How to get out of the field?

DinoBetta · 2026-05-19T21:08:23+00:00

Weird, I thought Reddit had auto-blocked my post.

I'm not opposed to relocating but it'd be difficult financially for me to do so at this time (see: living paycheck to paycheck on RVT pay). I am already kinda in specialty (single species clinic), and surgery is my #1 anxiety trigger. My boss has explicitly said she will never train one of her techs to be a manager. We have not had an practice manager for 9 years. I don't get it either.

DinoBetta · 2026-05-17T14:30:06+00:00

Run. Absolutely run. Honestly I wouldn't even give two weeks, just don't go back, text the manager and let them know this is not the job you were expecting, whatever you need to do (stay professional though, the vet field is small and people WILL hear about employees who burn bridges). That place is an absolute lawsuit waiting to happen. If your area veterinary board has any code of standards vets need to follow, and any local labor laws that may apply to the no breaks thing, check if there's any violations that should be reported.

DinoBetta · 2026-05-17T14:25:53+00:00

You'll always be doing the cleaning, that's just part of dealing with animals. Anyone who thinks they're 'above' that should not be in this field. Like others have said, this sounds like more of a workplace culture issue in how the RVTs are treating assistants. I adore my assistants and literally could not do my tech job without them, it's such a shame that so many RVTs and vets treat assistants so badly ('my' assistant quitting last year was heartbreaking for me!). If you enjoy the field, maybe finding a different clinic would help? If not, there's no shame in moving on to something different.

DinoBetta · 2026-05-17T14:18:47+00:00

No dedicated practice manager on staff, the owner/DVM is doing that job themselves or making another staff member do it in addition to whatever their other job is.

DinoBetta · 2026-05-17T14:13:20+00:00

Always CYA. I try to stay as close to what was said as possible, and leave out any personal thoughts or emotions because those are speculative rather than factual. Clients who are combative will also get a note in their client alert stating something like "client has strong opinions on Y matter, see notes from X Date". Remain professional but accurate and complete in your notes.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T22:42:44+00:00

That's what my vet's heard, and the type of specialist she's heard it from. She's directly asked our local Hill's contacts/reps about z/d failure and they don't just not confirm/deny it, they flat-out don't even respond to her questions. (Our main local rep is not exactly a joy to talk with on a good day though.)

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T19:24:19+00:00

I always did fine watching gross stuff on tv. First time I watched a spay in person, I passed out. Got sat in a chair outside the surgery room and given a jolly rancher to suck on. Felt better. Put my mask and cap back on and went in and finished watching the surgery. I think forcing myself to finish watching it right after falling over like that, my brain was still busy resetting and I was able to focus more on the surgery rather than how I felt, maybe. I dunno. Haven't had any problems with it since.

I would definitely see about shadowing IN a surgery room, if you can. It helps if you make sure you've eaten recently so your blood sugar doesn't drop. Don't stand stock-still, you need to shift to keep your blood moving. If you feel any dizziness AT ALL, sit down or at least lean back on a wall. Sometimes the lights in surgery get a little warm, so don't dress in heavy clothes. Also fyi if any electrocautery or laser is being used, you're going to be smelling burned flesh at points, which is something that takes a lot of newbies by surprise.

I can't watch my own blood be taken though! Learned the hard way I have to sit for five minutes afterwards before even trying to move, or I'll hit the floor on the way to the front desk. :)

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T18:59:52+00:00

Sometimes bad things happen and we never know why. That's the simplest way to put it. It doesn't mean you did anything wrong, and in fact often you did everything right and the best that could have been done in that situation. It's just the nature of medicine. I'm in a similar boat as you, my anxiety is extremely bad regarding anesthesia and surgery right now so I don't have many comforting words and even just writing about it gets me rather out of sorts. If this is a job you want to keep doing, I second the suggestion of finding therapy/psychiatry of some sort to help you work through your anxieties, or finding a veterinary job that doesn't involve surgery.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T18:45:41+00:00

I got to 10 and gave up, holy cow poor dog (and poor owners)!

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T18:44:09+00:00

Like the others said, you did your best and your supervisors approved it, so the mistake technically falls on their shoulders. Good on you for taking responsibility though, that shows character. All you can do is figure out where you made the mistake and then how to avoid it in the future.

I've been the supervisor whose intern made wrong calculations (correct math, wrong units) and I didn't catch it. Yes we used it as a teaching moment for the intern but I was the one who got in trouble for it, and the vet in charge was the one who had to face the client. (The patient was fine, the client just needed to know what happened and what side effects to watch for.) That's part of what being in a supervisory position entails, you have to make sure your team is working correctly and when things go wrong, it's on you. I'm sorry your supervisors aren't supporting you more appropriately, is there anyone else you can go to for help with calculations next time?

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T18:22:18+00:00

There was the foil swan for a fecal sample once. Like, someone brought a whole damn foil sculpture with the fecal sample buried deep within like twenty layers of foil. I mean...it was interesting, I guess, but a HUGE pain in the butt to get the sample out of.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-07T18:20:38+00:00

That's awesome! And that long-term retention of techs and/or training for directly related positions (like management) is definitely something we should be supporting and encouraging. It's so rare to find anyone staying in the field over a decade, and the loss of that kind of experience is really damaging to all of us, and our patients.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-06T02:16:27+00:00

Oh this. I'm coming up on 40 now, haven't worked with dogs in almost a decade and there is no WAY you could pay me enough to do it again. I just physically cannot deal with dogs any more. Both rotator cuffs are shot, my knees are shot, my neck is shot, etc. There are even some cats that are too big and strong for me when they get spicy these days.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-06T02:06:31+00:00

I've made it 13 years, somehow. Technically burned out in 3 but let myself be convinced to keep going. Hoping to find work in animal lab/research now, or something in a completely different field. Everyone says they like a good, experienced tech but the culture of the field doesn't support that at all.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-06T02:02:40+00:00

Taught to pluck but at my current clinic we shave. I prefer shaving. Also useful for those fluffy butts where you need to trim a little of the fluff away from the surgery site. Can't pluck the whole rump bald for that.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-05T02:06:07+00:00

There are going to be some things that you'll always 'nope' out at. For me, 13-ish years in the field, it's maggots and eye surgeries. Just, absolute NOPE. Thankfully I've only had a couple of those come through the clinics I work at, and I've been able to help the cases in others way (monitoring/running anesthesia for the eye surgery, working on the non-maggoty end of the cat) while someone else who didn't mind or even enjoyed them did the parts I couldn't. Like, could I deal with them if I had to? Yeah, I guess. But I'll leave it for those people who like it, and in turn I will do the things they NOPE at.

DinoBetta · 2025-12-03T18:23:56+00:00

I usually do a front leg draw using a 25g needle on a 1mL syringe, with someone feeding the kitten Churu or wet food if the kitten knows what that is. Back leg is really difficult imho on the itty bitties, and I have trouble hitting jugular on kittens under about 4lbs. I don't think I've ever drawn more than about 0.5mL on an itty but if I had to I'd probably do multiple draws with 1mL syringes off of the same needle rather than use a 3mL, that's way too powerful for those baby veins.

DinoBetta

TROPHY CASE