This question from a veterinarian gave me pause recently: \u201cIs there more fear in veterinary medicine than in other industries, or is everyone as scared as we are?\u201d For years, I\u2019ve written that while veterinary medicine is challenging, I believe it can be a hugely rewarding and fulfilling career. I also question whether the online doom and gloom around our industry\u2019s future and the mental health challenges facing people in our profession are proportional to what is actually happening in practices.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not saying individuals don\u2019t struggle with burnout or mental illness. (Of course, they do.) Nor am I saying everything will be rosy in our profession as we wade deeper into the age of artificial intelligence, corporatization and private equity. Overall, however, my position on veterinary medicine has been (and remains) optimistic. Our profession is in a period of rapid, irreversible change, and while that experience can feel like a catastrophic breakdown, the uncertainty and upheaval are not necessarily bad. They are simply the uncomfortable path we must walk as the earth transforms around us.<\/p>\n
That philosophy on the state of our profession pushed me to initially dismiss the idea that veterinary medicine fosters a more fearful culture than other professions. My knee-jerk reaction was: \u201cNo, we aren\u2019t any more afraid in our daily lives than any other professionals out there. It\u2019s just that every profession shares their struggles and fears internally while putting on a brave face for those outside their industry. We are no different.\u201d<\/p>\n
But then I stopped and thought about it.<\/p>\n
I recently heard the story of the Sword of Damocles, and it spoke to me. In short, Damocles is a courtier in the court of King Dionysius I of Syracuse. Damocles flatters the king, telling him how fortunate he is to be in such a magnificent position. The king offers to switch places with Damocles for a day. Damocles eagerly accepts.<\/p>\n
The next day, Damocles is placed on the throne to feel what it\u2019s like to be the king. He\u2019s given all the respect and power of the king. However, there\u2019s a catch.<\/p>\n
During the night, Dionysius had a sword hung over the throne, pointed down. A single hair from a horse\u2019s tail supported the sword. This was done so Damocles would feel the great fortune of rulership and the fear and anxiety of constant danger.<\/p>\n
Damocles was miserable. He couldn\u2019t bear knowing the sword dangled over his head. He begged to get off the throne.<\/p>\n
The story spoke to me because so many of us in veterinary practice have felt like Damocles: proud to be in a position of power and responsibility yet filled with a sense of fear that catastrophe might fall upon us at any moment.<\/p>\n
During most of my career, I believed perfectionism was a trait I should aspire to. I looked to the veterinary school specialists, who seemed to do everything just right. I watched classmates pore over textbooks late into the night and heard them lament missing a single test question the next day \u2014 \u201cI got a 98, but I should have gotten a 100,\u201d they complained.<\/p>\n
Perfection seemed to be the goal in practice. Heated battles took place over how best to tape a catheter, which antibiotic we should use and why, and exactly how much medical information could be given over the phone to a client who last saw a doctor who\u2019s now on vacation. I remember fluid-pump wars when factions couldn\u2019t agree on what \u201cmaintenance rate\u201d meant and a particularly nasty \u201cwizards\u2019 duel\u201d in which two veterinarians championed the published opinions of different world-renowned specialists to decide which flea medicine our practice would recommend.<\/p>\n
In all those cases, what existed was a clear sense that getting the \u201cright\u201d answer was imperative and that being \u201cwrong\u201d meant a feeling of shame or existential danger. \u201cGood enough\u201d was for slackers and people who didn\u2019t care quite as much, and not caring quite as much was viewed as a moral failure.<\/p>\n
Maybe others didn\u2019t perceive this battle for correctness the way I did. Maybe the stakes didn\u2019t seem so high for them. For me, however, the lesson was clear:<\/p>\n
That was the culture I believed defined veterinary practice.<\/p>\n
When I was a teenager applying for college, I remember drilling the interview questions I thought would be asked. They were questions like, \u201cWhat are you most proud of?\u201d and \u201cWhat book has most affected you?\u201d and \u201cWhat\u2019s your greatest weakness?\u201d I was ready for all of them.<\/p>\n
My answer to the greatest weakness question was, \u201cI\u2019m a perfectionist.\u201d I thought it was a superb answer because I got to act like an intense focus on getting things just right was a huge burden. It was the perfect backhanded weakness \u2014 or so I thought. I believed everyone knew that being a perfectionist meant working hard and continually striving for improvement. Telling an interviewer it was a weakness of mine was a way to share how great of a student I would be and portray myself as humble and vulnerable. Check and mate!<\/p>\n
Looking back on my teenage years, I see my lack of insight. I didn\u2019t comprehend a downside to perfectionism. (It looked like the road to success from where I stood.) The people who couldn\u2019t bear to be wrong did quite well in academics, as far as I could tell, and doing group projects with those folks always meant I\u2019d get a better grade than if I worked with a more laid-back crowd.<\/p>\n
While my views on perfectionism have changed significantly since entering practice, I don\u2019t think I was off base in terms of how perfectionism interfaces with academia. The drive to \u201cget it just right\u201d is hugely beneficial when you get the same reasonably manageable workload as everyone else, are scored on accuracy and are celebrated for individual achievement. Perfectionism is an excellent strategy for advancement through advanced education, and it\u2019s, therefore, a compulsion many of us acquired on our path to becoming veterinarians.<\/p>\n
But here\u2019s the rub: Perfectionism<\/a>, as I\u2019ve encountered it over the years, is limiting and largely fear-based. I see doctors, technicians<\/a> and practice managers who are genuinely afraid to delegate to others, accept pet owners\u2019 decisions and make recommendations that other doctors might disagree with. Perfectionists seem to be:<\/p>\n I don\u2019t want this to sound like I\u2019m saying accuracy doesn\u2019t matter. However, I believe we can be attentive, compassionate and highly competent without being afraid to fall short of perfection. I also think this sort of motivational fear is positively reinforced in our training, and it masquerades in practice as a superpower while taking a persistent toll on the perfectionist.<\/p>\n Last summer, I went on vacation with my family to Nova Scotia to go hiking and camping. A week before we left, my wife informed me that her greatest desire on the trip was to see a moose. I felt it a worthy goal and made it my mission to deliver the \u201cmoose experience\u201d to my beloved.<\/p>\n When we picked up the rental minivan, I gathered the family and told them our objective: We would find a moose. From that moment forward, the hunt was on.<\/p>\n We got up a little earlier than normal every morning in Nova Scotia because that\u2019s when moose were supposed to be out and about. We went on an extra walk each evening because the time just before sundown was supposed to be \u201cmoose o\u2019clock.\u201d We took turns watching the sides of the highway as we drove in case a moose might be lurking along the treeline, and we asked every other hiker we saw, \u201cHey, you haven\u2019t seen any moose (Meese? Mooses?) have you?\u201d<\/p>\n We remained on high alert for 10 days. Do you know how many moose we saw? Zero. Zip. Not one.<\/p>\n At the end of the trip, I had come to two conclusions:<\/p>\n see a moose. We stayed out later than we would have, paid closer attention to our surroundings, approached our hikes with greater enthusiasm, laughed about our efforts and found a reason to talk with people we would otherwise have walked past. We found motivation in our search that made our experiences richer than they would have been otherwise.<\/p>\n The fact that we never saw a moose didn\u2019t ruin our vacation. In fact, the search made the trip one of the best of my life. It turns out the act of searching can be far more meaningful than finding what we seek.<\/p>\n Veterinarians tend to live under a cloud of fear that\u2019s probably unnecessary. We have learned to fear imperfection and use the fear as motivation to strive for self-improvement. Unfortunately, given that we live in an imperfect world, that fear never ends, and it hangs over many of us like the sword of Damocles.<\/p>\n We don\u2019t have to live that way. We can be motivated by a desire to search. We can decide what \u201cmoose\u201d we want to find in our careers or practices and derive great pleasure from seeking it.<\/p>\n We don\u2019t need fear to drive us to be good at our jobs or to take care of our patients. We can instead throw ourselves into a quest to learn, heal, help, support or mentor. It doesn\u2019t matter that quests like these don\u2019t tend to end because ending the quest isn\u2019t the point. The point is to choose the motivation to search for what we care about rather than to flee from the fear of imperfection.<\/p>\n That is how we step out from under the sword of Damocles and begin to practice in a mindset without fear.<\/p>\n As many as 1 million moose live in Canada. Mainland Nova Scotia has an estimated 700.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We don\u2019t need fear to drive us to be good at our jobs or to take care of our patients.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":75437,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[412],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-december-2023-january-2024","column-dicharge-notes","clinical_topics-personal-wellness","clinical_topics-personal-professional-development"],"acf":{"hide_sidebar":false,"hide_sidebar_ad":false,"hide_all_ads":false},"yoast_head":"\n\n
#MooseTruth<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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#MooseTruth Versus Fear-Based Practice<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nGOOD LUCK FINDING ONE<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n