Feeling old and starting something new...

I'm not really one for blogging the details of my life out onto the big wide world but I'm about to make an exception.  While I work on fulfilling the requirements I need to satisfy to be able to get into vet school I'm going to keep a record of my experiences here.  I'll be writing about anything from my job shadowing at vet practices that I find interesting or worth sharing or want to preserve for later, as well as my experiences on farms and other animal establishments.  Having all this stuff available here will make sharing it with friends and family easier too - if any of them actually want all the gory details!  And who knows, maybe some other aspiring vet students will find some useful info here too.

The seven UK vet schools (and Dublin) all have different requirements for work experience for veterinary medicine/surgery degree applications but the general rule is that if you fulfill Liverpool Vet School's requirements then you've got what you need to apply to any of the other six.  So the absolute minimum consists of 4 weeks at at least 2 different vet practices, plus 6 weeks at other animal establishments such as farms, kennels and stables. 

Living in central London for the last thirteen years has meant that although I spent a good chunk of my earlier years on or looking after horses, I was fairly lacking in recent equine and large animal experience. That's something I've been working on fixing since deciding to swap my life of air-conditioned software development for one filled with weather, mud, guts, poo, and vomit.  Watch this space:  I'll be adding a post or two to here about my work with cows so far at some stage, plus whatever else I'll be getting up to that's non-human and non-computer related. 

So why start this today, when I really should really be finishing off some calculus revision with the May exams looming?!!  Well I'm about to start my first bout of work experience with a companion animal vet so I thought I'd get the ball rolling...  Also my brain seems to have become full to capacity for the day, so it was time to take a break.  The last thing we want is me overflowing and nasty maths spillage!  I want all that stuff to stay INSIDE my head. I'll be needing that later...

Tomorrow will be the start of my first stint at a real live vets, whoohoo!  I'm excited and a bit nervous at the same time, although both of the veterinary nurses I've met so far have both been lovely.  There's one other RVN plus one trainee and the vet that I have yet to meet.  I met one of the nurses briefly last weekend when I called in to show my face and to have a guided tour of the surgery.  The senior RVN, who I originally met back in December when we were both Service Volunteers on the Dogs Service at the Crisis at Christmas rough sleepers' shelter kindly offered me some work experience, which is how I've been lucky enough to be able to spend some time at this practice.

Silly to feel nervous I suppose, but I'm a bit concerned about asking stupid questions, getting under people's feet, breaking the little kittens, making small children cry and getting funny looks from the clients for being probably the most ancient work experience 'girl' ever...  My aims are to be as unobtrusive as I can while absorbing as much information as humanly possible, and hopefully to contribute something useful during my time there that will mean the staff won't regret having me invading their space for a whole fortnight! 

I think I have a pretty good idea what to expect, from talking to vet students and other wannabes along the way.  I reckon I'll be getting a good dose of cleaning up fur and poo and vomit from creatures of all shapes and sizes, as well as fulfilling the role of tea girl.  All part of the program - you need to be multi-talented to be a good vet, and you never get too qualified/senior/important to wipe furry bottoms and clean up sick!  There are a few other things I would like to take away from this fortnight at the vets, in addition to becoming more expert at wiping and mopping: 

• learning how to work with nervous, wriggling animals during one of their most dreaded activities - a trip to the v. e. t.!
• seeing what the most common ailments, treatments and procedures are, what can be handled by a local vet and what needs to be referred 
• getting a better understanding of the day to day running of a vet practice from a business point of view
• and seeing how vets and vet nurses deal with the variety of clients that come through the door

The latter is an aspect of the job I anticipate being one of the more challenging - the people side of things - I'm sure there will be plenty more about that in the coming weeks. 

Sure beats software engineering - bring it on!!!