December 2022

In this VETgirl online veterinary continuing education blog, Dr. Justine Lee, DACVECC, DABT talks about being one of the 22 Extraordinary Veterinary Women listed in a recent article in Today’s Veterinary Practice.

By Dr. Justine Lee, DACVECC, DABT
Director of Medicine / CEO, VETgirl

22 Extraordinary Veterinary Women

Earlier this year, I was honored to be featured in Today’s Veterinary Practice article “22 Extraordinary Women” in Veterinary Medicine. I was honored to stand by some of the top veterinary leaders in the field – from CEOs to working moms to leaders in veterinary industry and so much more.

In this article, we were asked to summarize our professional journeys, our favorite things to do outside of work, how we balanced work-life responsibilities, best advice to younger veterinary professionals, and what we could start all over again, if we were able to do things differently. It was interesting to read every ladies’ response, as some were very similar and some answers were very different.

Here, my responses below in the article:

Dr Justine Lee 22 extraordinary women

Shortly thereafter, an editorial called “22 Outliers” was written by Dr. Susan Daly, VMD. She expressed how she was annoyed reading the article, as it suggested that “having it all” was extremely difficult as a female. She pointed out that we were actually 22 Outliers, and that none of us were in current practice.

Ouch.

But fair. The more I thought about Dr. Daly’s article, I did realize how she was right – this was overlooked. None of us were in full-time veterinary practice anymore.  And I loved her points.

Now, don’t get me wrong (I don’t have imposter syndrome). I’ve put my fair share of a whole lot of hours in the veterinary ER. I left my part-time criticalist position at Animal Emergency & Referral Center of Minnesota after 10 years of being there (Damn you, COVID!). I’ve spent time in veterinary industry for 5 years. I’ve been on faculty in the “ivory tower” of academia for 5 years. And as a specialist, I’ve never done GP except for moonlighting during my ECC residency (“Yes, I will happily vaccinate your pet over treating a DKA!”) and teaching it at Cornell University in Community Practice Service. However, her article pointed out that none of the 22 women were on the floor currently “willing to do the ‘hard stuff.'”

She stated (sarcastically) that you can have it all if you:

  • Do relief work when you want to. (Notice the huge trend here.)
  • Work for “skimmers” — corporations that hire veterinarians to go to pet and farm-supply stores to give vaccines, which are high-margin, low-overhead items.
  • Work for large practices that have enough veterinarians to schedule them in shifts.
  • Work in a doctor-centric practice that schedules until 3 in the afternoon to allow time for records and callbacks, doesn’t hospitalize sick or injured animals, refers out non-routine surgeries or dentistries requiring extractions, and has readily available emergency clinics to use.
  • Quit working during your child-rearing years.

22 Outliers TVP

What do I take away from this editorial rebuttal?

1. Thank you – for those of you in full-time practice – for “doing the hard stuff.”

Oh man, full-time clinical practice is a grind. It’s tough. It’s long hours. It’s a lot of callbacks. It’s exhausting. It’s medical records hell. And no, I wouldn’t go back to full-time. You know why? Because it’s hard. And that’s why we have such a high rate of burnout, compassion fatigue, exhaustion, and suicide ideation in our veterinary field. Regardless, it’s a good reminder to thank all those around you who are doing it full-time for all that you do. Because you deserve a massive THANK YOU! And we often don’t hear THANK YOU’s enough. THANK YOU!!!

2 women jumping

2. It’s ok choose the lifestyle that works for you.

That said, please don’t work so hard and be so miserable in your veterinary career “doing the hard stuff” that it takes away the joy that you once had (You know, that joy when you got that letter accepting you into veterinary school or vet tech school). Having battled with suicide ideation during my ECC residency at PennVet and survived 2-3 tough-a$$ years during COVID in emergency practice, I can say that I purposely worked really hard to build my career so I could take the time off to family plan and enjoy life when I wanted to. I purposely sold my small business, VETgirl, so I could reward myself after 10 years of workaholism. I purposely moved to part-time so I could spend time with my one and only 2-legged kiddo, after having battled 3 years of miscarriages and infertility. Because that was really important to me.

There’s so much judgement nowadays (I’m talking to you, keyboard warriors!)… but if we all had a little more empathy and extended grace to each other, we’d realize that everyone is likely doing the best that they can EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. If you don’t want to work full-time and can support yourself doing relief work or part-time work or balance being a SAHM (stay-at-home-mom – or dad), do it. Do what’s best for you and your family. I consciously made all my life decisions so I could prioritize quality of life. As veterinary professionals, we talk about quality of life (QOL) with pet owners all the time – particularly when discussing euthanasia decisions. But when it comes down to it, we often don’t have good QOL ourselves. Well, it’s OK to choose that lifestyle that gives you good QOL, even if it means pulling yourself out of full-time practice.

3. Me-First is OK.
As a Gen-X’r, I’m all about working hard. But not as hard as Baby Boomers… because I watched my immigrant parents work themselves into the ground. So is it wrong that we prioritize Me-First? No, it’s not. Because you know what? If 2+ years of COVID taught us anything, it’s that life is short. And no one ever said on their death bed, “I wish I worked harder.” You know what they say? “I wish I spent more time with my loved ones.”

It feels dirty to be “selfish.” But if we don’t individually advocate for ourselves (especially as women who aren’t good self-advocates), then we risk worsening our burnout. Maybe the 22 women in this article figured out that pivoting to re-create themselves or their full-time jobs and taking advantage of all the unique, amazing other opportunities within our veterinary field helped them create the lifestyle, financial freedom and work-life balance that they needed.

Thank you, Dr. Daly, for the reminder to appreciate all our colleagues who are frontline workers, doing it full-time. Because it’s so hard. A true, heart-felt thank you to all of you guys rocking it on the clinic floor.

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