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The original was posted on /r/tifu by /u/QuotableConservative on 2025-11-12 18:00:03+00:00.
I’ve been working in veterinary medicine for about five years now, all of it in an emergency setting. It’s fast-paced, unpredictable, and often emotionally draining, but it’s also incredibly rewarding and honestly? Fun. For most of that time, I’ve worked as a receptionist, the first person clients see when they come rushing through the door, panicked about their fur baby. Recently, though, I started doing a bit more: helping with holds, assisting during x-rays, and learning the hands-on parts of patient care. It’s been exciting, exhausting, and everything in between. I really feel like I'm on my way to getting some great experience.
When you work in emergency vet med long enough, you start to notice patterns. You know which symptoms mean trouble, which ones can wait, and which ones almost always trace back to a certain cause. One of the most common things we see is: dogs coming in high on weed. I’m not exaggerating when I say it happens all the time. Sometimes someone will rush in and I can look at the dog and go, "Aw. Weed?" That's how routine it is. (also, side thought, it may also be the area I live in, inner city like, known for drugs, etc.)
Dogs absolutely love the stuff. If an owner leaves their edibles, joints, or even just crumbs of the plant where an unattended puppy can reach them, odds are, that dog’s going to eat it. It's like a magnet, ya'll.
When it happens, the symptoms are usually easy to spot: they get wobbly on their feet, sometimes peeing on themselves because they lose a bit of coordination. They often get lethargic and sometimes they’ll flinch dramatically when you move too fast near them. It can look scary if you’ve never seen it before, but once you have, you’ll never mistake it for anything else again.
In fact, it’s become almost a running joke at work. I’ve walked to the back before and said, “Hey, I think we’ve got a weed dog up front, regular symptoms.” The techs know exactly what I mean. Within minutes, someone’s grabbing a drug test, another person’s pulling fluids and Cerenia (our go-to anti-nausea medication), and the team gets ready to handle the situation. It’s such an average part of our week that I can usually call it before the vet even takes a look. And honestly, I’m rarely wrong. Not trying to brag, but if you’ve seen a high dog once, you just know. I hate to say it's funny, but bless their little hearts.
One night, we got a call that started out like plenty others. A man was on the other end, voice trembling, clearly on the verge of tears. His dog had gotten into some weed while they were out, and he was panicking. He kept saying he was a terrible owner, and that he didn’t know what to do.
So I did what I always do... I tried to calm him down. I told him that it happens all the time, that dogs love the taste, and that it doesn’t make him a bad pet parent. I explained what we typically see: they get wobbly, sleepy, and maybe pee themselves, but most of them come out of it just fine. I told him the next step was to call the Pet Poison Helpline. They have actual toxicologists on staff who can give detailed advice based on the amount ingested, the size of the dog, and the specific product involved. Unfortunately, that call does cost money, but it’s worth it for accurate guidance. Plus, if you bring in an inappropriate ingestion dog, we have you call Pet Poison right there in the office. The doctors prefer that.
Anyway, I also explained that our clinic was closing soon, and since his dog was already showing symptoms, we couldn’t induce vomiting anymore. Once the weed’s been metabolized, there’s not much we can do other than supportive care: fluids, Cerenia, a dark room, and time. That’s standard procedure in vet med. I told him that if Pet Poison recommended further care, he’d need to go to a 24-hour facility so his dog could be monitored overnight. He thanked me, audibly relieved, and said I had calmed him down more than anyone else could. I even laughed and told him, “Seriously, don’t beat yourself up. You’re not alone, this happens way more than people realize.”
A few days later, I found out that this pet owner was actually friends with the clinic owner. He’d called him to tell him how grateful he was for my help. He said I had made him feel human again, like he wasn’t the worst pet owner in the world, and that I’d taken the time to explain things clearly and kindly when he was at his wit’s end.
So imagine my shock when I was called into the office... and fired.
Apparently, they were framing it as me “giving medical advice over the phone.”
Completely blindsided. I had done what I’d done countless times before... followed our protocol, directed the client to Pet Poison, and advised them to seek emergency care if needed. I didn’t diagnose anything, didn’t tell him to medicate, didn’t make a treatment plan. I just reassured a panicked pet owner and provided general information based on established procedure. But because this client happened to be connected to the clinic owner, suddenly my compassion and competence were being twisted into “unauthorized medical advice.”
I can’t even describe how heartbreaking it feels. I loved my job, absolutely fucking loved it. I loved the chaos, the adrenaline, the animals, even the anxious owners. I was good at it, too. I know how to keep my cool, how to explain things in a way that made sense, how to make people feel a little less terrified when their world was falling apart. And now, it’s just… gone.
I know it’s not the end of the world, and once I stop crying, I’ll pick myself up and start job hunting again. But it’s hard not to feel betrayed by a field that I’ve poured my heart into for years. All I wanted to do was help, help the animal, help the owner, help the situation. And somehow, doing exactly that is what cost me my job.
Maybe someday I’ll look back on this and see it as a turning point. Maybe I’ll find a clinic that values empathy as much as efficiency. But for now, I’m just trying to breathe, grieve, and remind myself that one bad decision by management doesn’t erase five years of hard work and care.
TL;DR Gave "medical advice" over the phone and got fired from the best job I've ever had. Can't stop crying.