Episode 4: Interview with Dr. Fern Nelson

 

 *Opening Music*  

Listen up, animal care pros, compassion fatigue is real, and I'm here to help you address it. I'm Alissa Hebert-Wallace, an LCSW with over 20 years in the field, and this is Pawsitive Outlooks. On the show we'll take a look at various aspects of compassion fatigue and compassion satisfaction, including general information, mental health aspects, self-directed interventions, and a few guests along the way. 

I want to start by acknowledging that I live, practice, and learn in the traditional unceded homelands of the Acolapisa, Chakchiuma, Choctaw, Ofo, and Yazoo people, who continue to be stewards of this land. I also acknowledge the Houma people who were driven from this territory and on whose settled, unceded land I was raised. I mourn the loss of the individuals and tribes that did not survive the colonization, genocide, and warring of European countries. Finally, I acknowledge that this information regarding tribal lands was primarily taken from colonizers' records. 

*Musical Interlude* 

In today's episode, I'd like to share with you a little bit of an interview that I recently did with Dr. Fern Nelson. But before we get into the interview, let me tell you a little bit about Dr. Nelson. 

Fern Nelson is a first-generation Haitian American born to a pastor and nurse couple who emigrated to America to escape the increasing dangers of Haiti's dictatorship. From the age of three, she decided she wanted to become a veterinarian and work towards that goal, but music was also a large part of her life. While completing her prerequisite requirements for veterinary school, she completed a music degree in cello at La Sierra University in California and went on to veterinary school at the Royal Veterinary College in London, England. Upon returning home to practice general medicine, she quickly discovered a lifetime of general practice would not provide lasting joy, so she pursued a rotating internship to broaden her specializing opportunities. It was at VCA California Veterinary Specialists in Murrieta, CA, that she discovered her passion for radiology and is now in her fourth and final year at the University of Missouri. She hopes to continue her learning and teaching desires in academia while continuing music and traveling pursuits in her free time. 

Now let's take a listen to that interview. 

*Musical Interlude* 

Alissa Well, Doctor Nelson, thank you so much for joining us today. I'm so happy to have you. 

Dr. Nelson Thank you for inviting me. 

Alissa So as we get started, I'd like to ask you if you wouldn't mind sharing with my listeners a little bit about your social identities and positionality. 

Dr. Nelson Yeah, not a problem. So my-my name is Fern Nelson. I am a 34-year-old Haitian American cisgender female with she/her pronouns, and I guess my-my identity is that I am a first generation American. My parents and the rest of my family were all born in Haiti, and I was the first one that was born here, so I'm very much grew up in this odd land of being American, but having a home where English was not the first language that was spoken, and very much a Haitian culture, you know, kind of living this, I guess, immigrant Haitian experience in America? 

Alissa So your positionality statement actually brings me to kind of what I wanted to talk about today, which is the lack of diversity and equity and maybe inclusion in the veterinary field right now, and also how that can affect compassion fatigue. So have you had any experiences like that where your surroundings could be a little bit more diverse? 

Dr. Nelson Oh, I-I-I didn't mention where I'm currently located. I'm currently located in Columbia, Missouri, at the University of Missouri, and I think when I started, including all of the sort of daily staff members that I would encounter, you know, this is from, this is from the veterinary staff, the assistant staff, front desk staff, pharmacy, etc. I think there I was one of three Black people in the entire building. And there were a few people of Asian descent, but that number was under five, and everyone else is pretty much from Middle America or otherwise Caucasian. So yes, very much being noted in vet medicine in in general. To be fair, I suppose to America, I studied at the Royal Veterinary College in London and the experience was very similar there as well. I think I was the only Black-descent student in my class. My first year there was also a student from India who ended up going back home due to sort of mental health issues, and that was it. Everyone else there, there were a few people from Singapore and from Malaysia, and everyone else was either American studying in the UK or of British descent, of Caucasian British descent. 

Alissa So I have seen that same thing in my research where predominantly White countries are predominantly White in the veterinary field, like, to the tune of more than 90%. 

Dr. Nelson Yeah, sounds about right. 

Alissa So then I could see how that would...representation would really matter, which is what I've been reading, that the-the Multicultural Veterinary Association and there's also a Black association, am I correct? 

Dr. Nelson I think that's correct, yes. 

Alissa So they are really looking at anti-racism and anti-discrimination in the field, and representation is one of the things that they're saying will help. So I hope that by giving you a voice on my podcast that we make a little dent in some of that. 

Dr. Nelson That yeah, that'd be great. 

Alissa So have you, in being such a minority in school, in practice, in the vet world, have you experienced any microaggressions, or any outright, like, blatant racism, either from colleagues or from clients? 

Dr. Nelson From clients, yes. I haven't experienced anything from colleagues, at least not that I have picked up, and I feel like I'm a fairly astute person. But no, my colleagues have been nothing but lovely. But yes, I had both microaggressions and one blatant, one that I could remember, microaggressions.

Now it was...This is where things get tricky, being a Black female American, right. Because you're not sure if the situation that you're perceiving is due to you being a woman due to you being Black, or if it's a combination of the two. So the...I'm sure there are smaller ones that my-my brain has forgotten...but one example particularly stuck in mind where a patient brought in their pet who was quite aggressive and they were trying to talk about behavioral things that they can do with their animal. And my technician at the time was a man of sort of average height, probably, you know, 5’9”, 5’10” and he was actually a veterinarian in Mexico, but he hadn't taken his certifying degree to be able to practice in America. So he was working on improving his English and as well as, you know, studying up on some things that... disease processes and things that aren't present in Mexico. So he was working as a technician. And the place where I worked at before usually a technician is the person who calls the-the patient and the client from the lobby puts them in the room, takes a brief history, and they're very clear.  It was very much the culture of this business for everyone to identify themselves very clearly, everyone to always wear name tags identified who they were. So I had seen him do this multiple times a day for several months.  At that point he would call in the client and say “Hi, My name is such and such and I'm a technician. I'm just going to do a preliminary examination, get a history, then I'll go to the back, relay your findings to the doctor, and then bring them to come talk to you.”  Super clear.  He does his, you know, history, his fact finding mission, etc. for about five to 10 minutes comes back and gets me.  I come into the room.   And they continually speak to him at the computer rather than me directly in front of them.  And I'm asking them questions and they're answering directly to him.  And at some point they say something. “Well, the doctor here,” when I asked a question, “I told the doctor,” and they gestured to him. And he goes “oh, no, no, no. I'm not the doctor. This is Dr. Nelson.” And also again in veterinary medicine when you walk into a room—This was pre-COVID—handshakes are very much acceptable. I walked in-in and said, “Hi, my name is Dr. Nelson” introduced myself, but still five minutes into the consult, my technician is the doctor that they are speaking to.  And he said “oh, I'm so sorry. You're, you just look so young.” OK. Right. So I have a pretty good sense of humor. I was able to, you know, laugh that off. But it was definitely a story that I kind of nugget it away and-and kind of would discuss with people and say hey, what's your take on this? Is this because I'm a 5' 2", slender Black person and I do look like I'm 13. I-I admit it. So is it possible that they just missed all of the verbal cues? Was it were they trying to be rude? So that was kind of like a-a microaggression. Female, Black, who knows?  

One that was very much due to race, though, was during my internship. And again, most vet clinics kind of run on this model where a technician will get the information first related to the doctor and the doctor comes in. This patient had come in for kind of having a sort of gagging reflex. I'm from Southern California and this is where I was doing my internship, and so we get these long grass seeds or grass awns that can get stuck in dogs tonsils, cause a lot of irritation, and we have to go in there, sedate them and kind of pull these out. So it sounded, this was middle of summer, sounded just from history that this is what was going on, technicians still went in, got a history. At that time, I had a very large Afro, bigger than my head, and I walked into the room and the dog started barking. Now this is not an uncommon things for dogs to do, especially if they're quite owner protective and they're anxious. They kind of think of the room as their place, their owner. They need to protect. So anybody that enters into the room, they will start barking. I'm not bothered by this at all. I'm a vet. I deal with barking dogs all the time. However, the client felt like she needed to tell me, “Oh, I think she is worried about your hair.” And I said, “oh, what do you mean by that?” She goes, “well, there was a-a man who came to do work at my house, and he had hair like yours, and my dog was kind of scared by him. So I think it might be something similar.” And I said, “well, it could also be that she's just anxious and kind of trying to protect you and your daughter, but that's fine cause to do my physical exam I'll need help with the technician anyways. I'll just take her to the back and we'll see how far we can go.” I go back, tell my technician. “OK, bring the patient back so we can do an exam, etc.” She comes back in absolutely red in the face, fuming, upset because she entered into the room again and the lady asked if she could have a different doctor because her dog doesn't like Black people. You don't really need to read between lines there to realize that this lady doesn't like Black people. I'm pretty sure the dog did not care what color I was, of course. As anticipated, the dog was perfectly amenable in the back. A little anxious but allowed us to do our physical exam. And so I went back into the room, told the lady, “your dog was fine in the back. I think she's just anxious when she's around her owners.” Offered a plan for further investigation that they declined and left. 

So those are kind of the two that most strikingly, stick in my mind. 

Alissa Wow, so I have to say that with that second story. I've heard that same story from another veterinarian who is an older Black gentleman, and he had almost the same thing, except that it happened when he was a younger vet, and the person was very comfortable telling him I don't want a Black doctor. 

Dr. Nelson Wow, yeah. 

Alissa And at that time, he was like the only one. So he said “well take it or leave it. I’m the only one here. So if you don't want me, you can go somewhere else.” But if both of you had it, I'm sure that it it's happening. 

Dr. Nelson Oh yeah, almost undoubtedly. Very small population of Black doctors that we have. 

Alissa Well, I'm sorry that you have that experience sometimes. Like, I feel like your technician, like, I'm very, very infuriated right now and I don't know how I can apologize for, like, a whole group of people, but... 

Dr. Nelson I well...Is that you can't have to because you don't. That person does not represent an entire populace and-and-and you don't either. So I very much took it as an individual experience. I'm not going to chalk up one person's bad behavior to an entire group of people, so I-I appreciate your anger and-and thank you. But, um...You know, being some— when people look at me, they hear my accent very much, a sort of like Californian or transatlantic type of accent. And they see me, they just automatically assume I'm African American. So that is very much the experience that I have, but it's interesting because I don't necessarily identify as an African American. I identify as a Black American, but my Haitian culture is quite profound in in my growing up. So I-I end up with this interesting... Outside looking in, but still inside looking out sort of perspective. Although my experiences are very similar to most Black or African Americans here in the United States, because that's just people... and that's what they assume. I kind of approach racial interactions a little differently, I think, than if I had grown up as part of a family that had kind of dealt with this system systemically for centuries, you know. 

Alissa Yeah, absolutely. And-and that's the thing that social workers look at... that's the thing that social workers look at, like the intersectionality of people, right? And so I didn't just introduce you as Dr. Fern Nelson, she's a Black vet. Like I want...I asked you to-to give us your social identities and your positionality because that's you, and you said in in your introduction that you are first generation Haitian American and so that very much colors like where the rest of this comes from right? But you also... As you just said, look like what people expect to see in a Black or African American doctor. And so you also have that experience. And so it all kind of weaves together, but that's why I hope to have so many various other people to interview later on in the show, because everybody's experience is different, right? 

Like I've-I've talked to a White veterinarian who has had experiences that, If I were a vet, would be different than mine so intersectionality is important when we talk about representation and when we talk about moving forward with kind of this anti-racist work that you guys are doing and that social workers are doing and hopefully one day this institutional racism won't be something that we're dealing with, but who knows how long that might take. 

Dr. Nelson Yeah, yeah. The long road. 

Alissa So yeah, absolutely. So you talked about with your first experience that you weren't sure if it was because you were Black, or if it was because you were female, and that brings up an interesting point of how the field as a whole in just veterinary science is becoming increasingly feminized, right, like the majority, from what I'm seeing in my research, is female; however, the majority of practice managers, folks in education, folks with power are still male. So how... Can you talk to us a little bit about how that's maybe affected you in your career? 

Dr. Nelson Yeah, I well... That's kind of a... That's kind of a tricky one to answer. I suppose the all the things that you were saying are true. The male leadership that I have interacted with in, in the companies that I have worked for have been nothing but supportive. They would be if-if-if we use the term like we do for the LGBTQIA community, we I would say that these men are allies. They are men who are also married to very successful women and are-are not afraid of those who are, you know, either prioritizing or-or very well balancing their career and the, I don't know, social perceptions put on to us. So I haven't really experienced anything I would say directly that would seem like, oh, at least from administration side or or ownership side where it's like, "oh I think that they're halting my progression because I am a woman or they're halting my progression because I am Black. I don't think I can really speak to that because I haven't really experienced that in my workplaces. But I will say that I think that is a... Those positions being held by men currently still is a sort of holdover of what has always been the issue in the veterinary world and-and beyond, which is that we are still very slow in keeping up with appropriate representation. I think it's--my numbers could be wrong now--but I think the veterinary field right now is 70% women and yet, due to a conglomeration of issues such as our education now requiring so much more funding, and yet our pay is not adequate or matching, you know we still have to do four years of college study in the US at least you have to do four years of college, four years of undergrad, four years of vet school, and your vet school is pretty much at the same locations that some of the major medical schools are at, so your loans are equivalent.  Yet if you're not working for a big corporate group, if you're not working in a very populous state, your pay can be that of slightly more than, say, teachers or educators in the field.  You're not getting a med, a med school degree.  So what you have is a lot of young women flooding into the field, but coming in with a lot of debt, also still wanting to try to balance families. And so you don't have people that have the, I suppose, financial equity to buy practices, where many years ago when vet medicine was still very much profession, but it was much more feasible for you to start your own practice or purchase another practice because your loans were less so you, you know, you didn't have that debt weighing on you.  Also, you weren't having to pay as much to buy something then, a lot more when it was men dominated, a lot more men had practices and a lot more men still have their practice. They're not retiring yet, or they hire predominantly men, those men still in those positions.  So now we have this massive disparity, this massive gap, and now you have a lot of corporate organizations coming in with a lot of money buying up places.  You have people that are saying, "you know what, I'm so tired at the end of my day, I don't want to deal with personnel.  It's already too much dealing with clients that I don't want to own. I'm happy to just go home at the end of the day."  So I'm not sure that's really going to be corrected within the near future either.  So it's... I see it more as like a-a sort of lingering on domino effect from the environment of 20-30 years ago. 

Alissa Yeah, I can see it. I can see how that would-that would... like that domino effect that you said. You mentioned in the middle of that the financial disparity, and the loans, and the loans being equal to med school loans, and then you come out and you don't get the pay.  That is something that is very much in my research that I've seen is a cause of compassion fatigue.  I'm not going to ask you about your finances.  Don't worry.  So just it's kind of a good lead into like we... So we've talked about several things that contribute to the lack of diversity and equity and inclusion in the field.  Power differential I guess you could say in the field, and finances. Can you speak to if you have ever had feelings of compassion fatigue and maybe how you dealt with that? 

Dr. Nelson Yeah, absolutely. I did and I-I was lucky enough that I graduated that school in 2016.  So I had a solid, you know, at least three and a half years experience before COVID hit.  But even so, I-I-I graduated, I started doing general practice work.  Work... I'll call what... I'll call GP work from now on, I did that for two years and it was during that time that I had, you know, that hat micro-aggressive experience that I that I had.  But even without, you know, the sort of sort of racial tint to my experiences, even in those initial two years I started experiencing compassion fatigue.  Honestly, due to the lack of support that I had.  Just... Not-not from family, but from work.  I was put in a situation where I had been promised mentorship, that there was always going to be at least one senior doctor, but when I signed my contract there was actually there were actually going to be three other doctors working in that practice, many of which were very experienced. One of which I had done an externship with when I was in vet school, and I thought she'd practice fabulous medicine.  I was very excited, and by the time I actually graduated and started two of those doctors have left the actual company, and one, the sort of managing veterinarian, also had to manage two other hospitals and two other local stations from mine.  And for anybody who hasn't traveled in southern California, a place that is technically 15 miles away might be two hours depending on traffic. So I couldn't really count on if he was at another hospital in the morning and was supposed to be at mine in the afternoon, that he would actually even make it.  I-I didn't feel like I had the support as a new graduate that I would need.  Yes, you have all of this book knowledge, and you think you have practical knowledge cause you're doing all these extra shifts and you're like, "oh, I got this."  And then you realize that when you're in academia, you're in this nice little bubble of being able to talk to different specialties, talk to people that are more senior, you have more time.  But people... And… that are coming to their veterinarians just in general they might have an issue, a chronic issue with their pet, or maybe it's even acute, and it's something that requires a pretty extended and prolonged work up that might take more time than you actually have to give them.  You have maybe 15 to 20 minutes per appointment, and that time is the same whether or not you're giving a cute puppy vaccines versus dealing with an old dog that suddenly is now lethargic not wanting to eat and having intermittent diarrhea.  Those can take a very long time to work up, but people are like, "well, I made an appointment, figure it out in 15 minutes."  So that became very challenging. 

The other thing that has been very much exacerbated with COVID as well and just vet clinics getting very inundated with high volume cases and very sick patients.  I think people forget that.  If you're a veterinarian, you went into this because you love animals; however, that does not mean that your services are free.  It does not mean that you work for an-for an organization that will allow you to spend your time, which does cost money, the time of your technicians, which also costs money, and whatever various services for free.  People kind of remember that you're a veterinarian because you love animals, but they kind of forget that it is a job.  It could be a passion, but it is a job, and so that means that there are financial responsibilities.  Even if you owned your own practice, you would not be financially solvent if you saw every single side case without accepting payment.  But people take that and use it as a dagger against you, and say, "Oh well I thought you loved animals. Can't you do this? I don't have money. I can pay you later. I can't pay, but you should care and do this. If you don't do it, you don't care."  Then to add salt to a gaping wound, they say that we're doing it for the money, not realizing that southern California is a place where, yes, vets do get paid more than the average veterinarian, but if you were to take a general practitioner's salary in America--now, my information could be a few years out of date now that I'm specializing so this information might be updated post COVID--but at the time that I was working, If you didn't look at the specialty veterinarians, you just looked at all the veterinarians that were doing GP across America, our average salary per year was between $60 to $70,000.  We're not doing this for the money. We're not doing this or giving you a higher price bracket so we can have a yacht.  That was something that was once said, "to fund our yacht."  You are really out of touch.  I am making as much as a Californian 5th grade teacher with exponentially greater debt.  So you're taking someone that's already quite sensitive towards animals, doesn't like seeing them in pain.  We can't get a doctor to fix it.  One not be able to fix it, not be able to help that client and help that patient, and then you have someone accusing you that you're not helping them because you don't care and or you're greedy.  So that can get, oh, awfully, awfully depressive.  Because we're there to help.  Nobody's acknowledging it, and even when you can help, you don't have the support to be able to provide that help.

So during my first two years of veterinary medicine, it was-it was similar to like what you said... I thought that I was going to have to leave that medicine.  I thought, "you know what?  Let me go and do an internship so it opens up the opportunities for specialties, because I cannot do general practice work anymore.  I can't do this.  I need to find another avenue that might work, and if I don't find anything during this year of exploration, then I've got to quit. And, yes, my debt is exponential.  It is massive and I might be in debt for the rest of my life, but for my mental health I cannot do this."

Alissa We talked a little bit before we started, and so I have been right there not being able to continue and having to do something else.  And for me it-it meant going back to school, too.  So what did you, what are some things that you did?  Did you... You didn't just go back to school?  I'm sure you did some other things to help you in the in the meantime.  Like, how do you deal with that?  What are some coping skills that you have and some things that you do to-to deal with compassion fatigue when it rears its lovely head?

Dr. Nelson The first thing that I did was reach out to my friends and family members who, you know, might have experienced this before.  So I... My-my family was an interesting sort of blended type family where my mom and my aunt were always extremely close and decided that when they moved to America, they wanted to grow their families together.  And so my mom had three kids.  I was the youngest of those three.  My aunt also had three kids and they raised us all in the same house together, so we can kind of consider ourselves six kids.  With my mom, and my dad, and my aunt as the like triumvirate of parents, and-and so the oldest of us all went into orthopedic surgery for humans.  And then my older sister went into emergency medicine.  And then where I did my undergrad, it was very much a school that was, if people went there, so that they can get an education and get prerequisites that would allow them to go into the medical school in the next town.  So out of all of my sort of nuclear friend group, I was the only one that did vet medicine.  Everyone else did human medicine of some kind, either doctors or nurses, and I did five years of undergrad because I lived a year abroad in France.  And then my program in the UK was also five years, so I was about two years behind my friends in their linear progression.  So I knew that they would have been out a bit weathered by now and a bit experienced, so I asked them, you know, what are some things that you're going through?  Is what I'm going through normal?  And it was great to hear that, no, it wasn't.  So then that let me know, okay, this isn't just me being unable to handle it, you know.  This is-this is an anomaly.  This is not something... And then I was able to ask my friends that I made in vet school who were now scattered throughout the United States, "What are you guys experiencing in in your places of work?"  And I would get a little bit more of a mix there with some would say, “oh it's similar to you. I'm-I'm-I don't have the support that I-I-I thought I would have," and others that are like, "oh, I'm at a place where the support is excellent."  To say, “OK great. I know that there are place...”  I'm... this isn't a me issue.  It's not like for some odd reason I'm under-performing, and this is what's happening.  So there are other people that are experiencing something very similar to me in my field, and there are others that are having a better experience, so I know that I don't have to stay here.  There are possibilities for improvement and for things being better.  So then I then had conversations with my with my mom.  I kind of moved back home because my-my father had just passed away.  So I was there, yeah, for some family support.  And I told her, "Hey, I'm-I'm wildly in debt and I think I need to go back and get more, because I- I'm not happy here. Do you think that that's reasonable?"  And our family is very religious, so they happen to... My mom said, “You know what?  You have so much of life to live.  It's not worth it being miserable, even if that means you have to leave the... that field.  It's gonna be scary, but everything will work out.  It's got to be with you.  Just step out in faith and try to do something different.” 

Okay, alright. Well, I don't want to leave the vet field completely. It seems like a large waste of my childhood dream and all of this debt that I've accrued.  Let's see if I can find something within my field that I still love and won't drain from me, but add to me.  So then I knew I still wanted to stay local, still wanted to stay. And so I said, "you know what? I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna do a little test of the water here.  I'm just going to apply to a few places where at home will still be very much close.  I might even be able to still live at home.  If not, I'll be a short commute, whatever that means in southern California.  But let's-let's test the waters."  And-And the place where I ended up doing my internship was this wonderful, supportive place.  That was where I met Dr. Hoggan, who referred me to you, and it was just a breath of fresh air.  I was probably more overworked, and definitely on clinics way more than I had been as a general practitioner, because then I was kind of, you know, the lead doctor, if you will.  So I was on for three or four days a week.  During an internship, you're on six, and your hours are significantly longer, and you're dealing in a very busy emergency and specialty clinic, and so the cases are way more complex.  I never saw anything for vaccines.  Everything was very sick, or if not very sick, they've been dealing with it for a while because they couldn't get into their vet clinic.  And so I was... So there, like, definitely challenged way more than I had been before, but it was such a different experience, because I was getting an amazing amount of support.  I was working with people who were aware.  They knew how hard it was to be a new grad coming into this sort of environment.  They had gone through their bouts of compassion fatigue as well.  A lot of them were very seasoned.  They had worked in that location during the 2008 financial crisis. So they actually had seen a lot of people at that time putting down pets because they couldn't afford them.  They-they had gone through, you know, a massively emotionally draining time as well, so they knew what it was like, and they knew that they had the resources to support someone.  And so the, that was really my sort of life saving, I don't know, little inner tube.  That sure, the waters were still choppy, but I was in a place with support. 

Alissa Do you have any coping skills that you use now to just kind of... What gets you through the day? 

Dr. Nelson So the-the specialty that I went into is much less client facing, meaning that I'm doing a radiology residency.  And so I actually never have client interactions any longer.  My clients are my veterinary colleagues.  Now, not saying that's always a breeze and a walk in the park, but it's-it's less taxing when you don't have to explain the basics, right?  Everyone knows that I'm here as a service providing service to their patients.  They don't have to question if I'm doing this for the money, whether or not I care, that baseline is clear.  So that certainly helps with compassion fatigue, but of course you can, you can still experience some.  Because I'm a resident, I still get called in late night to perform an ultrasound on a patient or a run a CT, you know?  So I-I still have these interactions with these stressors that could really, you know, result in compassion fatigue.  But something that in my, sort of, final few months of finishing up my-my GP work before I started my-my internship--before I kind of had faith restored in in being a vet--something that I used to kind of get through was just trying to step back and keep a big picture in mind.  I think it's very easy to let work define you, especially kind of in, like, the sort of American workplace, where we very much work significantly more compared to maybe other cultures or other, you know, our other Western counterparts with much less vacation and we kind of think that that's a norm, and that's something you should get through.  I think it's very easy to kind of let work consume you, and then be a separate person with your own separate personal social life as kind of a-a secondary sort of thing, and so if work is awful, it's very easy to take that mentality and take it home.  And then home becomes awful.  And then you're kind of just living in awful.  So I tried very hard to compartmentalize, that, yes, maybe work was not the best today.  Maybe it was a little crappy.  The people, my friends, that I'm interacting with at home, the people that I'm interacting with at home, my family, they're not crappy and maybe their days haven't been bad.  Maybe their day was actually great, and so let me kind of get, I don't know, kind of like topping off on positivity.  Let me hear from them how their day went and see if it was positive.  Let me kind of sit back and reflect on my day and see if there was anything positive on that, and if it was just, all a, you know, negative Twister of Doom, then making sure that I talked to someone about that and kind of making sure that I'm decompressing and talking about my feelings in that way. But realizing that that was something that happened for 12 hours earlier in my day and is not what's happening now. So I think that was probably my-my number one coping mechanism, I would suppose. 

The other thing, and this is kind of just part of my personality, but if this isn't naturally part of someone's personality, I could see this also helping.  It's just trying to find humor in anything that is going on.  It's so easy to take things so seriously and let it get you down.  Imagine your life like you're storing up stories so you can be a stand-up comic.  If you have this awful interaction, try to think of "how am I gonna tell this to someone else where I can still convey that it was awful. Still get a point across, but also make them laugh at the absurdity of all of this."  And so it that is also very helpful to think, “man, like of all the things that are going on in the world at the end of the day, I am a doctor for animals."  I am inherently working in a place of privilege, there are plenty of people that aren't even sure where they're going to get clean water or food.  So even though my day is, could be in my world awful, I have to take a big look at this and be like the end of the day I'm-I'm a doctor for animals. This is pretty neat, and this is also kind of funny, and I kind of just have to take it in that light. 

Alissa Well, I am and will always remain jealous of you and our friend, Dr. Hoggan, who are doctors for animals, but I am going to steal the stand-up comic thing. I think it would help me in my day-to-day as a social worker because I've got some doozies.  So I am going to steal that.  Dr. Nelson, thank you so much for being with me today and joining me and agreeing to be part of this project that hopefully turns into an adventure.  And before we go, is there anything else you'd like to tell any listeners and anything that you would like to say “hey, I'm doing this. You can see me here!” 

Dr. Nelson Oh-oh I'm...I am not on the medias I am-I'm-I'm barely on the ‘Gram.  If you opened up my account you’d think I was a creeper cause I have like three posts and like five friends.  So no I-I don't have any-any sort of follow me or watch me, but I-I-I do feel like I have something else to say.  So, this, you know, I told... I-I kind of spoke briefly about the way that my my family was and how-how we all grew up, and my parents, they didn't force us to go into, you know, the STEM field or-or anything along those lines. But I think we kind of just understood with how they grew up in Haiti, the social economic situation over there, that we couldn't come here and not try to achieve that American dream.  So all of us are in, you know, some sort of-of STEM field.  The oldest of us all is, as I mentioned, orthopedic surgeon, and she has a seven-year-old daughter, and her seven... We're all very close.  And so her seven-year-old daughter knows that I'm a vet.  We talk all the time.  I'm her godmother.  She-she knows about, you know, our other... She knows about her uncle, who's an aerospace engineer working for Boeing. She knows about her aunt, who is, you know, an ER Veterinarian... ER doctor, sorry, for humans.  She knows about her other uncle, you know, is a school psychologist.  So she knows about all of these successful, uh, high achieving people.  And yet the other day she had mentioned to me that although she, you know, she thinks that she wants to be a vet, she's not sure she can be, because she doesn't see anyone else in her area that looks like her. 

I am... I don't live in the same state as her, but we're close. And yet she still doesn't... She sees me as an anomaly.  She sees me as an exception to the rule, and at seven years old doesn't or is unsure that she can also be a, quote-unquote "exception."  And so I-I thought that was quite profound, because when we were growing up, it's not like the situation was any better then.  It's not as if we saw Black aerospace engineers, Black surgeons, Black administrators and schools.  We've been seeing that and, I'll be honest, I don't know when growing up how much that played a part in what I thought I wanted to do.  I decided when I was three, I wanted to be a vet and that was just what I was gonna do until either it was proven that physics was going to be the death of me and I wasn't going to get through, or-or I got there, you know.  And it made me realize there-there's quite possibly a large subset of kids, adults, who want to do something and feel like they can't because they can't imagine themselves... They don't see representation in those spaces.  For anyone who might have been feeling that or know someone who's feeling that, all I can say is "well, why not you?"  If you don't see it, why don't you go and try to be that, so that way the next generation will be able to say that there'll be enough of us that are in those positions that they won't say, “Well, I can't do that because I don't see myself there.”  It'll just be a question of, "well, I can't do that because I don't want to."  They'll know that they can, but it's just something that they don't want to do and they want to do something else.  So for-for anyone else that that might be feeling that, you can.  You can do it, and you can be that role model, that representative, that figure for whoever's coming after you. 

Alissa I want to give that a standing ovation, like I literally. I want to jump out of my chair right now!  I... that was so wonderful and so profound, and I think a great way to end.  So thank you again for joining me. 

Dr. Nelson My pleasure. OK. 

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Compassion fatigue can have a detrimental effect on our mental health. If you need mental health assistance, please contact Not One More Vet at nomv.org. If you need to speak with someone right now or feel you are having a mental health crisis, please call the US National Crisis Line at 988 or visit nomv.org/crisis-numbers outside of the US. Please seek immediate assistance by calling 911 or your local emergency number if you feel unsafe. 

This has been Alissa Hebert-Wallace with Pawsitive Outlooks. If you enjoyed the show, hit that follow or subscribe button, tell a friend, and leave a review wherever you access podcasts. Also, your feedback is always welcome, just click that link in the description. 

Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time. 

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