The Journey Of A New Graduate

Well, it had to happen. I’ve been merrily working on this blog now for over 6 months with no problems and then January rolls around and I’m stuck. Humph. I’ve lost track of the hours I’ve spent staring at a blank page trying to encapsulate my feelings this month. Am I aiming to be uplifting? Serious? Controversial (never!)? I go back and focus on last month’s blog, reading its message of looking for the positive and try to find examples, which I do. For instance, I successfully placed a stomach tube in a pony at the first attempt when called out to a colic last week. This may not seem like a big deal but I’ve had a real mental block about this so I was thrilled I managed it smoothly and (I hope to the owner’s eye) calmly. Thinking about my sort-of new years resolution to look at the positives has got me thinking about the other resolutions people make. Now I’m not making any claim to attempting dry January or ‘Veganuary’ (I’m an everything in moderation type of person) but thinking a...

Sorry about the lateness of December’s blog everyone, I promise I had made good progress writing this edition during December but then everything went rather mental. The week before Christmas I spent on call which culminated in a Saturday which did not seem to end! My last patient of the day was down as a pug that had been in a dog fight… ‘Geez’ I thought to myself, picturing awful lacerations and eyeballs out of their sockets. In trots in this little dog, the only thing wrong that I could see was that he had a mild limp. This was not what I was expecting! The owner explained her dog (the pug) had run out of her house and into her next-door neighbour’s house where he promptly tucked into the neighbour’s dog’s (a mastiff) lunch. Said mastiff, unsurprisingly, did not take kindly to this theft and gave the little pug what for. Amazingly the wee dog escape unscathed, just pulling a muscle running away home! Which is a nice example of the main thing I have learnt about being a first opinion...