So the title pretty much sums my week up. I did work experience at a veterinary clinic. I was pretty nervous walking in the door, (what if I mess up and cause an animal to die or something? What if I don't know how to do something?) My fears were calmed when they handed me a broom and a mop and told me to clean the place. Then, lucky me, got to start cleaning out animal cages! Around lunch time things got a little more interesting, from about 12-3 every day is surgery time, and even better I was allowed in to watch. Now, watching various cats and dogs get cut up probably doesn’t seem like everybody's cup of tea but watching surgeries were the highlight.
Fortunately I do not have a weak stomach, at one point I was eating lunch while watching one of the surgeries. Unfortunately though, I think I might be allergic to cats. Yeah. Not good. But as the week went on I took a lot of medication to stop my allergies, learnt how to use a mop (don't judge me) and declared my hate on kitty litter.
The radio was on the whole time on a trashy music station playing, you guessed it, trashy music! I confess, anything that isn't classical music I call trashy music. But now I actually know the lyrics to heaps of 'popular' songs!
But amazingly on my last day the place was understaffed and it was one of their busiest days. A huge 'shipment' of the shelter dogs and cats came in, and they all needed to be vet checked and de-sexed. After the animal's operation they are pretty much just put down on the floor on a blanket until they wake up, and then they are carried into a cage. Reason number 401 why I am glad human surgeries are different to vet surgeries. Anywho, there were a couple of cats lying next to the wall and then they suddenly woke up from the general aesthetic but the back half of them was still paralysed/numbed. So they began pulling them selves around the edge of the room using only their front paws, (it was so cute!) one travelled a fair way before we realised it had woken up. Everybody else was busy with cutting up another cat, so I was instructed to take the kittens back to their cages. Easier said than done. The first time I had ever carried a cat was that morning, so I barely had gotten the hang of it without having to worry about a ginormous ouchy on their side.
Want to know the weirdest thing that happened while I was there? A cat came in whose registered name was 'Shit Head.' I'm serious.
Well that was my week :) Now I really want to become a vet, doing slavery at the clinic persuaded me to keep aiming to do that. (But I never ever want to touch kitty litter again!)
~Saph out.
Work experience eh? Yeah, I remember I did mine last year ... it was at the local council - in the planning and development dept.
ReplyDeleteIt was kinda mixed parts fun, interesting and staring-at-the-clock boredom. :p
Sounds like you had fun :)
And 'Shit Head?' Are you serious? Who names their cat that?