentals we're really paying on dental cleanings because you know preventative medicine if you the more you do dental cleanings the dogs need their teeth come out it's really big and small dogs and then other days I do wellness exam sick visit so you know ear infections right now on a rampage through Charlotte we're actually Charlottetown in the hotspots for this respiratory virus right now see a lot of those day by day and then you know just you know check ups with vaccines and I'm just making sure all the animals are healthy and living their best life do you have a You have any quotes or mantras that you live by fake it till you make it because we sometimes like I just don't know the answer and I just have to kind of put on a smile and you know kind of on my head until I can run out into the computer and look up an answer on van or in my books so it's kinda like you know you gotta fake it till you make it because we don't know everything and so you have to kind of smile non-fake it until I make it back to my computer so I can look up the answer if you could have this can be that related or I can just be Liz related if you could have anything out of life that you want it what would it be honestly I want to be able to save as many animals as possible so when I was in vet school I would volunteer for the shelters and I would always foster a dog that would either be you know deemed on adoptable or mean or You know just needed extra work for the shelter couldn't give it so I fell in love with kind of that like hobby of like taking dogs from being like absolutely just mean like scare dogs to lovable couch potatoes I like finding them a home and so I think like long-term if I could eventually like open up kind of a rescue but if I could like do that the rest of my life and be able to save like at least one more like you know keep going like at least one more time how you feel my last purpose that's awesome when we first connected you told me that you talked about the connection between mental health and veterinary medicine because the suicide rates of us are so high and you also told me that they were one of the most unrecognized would you agree with that yes OK so I did a little digging around and found that it's more than twice the net of the medical profession and four times the rate of the general population so it puts the statistic at one and six that's consider Sitter suicide or at least once in their career so in your opinion Opinion why do you think that such an issue I am I think there's a lot of different factors that go into it one we go in and we see like your dad like we see all these animals here you know it's the circle of life yeah we understand that but sometimes you know you can eat is hard so that aspect of it of you know we go in because we love animals and then we're seeing all the sick animals so you know we end up euthanizing which euthanasia is a beautiful thing like it's the best gift that you can give your animal peaceful crossing and I think that helps with the sadness behind euthanasia but it's still sad you know like an animal dying is always gonna be sad so that's one aspect of it another aspect of it is the clientele like the pet owners like you know a lot of them don't respect us as you know human beings and it makes our jobs harder because we do you know how to Have the ability to help a lot of these animals and then we have owners who are you know accusing us of being in it for the money where are you now not letting us run diagnostics because it's not necessary so we're then responsible to figure out what's wrong with a sick pet without being able to run diagnostics and then like you know trying to cure the sick pet like we know we can without having all the answers which makes our job 10 times higher and it's already hard enough because like I said earlier were an anesthesiologist or radiologist we had to have so much knowledge and it's like a lot of pressure on us to be you know the best we can be like imposter syndrome and that meant so real because we graduate and I know I graduated in May and I've been doing this now for a little bit and I I still go in thinking I I don't know what I'm doing like I need a doctor can so I can get a doctor and it's just hard because we have all of these like obstacles we have to like jump over Over to be the best we can be and it feels like you know we just keep jumping over obstacles and it doesn't seem like there's ever going to be an end of the obstacles jumping over and then like really takes a toll on your mental health even that school will take a toll on your mental health like that school was probably the worst four years of my life in in any type of school setting it was just terrible like the school itself the staffing like they weren't nice people I had a Lotta good friends but like we were all there too you know better ourselves like as a veterinary profession so all the relationships were kind of superficial so you know when things got hard take care of myself you know like I can't be taking care of you to just like kind of like a fool I gotta say my self here and keep going so we didn't have like a lot of support there's just a lot of things that contribute to and way on our mind well that's interesting that you brought that up about the support Work from the school because something that I thought was super interesting like I said I was looking up your employer and like in the website and reading through it it says that they believe it's equally important to support the health safety and well-being of their associates so do you feel like that's a topic that openly discussed and manage between your employer and colleagues I believe for the most part yes I believe that my company is really good about work life balance on that you know offer days off you know four days a week I'm pretty in a relaxed about you know if I wanted to take a day off to go do something they do have like health and wellness resources they have them mental health like advocates and you can you know just like nine to their little portal online request mental health my boss is probably the best boss in the world like I have never had a boss's greatest him like I got bit by a dog Friday And he has called me every day like three times like trying to check in to see how I'm doing and I mean by dog bitch as you know I'm in Boston it's like an extra mile in like caring it's like it's like actually really good for my mental health because I feel like I'm cared about and welcome so I would say like you know my company specifically I can't speak for others but I think they do a pretty good job of taking care of their veterinarians do you have a support system outside of work yes as much as you know a veterinarian can like you know you know my boyfriend and my family they're not in vet medicine so it's hard to go and be like this is why I'm upset today like you know I had this in this case and this owner didn't want to do diagnostic did my treatment for the block and I can't really they can understand you know like the broad picture of why I'm sad but they can't really understand like why Why I'm so sad about it because I don't really know how do you know I know that like treatments and how easily it could've been fixed so there they are a support system but they can't be a you know for like fall and like I understand what you're going through like I know exactly how I feel is type two which is why friendships and vascular so important to make because that is a good support system after you're done to be able to fall on the friends that you went to school with and be like this is what happened today like I can't believe you know and then they kind of able to talk you through it better than your normal support system what do you do to support your own mental health I like you know I like to pretend like I a go work out and you know kind of take a break from that mad like you know I wish I could be a little bit better about once I clock out I'm not there anymore and I try to say that like I have two friends work with vet technicians Mentioned that you know I'm close with and I'll talk to you outside I don't like when I clock out I'm not Dr. Dale anymore I am I'm just list so I'm trying to like put a balance so I need to I need to probably work harder on taking care of a mental help it also do you know my boyfriend he's really good about getting me out of the vet med like little bubble cause we'll go to I'm wearing a gamecock sweatshirt right now and I mean go Hokies I'm not a game time but I mean he like gets me out and like takes me an hour to football games for Carolina and I mean that's just like a new place for me a new experience and that I think that's really awesome but I last game Saturday so now I've got to like scramble to figure out what do you think contributes the most between vets and deteriorating mental health honestly the way people treat their animals is really hard for us and I think personally for me I think that's what's really Deteriorating my mental health is just day after day client after client is coming in and they get these pets and they don't really think about it they just think of this is a cute dog I'm gonna get it cause I want to keep dogs but then they don't understand cause that's associated with taking care of the dog when you say costume in like actual physical money yes and yeah the time to the time that you have to put into a dog so they don't I don't think they really take into consideration what happens after you get the dog it's just Seno they're looking at I'm getting doc and from that point on they're not thinking what's going on and so it's hard when I get a client with a new dog and you know they don't want to get their core shots they just wanna get rabies and they don't wanna you know put them on flea and tick prevention they don't wanna put on heartworm they think that we're just trying to sell them this pill to link up their bill when in reality you know I've diagnosed five heartworm Heartworm positive dogs in the past two months and the treatment for that it's just terrible there's no like for sure way that they might not die during the heartworm treatment so it's better for a minute and treat it so owners don't really like do the research and you know put in the time and effort to see how hard or like how much is involved in taking care of pet appropriately so it kind of wears me down when I just say day after day owners who just want the dog to have the dog and not put them in no effort to take care of it which is what my job is is to take care of your dog so if you know you're not taking care of your dog you're making my job almost impossible because I can't take care of you know I've heard the same thing from teachers that like they're putting in all of this work at school but then they go home and send the kid home and the parent isn't doing anything like reading with their kids or like if their little little kids like helping their kids learn how to go to Learn how to go to the bathroom and then they're having these issues that they try to come bad at school it's kind of the same fight that it's like you are we supposed to be taking care of the pet 90% of the time I'm just here is support for that lol times but if you're not doing that work then how are you supposed to be able to help and then I assume people come in and are like what the hell like yeah and that's what they like I had a lady one time she was like you know she bought her dog and that was eight weeks old and I was like you know we want to like whenever you're just hanging out with your dog play with his paws put your fingers in his mouth play with his teeth looking at you know like put your hands on the stock you know so it gets used to being like handled that way when it comes to that it's not a stress that way you know you're training it you know work on sit work on stay work on these like basic commands that you know if you're just hanging out at your house it's pretty easy just get a handful of treats because a lot of dogs are food motivated T-shirt to sit and people don't want to do I want to do that and then they bring it back when it's you know puppy with high energy early I'm gonna have to get rid of this dog and it's just dogs or something you can just say I will never understand those people it's something you can like take in this to be like oh you're not doing what I want you to do is tell me to take you to the shelter that's why I don't like the dog shelters right now are overrun with Eno homeless animals and it's so sad because these dogs don't know any better you know you can just look at them and say you shouldn't be doing this because they don't know that right that's why training is so important because they don't know and it's up to us to teach them and when we failed to teach them that we found this dog and we've subjected it to being homeless which is like circles back to like why I like to foster dogs from the shelter who you know are deemed on adoptable and then get them adopted out I had a dog when I was in vet school Get my graduation to pull her out of the shelter because that was the only time they could do it so I was like all right I'm gonna just skip you know walking across that's cool if you understood that she the first time I met her she was just cowering in the back of the cage and she was that she was a hoarding dog so somebody had 37 dogs and she was wanting a smaller one so she had to jump up on the counter at this one bedroom apartment to get away from the bigger dogs police and so they know when and sees the dogs and she was the only one who was just terrified and like I went to get her out and she just tore me all the pieces and I was like yup you're coming home with me and so after I think it took a night I think and she saw that she wasn't in danger she became the best little dog and her name is cricket and someone adopted her someone adopted her in Silver Spring Maryland and they still send me videos of it Do you know pictures of cricket and it just warms my heart like especially when I'm having a bad day like I don't know her name is Liz too and she like somehow knows when I'm having a bad day cause I just it's like forms my heart goes success stories against all the bad stories that so that's another thing to have been able to say OK so going back to the people how people kind of act like shit a lot of the day what do you think the biggest issue is with people who behave like this I don't think that they really understand what vets are here to do so I don't really think they understand that we're here for your pet we're not here for money at all at all we're here to help you and help your pet we want you and your pet to have the best relationship you can have And weed we actually surprisingly no shit when it comes to in a pet health so when we're telling you you know Spanish lady dog we're not just doing that so we can get money out of you we're telling you this because we don't want your dog to be prone to parametria which is infection of the uterus we don't want your dog to be prone to breast cancer you know prostate cancer all these like illnesses that are in it due to being in tact you know one of the biggest things emergency medicine sees hit by car and you know the vast majority of hit my car dogs are intact because I'm running around trying to look for in a mate in that end in a shelters are override too but you know we're trying to help you help your pet you're saying hit by a car like that they're not being responsible with her dog yeah that's why that happens is that like that that can be Can be so a lot of dogs will get loose and just runoff or some people don't like keep their dogs contained it's really bad around where I live people just let their dogs wonder in room I'm in so when you're letting your dogs wondering Rome they're gonna wonder in Rome to try to find me and then while they're doing that they don't know because you're saying if you're not getting them neutered and spayed yeah oh yeah OK they're like you know they're on the prowl for some you know right then that's interesting that it's more likely that they'll get hit because they're doing that still have those hormones how interesting yeah that's that's a thing I would ever think of you especially I mean because I mean I never thought of before when we went to dinner and you told me about I don't remember the name of the infection the Dimitra yeah like obviously I would never of known that but I mean that to me it seems more like tangible compared to like something you would never think of that and people aren't Putting in the research an effort to make sure that that part they're preventing the dog from yes male dogs like there is there's no reason that they need their testicles there's absolutely no reason these guys need their test cause I mean unless you're like maintaining the breed standard and you're just going all in all the right ways of like breeding you know responsibly but a lot of people just you know they're like I wouldn't want I don't wanna do that to my boy like I don't want to take his manhood and like stop personifying your dog like he doesn't he doesn't care about his testicles like he'll probably you know oh better to get it like neutering the pros outweigh the cons because your dogs definitely not gonna lay in the corner and glare at you for taking his like dog doesn't care he'll probably think you in the long run when he doesn't have like the risk of prostate cancer the risk of me know a hernia what was funny to about it is that you are Are elongating your pets life and I know a lot of people do kind of do that selfishly and so you would think that anything these people could do to make sure that their animal lives as long as possible but they won't do that way because they don't want to pay for it right that's one of the reasons us another girl I had one so I was like how you plan on breeding your dog and she was like no and I was like that I would recommend getting her spayed just because you know when you spay them before the first heat cycle that chance of like memory cancer running out the risk of her getting parametria you know she can walk her on walks without having to worry about intact dogs just like trying to like get to her you know like smelling her and being like oh wow she completely cut out chances of her bleeding everywhere cause she's on her heat cycle and she's like but I don't wanna hurt her oh my God and I'm like I like you are though you don't do it OK well Pyometra hurts more and cancer hurts more and you know they're there is a chance that your dog can live its life and not get any of these you know illnesses but why risk it by risk it so that's like a daily conversation I have with people I mean it just breaks my heart like when people hear me coding them for dental extraction or something and I know this tooth needs to come out but they can't afford it and it hurts me like I don't I don't want to you know have to charge that much but what you know we have stuff and we have like a you know the hospital and we have to charge so we can maintain that stuff so it goes like it is sucks breaks my heart when you know people here the price and like I can't afford that so just leave it sucks what do you think needs to happen in order for these people's behavior to change I think They need to understand that we are humans and not just you know somebody driving a Mercedes get out of their car going into work to get a fat paycheck and leave and we are humans that have a really big heart for animals and we actually do have feelings and weed you know just wanna be trusted with your pet and we wanna be able to do the most we can for your pet so just let us like I wish you know more people when they do get a pet would start a savings account for their pet like you know every week put in five dollars in the savings account idea and then if anything ever happens like your dog swallows a foreign body or you know content stone and gets blocked you have some money to fall back on that way you're not stuck with the hard decision of do I euthanize or can I treat this dog because we do see a lot of that of Dogs that could be treated if the owner had money and then you know the owner can't afford treatment so we have to euthanize because there's no other options which tears me apart that's why it's so hard like working for a corporate vet clinic versus you know privately owned by clinic because when I did work for a private Lyons pet clinic then you have more freedom so you can be like OK well you can do a payment plan but corporate doesn't have that ability because you know a lot of people won't use that so if we were like hey will let you do a payment plan they just won't pay it which hurts for other people so we just had to get rid of it which sucks but but that's corporate but that's corporate brown speaking of that I mean you said how you do this because of your love for animals so how do you separate your emotions and having to do things like utilizations or just when bad things happen to pass But to pass I'm still working on it when I am doing euthanasia I kind of have to like talk my before I go in the room I'm like OK this is what's best the stocks hold your peace for letting it peacefully pass you're giving a gift that you know many dogs don't get to get you knowing all these dogs die like you quit early tragic death so I can take it by car you know something slow painful death like I'm able to give this dog that crossing or if her owner can't afford treatment that's what really hurts me but I am still thinking in my mind giving the dog a peaceful passing it's going to be no Better Pl., Mimi it's not gonna be suffering anymore and then there's no chance in the future gonna have to be in pain again and deal with this type of Peptalk when I'm doing it just so I don't like go in a corner and cry for an hour but then I still in that point I normally happen yeah the older dogs who I'm just helping him kind of peacefully past those are his bad and it's the ones who I feel deep in my soul that I could help and treat if I was able to that's one of the biggest things on mental health as you know having the tools and the knowledge to fix it but not being able to you is really rough I think that it's almost comforting because like just as a pet owner who does very much love animals and appreciate very much so what you are doing I just think that every time I've brought one of my pets to have to be put down just because they're old they had cancer they had kidney failure or whatever the issue was that was bringing them to the end The end of their life you want to put them out of the misery before they actually suffer and die it's comforting to know that I'm not just handing them over to a person that's like all right put the shot in there done Contigo see you later cause I almost had because I've only gone once to the actual that to bring my pet and that's kind of what it felt like is that I just like handed them the carrier it was like hi Jane I love you see you later so it's kind of good to know that like your son in the back they were the person that actually like also feel that pain yeah no you don't wanna feel yeah and I mean there are some older vets have been doing this while we're just numb like when I was in high school I worked for a vet him he was just numb like people had used him up like taking his niceness and ran with it used him for everything that he get out of them you know he seen everything you could see and he was just numb And he got he probably was kind of like thing and going for euthanasia and he's like all right let's get it done but I am a firm believer that animals can make sense energies and so animals know like when people really care about them I think that's why I'm so good with the dog say can't find I know you're not a bad guy so like that also like makes me feel a little bit better because I feel like dogs know that I actually care about them their time to go so they're kind of like at peace no I don't stress them out at all you know I'm here free certified so I have it on the like studying to you know kind of know how to do everything in the least stressful way possible so you know put a catheter in them and we asked the owners to stay with him you know like let us put a catheter in them kind of you know they've had I'm sure surgeries before so now probably thinking about going back up Do you think like that but you know the owner staying with them and then having some money with the good energy around them like an hour which is very important to me at least to make them as comfortable as possible so as peaceful and it's you know they're just falling asleep I've heard that and that was something that I didn't hear until like not that long ago that you should stay with your pet when they're being put down which oh my God like I can't I haven't been in that position yet and I can't even imagine what that like that's why I say like I haven't been to the vet I've only been to the vet one time and they gave the vet the carrier in when she left but like I'm talking about so I have my two pets now but like all my pets growing up my parents always just talk like there was no way in hell that I was even going in the car to the vet with them I can't even imagine having to go in the room with them but I can also imagine just leaving them there by themselves Adams house yeah and you know if owners are like I can't do this at least because we sedate them first and then we push the euthanasia solution I'm like can you at least until they're sedated so I'll just you know put them under you know some sedation they fall asleep they're not passed away yet but they are asleep so if you do leave they're not gonna know you leave but if the owner absolutely just cannot do it then I try my best to make it you know a peaceful passing blanket will go in her room and I'll pet them you know I have a technician this is my technicians always now with me it's gonna be a process of euthanasia there like I said take forever because Liz has all these like things yesterday like I'll feed them chocolate I gotta tell me she didn't get them jerky just like you know their last moments or not I did that to him yeah so if the owner can't stay like I try to still make Make you know the last moments good so you know I pet them all you know sweet talk to them in and kind of make sure they're not alone right but I understand like you're some people this is their baby and it's hard to see them go so I'm not gonna hold it against you but if they can't stay but if you can stay play stay and I had a euthanize my horse a couple years ago and I back to the energy think I definitely think animals can read energy so I like heaven and I was like you know we're just gonna go get a shot or not you know nothings happening and so I like help held at Keller kept my cool I feel like nothing was wrong and then once he was sedated I just like broke out in tears and was just a mess and I like I wanted to hold it together cause I didn't want him to be stressed out because animals really do you know read your energy and if you're stressed and then they're stressed for sure so that's like if that's a whole other like talent that you have some ass or just you know You know holding it together and not letting your animals in on you know your stress levels right how do these scenarios kind of shift your perception of your career honestly it makes me feel important in a way like being able to allow an animal to peacefully pass but you know that's the euthanasia aspect of it and you know like a client you do care about their animals you know make me feel important to which you know good feeling like they make me feel like you know I'm actually need it where is the clutch bar as the clients who think I'm just you know and it for the money makes me feel not needed like I'm kind of just a mean person which sucks would you say you ever question your choice in Korea absolutely really yes so I actually question if I'm gonna be able to do this the rest of my life What is interesting based off of just you know how many people don't care for their animals and it's really hard some peanut there are people out there who would do anything for the animals and those are my favorite type people because that's great it's amazing doing exactly what you need to be doing but there's a lot that don't and so every day that I go in and I'm getting like people who don't want flea and tick prevention and they come back with Lyme disease or the dog has chronic allergies but they don't wanna do anything for the allergies they just try Zyrtec at home that's obviously not working that every single day is it's wearing me down and I'm hoping you know as the years go by more and more education gets out there and you know the more I can help educate people it'll get better I'm not hopeful but the optimism side of it I hope it does happen but I don't But I don't think I can do this rest of my life because it's so deteriorating to my mental health it's just it's hard you know when you if you know you see somebody tied up and you have a pair of scissors like you know you can go cut that rope and save them but there's just one thing blocking you and you can't get over there to cut that rope it's kind of like how I feel sometimes like I can't help these patients even though I have the scissors to go cut the right but I can't because there's not one obstacle OK so shifting gears here just like a little bit lighter why tell me why you became of that I know you love animals but is there like a deeper underlying reason like a moment that you were like you know what this is what I'm gonna do for a career high volunteer for a rescue when I was in middle school it was irresistible animal rescue there I don't think they're in business anymore but a dog came from a home that I had like bubblegum in her hair her hips were just figured she was just kind of abused and she was scared of everybody except for me Except for me and it made me feel really special so I was the one who got to do all of her life in a medication ministration and I got to walk her took her to a pool so she could like do physical therapy and she just only trusted me and that I wanted to be a vet before that but that kind of like solidified that oh my gosh I could actually do this like I actually think I could like help animals and it was more so like animal rescues I think are the reason I got in the vent man because you know helping animals helping animals I wanna helping but like it was just all my life I just didn't know anything different like what else would I be you know like I couldn't see yourself doing anything else and I guess I'm pretty smart so like and you have to be smart to be a vet so I guess I could do this kind of mentality so doing everything for her kind of like open my love of being able to treat things like yeah I have the power to help you heal I mean I'm not trying to be like I'm Jesus I can help I have like you know the ability to help animals because you know I can stomach you know cutting something up and are taking something out and I almost like Swiss Kriss and went into you know nursing and then being a human doctor but I was like absolutely not after like the LPN program and I was like nope it's a no for me I feel like being a vet is one of those like dream jobs I think a fire fighter please send a dentist it's like one of the things that like when you're a little kid you like I'm gonna grow up and I'm gonna be a vet so I feel I was just curious would you consider being a vet your dream job yes so I was a little girl Hill I wanna be that when I grow up I want to be a vet when I grow up but I think I have a stubbornness to me like I just kind of like solidified in my mind over and over like the more I said I wanna be a vet like a kind of like stuck and then yellow high school camp Who comes around I'm like I want to be a vet and then my dad's like you can't be a vet like you're going thousands of dollars in debt to make $60,000 a year like you'll be miserable and I might now I wanna be back and I haven't like stubborn nice to me to where nobody can change my mind but then I let people talk like oh that's cool so hard to get into you'll never get into vet school mama boss I started shifting to nursing and I was like OK it'll be easier to transition but then once I start nursing you know my dad so how miserable I was it was like OK you know you used to be a little happy bundle of joy even knowing you're going to be a veteran in this year as you know you change that you look miserable so you know I support you in whatever you do as soon as he said that after Virginia Tech I went to get my animal and culture sciences you know I make connections to try to help myself out as much as I could and getting in the bed school got into vet school now I'm here now so that's crazy that's pretty cool that you wanted to do that for so long I like what you said about how are you Just kept telling yourself that that's what you were going to do and almost like that's kind of what made it a reality for yeah like cause I mean what else what I do like and I can't even now I like look at all these different careers I'm like if I have like got out of that man I have no idea what I would do like what what would I do like I don't know how I had asked you that when we went to dinner that I was like oh so if you had another clear choice I got a literally have no idea what I got because you say that it's not something that you might do for your whole life but you also have no idea ever do other than that I know it like I did like waitressing tables when I was in college so me maybe I'll just like you know when I'm 40 or 58 Hooters is still around or so so you're telling me that you're gonna leave because people are fucking assholes to be a server people are fucking assholes yeah it's a different type of asshole for sure and then tell you I don't know because it's not his It's not as honorable there's not a third party involved like if someone is an asshole to me at like if I'm working at Hooters or something no I can't look at some Miami like her asshole Robert probably get fired real quick what do you think it took mentally to achieve the school since you've been working on it sounds like for so long it takes a little a lot mentally like you have to have confidence and I like to say I don't have confidence but there has been some sort of confidence in there to get me through this because you know late nights studying and you know there's so much material you know like that's go to school for years and then they can go out and practice doctors go to school for years and then they go specialize they space out what they learn they only have to learn about one species and that's the human and then they go out and they And they specialize in they kind of narrow in and so they learn more after they graduate we have to learn about multiple species five we have to learn about pigs cows horses dogs and cats and chickens on top of that but that's not what we're testing on at the end so that has nothing to do with the poultry science so no that was before that school that was just the degree that Virginia Tech offered we have to learn about all these different species like you know dogs can handle certain medication's that cats can't do you know horses can't handle some medication to other things can't so we have to learn about all these different species and we're cramming it like you know we get two weeks of learning and then we take an exam so we have to cram all that knowledge you know tons and tons of information and then go take a test on it so you're studying you know you're going to school you're going to class you're going to lab then you're going home maybe eating then you're studying until one in the morning and then you're getting up at 6 AM to go repeat and it's just A lot of work that I didn't you know I cannot compare you know under God so I was like OK I can I can do vet school I had no idea that it was gonna be undergrad on steroids and energy drinks like it was just a lot more and so you know I think you have resiliency I think you have to have stamina you have to have like I wouldn't say you know a strong mental health because a lot of people didn't but you have to be able to you know notice when things aren't when your mental health is like declining and you have to know when you get home fuck you can't just ignore it I know a lot of vets and doctors are stubborn when they have you know something wrong they like to no we're doctors we don't need like we don't need another doctor but now we do absolutely do need other doctors and we need therapists and we need you know support so men see if you get out you have to like completely reevaluate yourself to take on you know vet med as a doctor would you do it again yeah I like to say no I wouldn't do it again but I would 100% I meant I may do it a little bit differently I may form friendships a little bit differently I may not do some of the things I did and then I might do some things I didn't do but I do it again what would you tell people that wanna get into this field or they even want to pursue their dream job this I think you need to get as much experience in the field as possible before you know starting the crew because once you're the second here Invesco and you decide I can't do this you know you're already in that year you know wasted two years and you gotta restart it that's detrimental to your mental health but you know when you're 15 and high school and you want to be a vet go go work at a vet clinic be a kennel technician be a vet assistant you know volunteer shadow there's a lot of us even myself included that if you know a 15-year-old came up to me and was like I want to go to that school I would take them in my wing in a heartbeat and I was showing you know everything about that man not just that Just say oh we get to play with puppies and kittens you know I wish him he know this sad side of a man just so you get a well rounded picture of what that meant really is if you want to do some thing and it's gonna take a long time to get to that career path and take a lot of Hino schooling and a lot of effort get a good idea of what it is now don't just rely on in an article you're a fat you get to play with puppies now get in there see what's going on like see it for yourself and kind of get a good idea of what you're getting yourself into I feel like that's the best way to learn for anything like you don't fully know until you actually experience it so that's definitely makes sense yes so I'm willing to try to really focus on progress instead of perfection do you feel and I think I know your answer but do you feel like you struggle with perfectionism yes that goes back to imposter syndrome like which will get it Don't get into I have to I'm so scared to mess up like I'm scared that you know I get a dog with wonky blood work so I go to my computer or my book and I look up every possible thing that could cause that blood work to be that way because I don't want to miss anything that could result in an animal dying I had a patient come in on Wednesday one time he was just not acting right was acting OK but just kind of off and the only thing wrong with the bloodwork was its liver values were slightly elevated so my mind goes to OK maybe cut into something because the owner said oh she's doing better OK will let you know do some fluids, and see what that does and then you know we can do radiographs we can do XXXX and she didn't wanna do that she is you know she's like well she's getting better so I just wanna take her home she took her home this was Wednesday that Friday she calls back Cause that she's like my dog doesn't want to get out of bed she doesn't wanna go outside and I was like can you send me a video she sent me a video and this dog is comatose like absolutely comatose on my do you need to get to emergency vet right now and then she got to emergency vet and the dog died at the emergency vet so that killed me because I was like you know going back to her perfectionism what did I miss like what did I not do that I should've known I was combing through this dogs record just to see if there's any possible thing that I possibly could've missed and I was just going over and over and over and my boss finally had to come up to me and say you know what it's like you gotta stop you're just gonna kill yourself if you keep thinking that you did something wrong here he was like the owner didn't wanna go through diagnostics there was nothing more you could do but it was hard till I kind of except that you know because the perfectionist to me you know I want to do the best so I was like even like being myself up like oh if they hadn't taken a pet to Dr. pons he was like One of my mentors who's like I think it's the greatest thing in the world Hans the dog might not have died so that's like a very dark thought for me to have as a veterinarian but it goes like you know I'm such a perfectionist like you know I have to like everything has to be done right and it even goes with surgery when I was in vet school like everything had to be perfect like I had at my ligatures how to be perfect like my knots in like the vet that was over the clerkship she was like you you were too hard on yourself you're way too hard yourself and you're gonna end up like you don't really hurting yourself so I have been trying to be better about that but in my cases like that were you know the dog dies and I don't know why I still to this day can't figure out why this dog just died because especially considering the owner said it was getting better and then it just took a turn like like I've got tons of differentials in my head but I just can't do it down because I can't do diagnostics so what do you do to Try to combat the perfectionism I just honestly my boss is great because he kind of just like he sets me down he's like you know you're a good vet I'd like to leave it or not I believe you have validation like you're a good vet and you know everybody makes mistakes and you're not always gonna have the answers like think nobody in the world is ever going to have an answer for anything and that's something you kind of have to like accept it that's something I am trying to accept but that's what the beauty of you know my job as I have three other vets with me ideas off of so if I don't have the answer they might so that can you take some pressure off of me that I have to know every single answer what is the biggest mistake you've made and how did you recover from it not educating clients as much as I could you know I have some days like I'm just tired and these owners are like Yep I don't wanna be on prevention This is a nurse and I know I say OK and this is the risks and I feel like my mistake comes in I should've hounded on more like almost like I should've been an annoying person but am I gonna come across hateful if I try to like educate these people and I don't want you know because I do work for corporate like they could just easily cat call and say she's you know bullying me into doing that so I think I'm getting better about it now like wording wise but see that just yeah and my tone because you know if somebody tells me I don't want to take care of my pan and on the inside I'm just like fuck yeah I hate you like it on my face but like on the outside have to be like well this is what we should do before like a nice voice I was gonna say I feel like that just sounds like you're still being hard on yourself yet but luckily I haven't made any mistakes like you know detrimental to any pets yet right Fingers crossed that doesn't happen but I am always scared that you know during surgery I'm not gonna tie a knot tight enough in the dogs gonna be cut back open or even bleed out like I always have that like I'm gonna mess up somehow so I'll get back to you OK imposter syndrome you've brought it up several times and we talked about it when we went to dinner we grow up and we enter these positions of like these big fat like whether it's fat whether you're an insurance whatever you're doing and you're like holy shit like I am the person that people call now what the hell so how has imposter syndrome affect to do so when I was growing up I worked for a vet Dr. Amber Milton I was a kid you know like 1314 I want to be a vet and he is she was a vet I thought she was the smartest woman that ever walked this earth like she She did no wrong in my eyes like she basically wore superheroes like she was amazing like she knew everything like she could do whatever like she set her mind to I had a ferret ferret got a genus disease which is a very common disease and ferrets and she was like you know I'll take the adrenal glands out that'll help her and this is the first time she's ever done that surgery and she kicked ass at it and I was like oh my gosh this woman is amazing and so I thought that up until I like it's still his day I think she's the greatest thing I ever walk but now that I'm in her position I'm like wait a minute wait a minute she didn't know everything there's no way she knew everything and I'm just like she was in my position she was just literally in a faking it until she made it like you know that confidence booster it's just she was also a scared little bit a man who didn't have all the answers and so it's like kind of interesting to me to know how like you know I viewed her and how you know maybe a 15 year old to use me and then here I am now Yeah like wait a minute it's just very interesting and like imposter syndrome you know it's basically like we don't think we should be here like I had to have done something to like cheat my way through and get through it like somehow scanned everybody to like be a vet when that's not true so what triggers it then for you it's confidence that you know being hard on yourself not thinking you can do it in like a form of I think I'm a imposter I don't think I should really be here I think somebody messed up somebody messed up who gave me this doctor degree because I don't think but in reality I should should be here and it's just you know imposters don't have imposter syndrome you know so if I was a real imposter I would have them oh yeah yeah messenger so that's something I have to tell myself I love that so Do you think that it ever completely goes away no talking to that to her now you know six years old they like it doesn't ever get better talk yourself there and be like this is fake you should be here and you know like you have the ability to do whatever you put your mind to believe in yourself and that's you know something you have to do through all the mental health irritation that the profession brings you yeah OK so just a little bit more of heavy questions I'm a little afraid to ask you just because of my severe love for animals not that bad but I hope it's not that bad it depends on what you say I know that we had discussed the importance of bringing to light some of the issues that people have with their pets and I think that we've really done that but people cannot conceptualize what they don't know And you have no if they don't know how people are treating their animals or what is really out there there's never going to be a way to fix it so focusing on like the education what do you think the worst thing that you've experienced as your time as if that has been so I had a dog come in that was basically pure scabs like the skin it was like bleeding it skin infection all over it it was a really bad case of Demadex the puppy was so mad like it was leaking fluid and the puppy was so miserable and itchy he had to bring it in the tub because it was just getting pus and blood everywhere and so I did a skin scraping and confirm demon decks and a I was like yeah this is a treatment before but he didn't pay for the first set of treatment but then I was like you need to come back in two weeks to You re-up the treatment basically cause you know it's every two weeks and I do that just so I can recheck the dog just see that you know Howard he never came back so I kind of didn't know what happened to the dog and I was like try to call you no hand is doing a wellness check and then eventually he was just like no I took care of the dog and yeah boy yes yeah so he instead of treating that very treatable disease he took it upon himself to you and I don't even wanna think about how he did that but he was just tired of me calling to check in on it but he was basically like and that just shattered me what are the most common ways people put themselves before their pet I will have owner Chino come and driving in brand new BMW don't have their nails done they're nice clothes and then they're gone And their dog ejection because it has you know some sort of infection and they'll be like oh I can't really afford that today so I am biking I'm looking at their BMW fob that has no scratches on it cause it's brand new and I'm looking at their nicely done nails and I'm like OK you can't afford this today OK well on the inside I'm like goes tell your BMW and go get your dog so that BMW and go get a more affordable car and take care of your dog litter I obviously I'm just like OK won't like if you like you know if you find the phones or if you can find a way to do this it would be great for your dog what are some common things people do that they may not realize they are doing it that's not in their pets best interest breeding them and I don't think people really understand how breeding works so there's a lot of things that go into breeding that people understand like genetics I had a lady come with her chronic allergy pitbull who is intact and I was like are you planning on breeding this dog she's like not right now but in the future and this lady also doesn't wanna pay for her dog to have any relief so I was like why do you want you to know that this dog is a chronic allergy dog it's likely that if he has chronic allergies any offspring he produces will also have chronic allergies so you're bringing in more chronic allergies and to the world and the puppies oh my gosh I didn't even think of that and she says she understands and that she's not gonna breed him but she also doesn't wanna book a neuter so I don't know but you know a lot of people just you know see their dog is like oh my gosh he's so cute and he's the best little dog they don't like sideration he's not a good breeding stock that's backyard breeding and they just wanna make a buck off their dog they don't wanna you know do everything the right way because that would be expensive at what point are we breeding dogs just to get much better already in the shelter That's what you're doing like the shelters are overrun right now there's just packs for like there's two German Shepherd's at the local shelter here that have until the 17th before they get euthanize purebred German Shepherd's but people are out here poorly breeding German shepherds who are gonna have no hip dysplasia they are homeless animals right now and every puppy that you breed put that homeless animal in a plastic bag that I put in a black trash bag off to the dump and I don't think people really understand that that was a powerful statement not that I like that yeah it's it's sad but it's I think like sometimes you just have to be really raw and upfront with people and really show them like yeah this is that the reality is the reality of it this is how nasty it can be what is the line between spending a fortune on your animal and that's what you signed up for when you get a pet I think what you sign up for when you get a pet is preventive care like I think you sign up for all the tax Vaccines I think you sign up for a flea and tick prevention I think you sign up for you know dental care spaying and neutering and then you start crossing a fine line when it's you know a dog has cancer and it can be taken out with oncology but it's gonna cost you $5000 if you take out that cancer what's the prognosis is it gonna be you know a couple more years then you know maybe do it but if the prognosis is low then you know you're doing this I was like you know being the best of the best so if you know you get a puppy and you do everything you can for the puppy but then it gets to a point where you know it gets cancer I'm not gonna look at you and be like what are you signed up for if it got cancer because no like I understand it's not in everybody's budget just dropped like $6000 for a cancer treatment but if it is blocked you know I actually a few few weeks ago I had it on I had a owner who had a dog he was straining to P and it was a male dog and it was intact something might be wrong with the prostate it might have some stones Baba so they were like can you get this done before one because we have we have to go to Panthers game and I was like your dog can't urinate serious and they were like well what do you the radiographs we don't wanna do bloodwork I was like fine so I didn't see any obvious blockage so I was like we can still do bloodwork and I'll send home antibiotics and pain medication since you're in such a rush because she was like can I bring him back tomorrow I can't urinate I was like it's kind of like important that he gets fixed sooner rather than later and she's like OK well can you do whatever like to go to lunch now be able to urinate while you have Panthers game so then she comes and gets the dog is in home antibiotics and pain medication's in the back tomorrow reassess get to your pants Panthers game go Panthers she doesn't take home pain medication cut at the pay make a short $18 and she didn't want you to spend $18 on that pain medication and I was like you're about to go to the Panthers game pay $18 for two beers but you can't pay $10 for your dog who is in pain when he is urinating that's disturbing to me like I just I don't know where peoples heads are at sometimes I'm just like this is actually baffling to me right but that's the bare minimum like that's what you get when you get a doc you sign up for stuff like that you sign up for you know he might have a UTI and a dogs UTI is more important than the Panthers game I'm sorry tell the Panthers that you know my hear this but it off is more important then you going to the Panthers game even if you're gonna be late like I am I was working like nonstop because I had like 20 patients that day you know I'm I'm trying and I was like trying to do that patient as quickly as I could so I can get to the Panthers game off of him not to take home pain medication Are you saying that people's brain works like that and that's it that's exactly why I said I wanna fuck selling education because like I could never again as a person that loves pets could never conceptualize acting like that that is so crazy and is my dog you know if he ate a bag of tootsie rolls and I was like I'm dropping everything right now I was like I can't come out tonight I'm sorry I've got to take my dog and make him throw up and he was my focus and I was like I don't care what I'm missing right now because it's my child like whatever it takes for my dog to get better what kind of qualities would a person who should not have a pet or not have a pet at this time in their life have I think everybody deserves the love of a pet but I also think you have to be at a certain stage in your life to do you know if you're going through anything stressful where you can't focus on this pet and you give it the bare minimum wouldn't need What it needs I think you should reevaluate and come back at a different time in your life you know if you're struggling financially it's hard to pay the bills and you can't you know if something happened and you can't afford to drop $400 reevaluate and get a pet I know that sucks because I feel like everybody should Eno be able to experience love a pet but there are times in your life that aren't going to have that extra living being right there you know if you're going through a loss of a job don't get a pet don't get a pet because it's just you know more pet and I think people don't really understand that and so you know when life gets hard they want something to booster you know happiness is not gonna get a dog without realizing that it cost money pets bring us happiness and it's not fair for pets did you not bring us all this happiness in us not be able to give them something in return and what I imagine that being in return is you know basic medicine to make them you know healthy Not healthy if they're gonna be there to make your life you know happier and brighter than the least we could do is be there for them to make them you know have a good life too when we went to dinner I know you had said I like how you worded it it was we have these pets because we need them and they make us happy so the occasional times that they need some thing we have to be there for them yeah like that they are there for us like when we are at our lowest like when we feel like we have nobody petro be right there like by your side there's even been instances like you know you read the news and some ice killed themselves and their dogs like it was laying the side of them you know pets are there for us you know unconditional love they gave us you know unconditional love the least we can do for them is give them you know a healthy happy comfortable life and you know make them feel loved to like I know they probably don't think all mom and take me to get married bitch I should probably hates me I don't think that but you know when they are feeling sick and you take them in you know and I start giving him medicine and they feel Feel better I'm not stupid like I know like you know these humans help me out like these humans when you feel better type deal like it's the least we can do for sure OK so to wrap things up I just want to ask you a couple fun questions OK so what is the weirdest coolest most bizarre thing you've seen us we did an x-ray and there's literally like a long snake and then shoot yeah and like honestly foreign bodies some of the things like animal swallow is hilarious my when I was in high school Amber had to take out a butt plug that a dog no way that's a theory it's it's gross but dogs really smell the sense of humans and like they love eating condoms that's like really fake I'm foreign body and I love condoms and you know butt plug I guess was on the list appetizing that's a delicacy What is your most prime moment I'll I think my most proud moment was my very first surgery that I did so low cause I was like really hard on myself and vet school like I can't do this I can't do this and then you know I get out in the real world and I'm like by myself the only vet in the clinic and I do a surgery and it healed and it was fine and I was like oh my gosh am I a doctor soda back up honestly that was a feeling like I'll never forget like I actually felt important like I put on my white coat I deserve this wow like I'm actually a doctor what is some thing you used to value but no longer do I think I use the value like my free time a lot more that I'm in this is no I'm not saying the second thing at all but I still like and I really value a day off or you know the weekends or Saturday night like You know I saw my friend this past weekend and we were talking about how every Friday night I called you going out and that that's just something I really loved being able to go out with him and like all my friends and like and hang out and enjoy life and I really love those nights but now I just don't ever do that like I just don't care like I don't know if I like grown-up or white but I just don't really care about it as much anymore am I growing up or am I like getting depressed figure this out so like a free time and social activity is used to matter a lot more to me than they do now OK so last question what is your perception of becoming your ideal self my ideal self would be some money who knows what to say at all times kind of like I would know you know exactly what to say and do like I wouldn't question myself I wouldn't doubt myself I would just be confident in my abilities and I would know exactly what to do but like if I look like talk to 15 year old Liz she would be so like proud of where I'm at right now she be like oh my gosh look at you you know your shit so like I think you know 10 years from now I can look back and be like you know me now would be so proud of her I am 10 years well I'm gonna have seen way more things and I've talk to a more people who know you know so I know what to say I don't know what to do and I won't be like I'll still probably have like some imposter syndrome but I'll be more confident in it or if I do have imposter syndrome and how to fake through them so I think just you know my real self I just be more confidence more experience and just knowing your shit little bit more not be afraid to actually know her shit and tell people that she knows her shit like when people question me I'll be like no no question me I know what I'm talking about right now so I really appreciate that and I just do want to say like you know I kind of talked about bad you know pet ownership but there are a lot of good pet owners out there and you're not like ignored like you are valued like I love those owners more than I can even stay owner to take care of their pets and do the most for them are valued they're not you know you are seen and you know I love those owners more than I can describe because they make my job do you know what I went into that mad foreigner to help animals like you guys rock you help us and I like dark times like when I have a owner and it's just like do whatever it takes to take care of my animal it's just a breath of fresh air cause I'm able to do what I went to school for so just putting it out there that we do love you guys awesome thank you so much you're welcome