Stupid Rainy Day

Today was stupid.

Every phone call I got was nothing good.

One dog has been suffering with on-going vomiting and diarrhea issues for a month now.  A month.

She calls to schedule bloodwork and I ask her how the dog is doing and she cheerfully says, "Oh he stopped vomiting."  The chart didn't say what bloodwork the doctor wanted to run, so I took her number to call her back when the doctor got back from her lunch break.

Doctor got back from her lunch break and had a few questions she wanted me to ask, including, "When did he stop vomiting."  I call the number the owner gave me, and a man answers the phone.  So I ask him when the last time his dog vomited was.  "Oh, last night."

Okay.

So we schedule the bloodwork for first thing Friday morning.

An hour later, the lady is calling back, crying, begging me to schedule her dog for the bloodwork today because "he'll die before Friday."

What?!  Seriously?

Now the story becomes that he won't stand up.  Not good.  "How long has this been going on?" I ask her.  "Um.  Maybe.. two days?"

Two days.  Your dog has been seriously unstable to the point of not being able to stand for two days and you failed to mention that when I asked how he was the first phone call?  Wtf.

Really.  Just wtf.

The only thing I could do was tell her to take the dog ASAP to emergency services and hope for the best, but I have a  feeling that when I get back to work after the holiday there will be a fax from one of the local emergency hospitals letting us know that our patient has been euthanized.

Putting much beloved and well cared for animals down is not, in my opinion, as hard as dealing with the frustration, anger and guilt of not being able to save these animals who are owned by people who just don't seem to care, or who decide to care too late.