What motivates me as a Vet? Why do I do what I do?

Firstly I've never wanted to do anything else. From the age of 10-11 years old this is all I have ever wanted to be. It was not a "what should I do with my life" decision but rather something that I almost felt in my bones, as it should be with any vocational profession.

Sadly with the advent of corporate practice we have surplanted the vocation aspect of the profession with the less honourable and vastly more impersonal business aspect. Vocational professions such as Veterinary Medicine you have to live and breath, you dont stop being a Vet just because you have time off. People will always want your advise or opinion, and I speaking personally, always want to be able to willingly provide that to the best of my knowledge and ability.

My Grandfather was a Vet in Skegness in the 1950's. Sadly I never knew him as he passed away when my Dad was only young (as well as his Mother leaving him orphaned in his teens). But growing up my Dad would regale us with stories of my Grandfather looking after the many and varied animals at the Skegness zoo's. Tales of the wolves howling into the night, or the porcupine getting bloat, or the monkeys that loved my Grandmother but would aim to urinate on any one else that came too close to the cage bars. I remember stories of how my Grandfather was accompanied by a fiercely loyal white German Shepherd called Nell, who never left his side, or indeed his bedside when he was taken ill. But most importantly it always shone through in my Dads stories just how much my Grandfather loved and lived the job. He would never turn a sick animal away, and would often help at his own expense and waved money aside if payment for his services was not feasible. Indeed so much so that my Grand parents died with very little to their names. But this stuck with me and it has been the reason I have wanted to be the Vet I am and has in part shaped the way I practice.

The second reason as to why I do what I do comes from my being a Christian in faith. It is at this point that alot of you will no doubt lose interest on the grounds of "we dont want to talk about religion or politics", but if you bare with me I think the Christian faith is really the only solid reason as to why we have a Veterinary Profession at all, indeed why we even give a damn in the first place.

God gave Adam and Eve as the first created man an woman - created in His image - dominion over the the animals. The term dominion as we use it today leaves an unpleasant taste in the mouth of many as it has conontations of subduing and enslaving / being dominant over lesser beings. It actually has another meaning of "caretakership" which more appropriately filled Gods roll for Adam and Eve. They were to be stewards of Gods creation and with that comes the responsibility to ensure the welfare and well being of God's creation.

Let me be clear - I have no issue with the concept of a 6 day creation account, and having been in the science world for over 25 years I have never had my belief in a literal 6 day creation shaken by the evidence available. In fact an evolutionary basis of our origins does not account for our strong desire as humans to preserve and protect the animal kingdom. If we are merely the product of chance random processes that can only work on material level, we have no rational way to account for a need to love a species other than our own (in fact no reason to love our own species), no reason to want to care for deeply an animal and make it part of our family when it serves no "other purpose", i.e for meat or milk. Indeed we have no ability to account for reason or rationality. To paraphase CS Lewis, if our minds are the result of chance random processes, then we have no grounds on which to trust the thoughts that emanate from them.

In short - I do what I do because of both my heritage and my beliefs, and with a weight of emphasis towards the latter, I have a seriousness to my vocation that maybe many others in my Profession don't have if they do not share the same beliefs......a mandate from my Creator God to caretake for a portion of his creation, and as such one can in some ways consider the roll of animal care the oldest job in the world.