When a bond is formed and a standard is set, there are expectations that need to be met. Those expectations are hopefully very high. When you set a high a standard there is a lot of pressure to maintain those standards. When those standards are not met, that trust can be broken. It is not necessarily something that is malicious or intentional, but none the less, the result is the same. When trust is broken, so is the bond. That bond and trust is very hard to rebuild.
What happens when that bond and trust is broken by your veterinarian or vet hospital? That can be even harder to repair if at all. Your pet is often a member of your family and even small concerns can seem like a crisis when you are in the moment. There are times, probably more so in the most recent years, that we as veterinary professionals have let our clients down when they could not be there for them. In some cases, struggle to meet their basic needs. Even the little things that we take for granted and assumed always to be present are simply not available. I equate it to going to KFC and being told they are out of chicken, not once, but repeatedly.
From my point of view it is painful to watch. To see the bonds we formed breaking right in front of my eyes. Not maliciously or intentionally but simply due to miscommunication or human error. We are all human. Humans make mistakes. A group of humans is made of many individual humans all capable of making mistakes and misunderstanding. I believe it is more complicated and more difficult to get a group of humans to not make mistakes that it is a single human. Sometimes the breakdown is a simple communication error. A simple misinterpretation of what is requested. Other times it is a complete structural breakdown from the bottom up or the top down. Information flow is just there. Enough time is not taken in the moment. It takes more coordination and more communication to keep the boat rowing in the right direction and all the rowers rowing in the same direction.
I feel that there has been a lot of change in the veterinary world and a lot of change with me specifically. For starters, I took a break from the veterinary hospital that I built from the ground up at a time when two other critical veterinarians needed to also exit the practice. The practice took a big hit when that happened. For a while things seemed ok, but then things were definitely not ok. The hits kept coming. Eventually clients felt let down. Staff felt abandoned. I elected to come back part time, but even that did not stop the ball from rolling downhill. More hits happened and trust was betrayed by not living up to the expectations that were set as the standard.
I admit that I have fallen into this situation many times over the years. I have been accused of charging too much, not making time to see patients when they need to be seen (regardless of what the schedule looks like), not valuing my staff’s input or taking their concerns seriously, not explaining the situation sufficiently, making the wrong diagnosis, or the worst part, simply not caring. Now granted, I often feel these allegations are not factual. I always care and I always try, but it is simply not enough and I am only human after all. You see the sustained and cumulative stress over the previous 23 years took its toll. I let it wear me down and I had to shut off parts of myself to survive. I do mean that literally. I mean this not as an excuse but as means of an explanation.
I do not know if the bonds that have been broken can be fixed, but I am here to say that it is my profound goal and with my utmost determination to focus my efforts to rebuild the trust of my community, my clients and my coworkers. I believe it will take a lot of time and late nights, and it will not be instantaneous, but I am willing to put in the work. Rest assured, I have learned valuable lessons from my time away. I will work hard but also set boundaries so that I do not let it wear me down again. That way it is sustainable energy. So from the bottom of my heart, I apologize for the times that I have not been there for you. That I have let you down. I cannot be everywhere and everything for everyone but I am going to try to be more available and more involved. This is directed to my clients, my patients, my staff, my hospital, my community. I love you and I want to be a positive part of your lives.