u/MaleficentBake9995

I wrote like a whole post on this situation when it happened so I'll just summarize here - I work overnights, came in last week and found a patient deceased and in full rigor just after rounds. Looked back on cameras and this patient (a 24/7 obs for altered mentation) was left alone for hours. Wrote up a report to management and thought that was the end of it.

Came back from my weekend to find out that I am catching the blame for the patient passing. I go to management, they assure me that I am not being blamed and they back me 100% ... yet they refuse to publicly say so. No email, no staff meeting, just leadership talking. So I'm stuck being ostracized by everyone but my direct team because of some shitty rumor. When I corrected the one person ballsy enough to confront me about it with the necropsy results (sepsis) and the physical proof, I was told "well if that were true, they would have said something" ...

I'm fucking tired.

I like my job. I like my clinic. Usually it is drama free and smooth sailing as we do not intake after hours and my team and I are only in charge of inpatient care. It's been a nice reprieve from the chaos I faced as a client facing tech in other clinics. I really don't want to leave, but I also don't want to burnout again. I've been caught crying at my desk twice now over the shit I've heard and read people saying about this case. Its so fucking stupid. And the actual responsible techs are still fucking working in inpatient!

It's been a bad few months here - we usually have very good patient outcomes. My specialty is rather niche and aside from the occasional emergency we really don't see the level of death I was used to in emergency or urgent care clinics. But in the last three months we've lost five patients, nearly all of them discovered on or crashing suddenly on grave shift. I'm so angry and so exhausted and I really just want a vacation but I can't really afford one at the moment.

I just don't even know what the fuck to do...

Ok so - first off I work in vet med, no HIPAA laws to break, but I will be really vague to protect client and patient identity regardless.

I've been struggling with the other shifts at my clinic for a bit now. They constantly leave trash lying around, leave messes for us to clean up, or just refuse to do things so that we have to do them. I've had to complain to management this month already about patient care being neglected, concerns not being communicated, and notes not being taken. They're understaffed and overwhelmed for sure, but its not like I'm asking for novels to be written - vitals and a brief summary of care provided is fine (example: HR 100, RR 80, RE WNL, CRT <2 sec, refilled pt water dish and let pt out to use bathroom).

(Warning - animal death discussed very bluntly)

Tonight though was the fucking worst, I came in to find a patient deceased. And he'd been gone for awhile, he was in full rigor when I found him. I looked back on the cameras and noticed no one had interacted with him in nearly three hours! This guy was under a 24/7 observation hold - he needed to be monitored super closely, and no one had even checked on him in hours!

On camera the person assigned to this patient can be seen at one point walking past, noticing something, walking into the kennel space and checking the patient and then just ... walking away. I don't want to speculate, maybe he went to tell someone right? Maybe he didn't know what to do, or maybe he just thought there was nothing wrong. I don't know. But no one came back for hours afterwards and no one reported any concerns at rounds.

I'm so tired of feeling like the office bitch, walking around and complaining about shit when I work on arguably the least busy shift. I feel like crap for reporting my coworker who is probably just trying his best and made a mistake. But fuck man, this patient is gone now. Like their family is devastated. And I'm so fucking tired of feeling like I'm constantly cleaning up after everyone else.

Update: I went to the morning manager and explained the situation. She was also shocked and asked me to write up a detailed report with timestamps to send to our chief of medicine and the owner (tippy top management). I also emailed my direct manager when I first noticed the issue, so I have a record of the situation with someone I trust as well. I don’t know what will happen with the tech, but I did suggest that maybe patients like this need to be a supervisor responsibility (aka my role or higher) until we can streamline our training process. We’ll see how it goes from here

Despite my own anxiety issues, it seems like my dog is trending in a positive direction. It’s been about 6 months since she had a verbal/barking/growling reaction to a strange dog. Today though, that streak ended

I take my dog to Petco for routine nail trims as a former friend and coworker runs the grooming department at my local store. Today someone had called out so I had to wait a bit for my nail trim. No worries, I did some browsing while we waited. Enter crazy lady and her border collie stage right

This lady was talking to someone, entirely ignoring her dog when he spotted us and started dragging his owner our way. I immediately u-turned and walked down a different aisle …. Only to find them following us. So I turned down another aisle, and there they were again. Finally I speed walked several aisles away and seemed to have lost them for a bit.

I took a moment to calm down and continued about my business…

Bet you can guess what happened next - they appeared at the end of the aisle. This woman apparently left mid conversation to chase me and my dog with hers. She never said a fucking word to me, just ran with her dog right at me. So I ran away.

I raced around the corner into the reptile displays and hid … only to look up and see THAT FUCKING DOG AGAIN! I swear he was peeking around the corner like Jack Nicholson in The Shining. And my dog screamed.

Idk if you’ve ever heard that high pitched, horrible sound dogs make when they’re truly terrified, but the only other time I’d heard that was when we were getting attacked by the dog that started this reactivity journey for us 3 years ago. I finally shouted at this crazy lady “PLEASE STOP”, and she came around the corner, rolled her eyes and walked away

I had to go back to the grooming counter in stealth mode. Like what the fuck? Who fucking does that?

I have been wanting to get my dog into agility for years, since before she was attacked. But the agility instructor at my local training club has very strict rules regarding aggression, reactivity and disruptive behaviors so I never was able to. Now after YEARS of work and the referral of several other trainers at the club, I was given a chance to attend!

Today was our first day at class, there were four other owners there and nine dogs total (including the instructor’s demo dogs). All work is off leash but one at a time and the instructor is incredibly communicative about when dogs are moving and where. No one is ever allowed to have two off leash dogs in the class at a time so I felt really safe running our drills.

Punk was great! She got through nearly all of the obstacles even though she went about as fast and gracefully as a drunk snail. The only thing she didn’t attempt was the teeter totter (no one did since it was the first lesson in an intro class and that is a more advanced skill). She even went through the tunnel on her own which she has never done. She had one barky moment when the demo dog was running (and screaming because she was so happy to run lol) - Punk and several other dogs started to bark at this, but no one seemed bothered by any of it.

At every turn she was right with me, never really straying towards anyone or anything just kind of following me around. She took pretty much everything in stride and just seemed happy to be doing something new. I’m so incredibly proud of her!! She’s come so far and I’m just so happy to be introducing her to one of my favorite sports.

I usually take my dog reactive dog to a local dog park after my shift ends around 7am on weekends as no one is really up at that time in my sleepy little town. I'm diligent about keeping an eye out for people most of the time but after almost of year of absolutely no run-ins I kind of got complacent.

Yesterday morning i got in, saw no cars in the parking lot, beelined it to the fenced area and let my dog right off her leash ... only to notice the person and their labrador at the far end of the park about a second later. My dog was already racing over and I called her name in this really obnoxiously anxious voice, scared I was about to watch her get herself bitten for harassing a strange dog. Punk has never bitten or even attempted to bite anyone/thing but I would never blame another dog for retaliating against her when she is obviously the one instigating a fight.

Luckily she skidded to a halt and just trotted right back to me. She used to have amazing recall prior to the attack that made her so fearful, but we've rarely done any real off leash work since her reactivity started, so I was pleasantly surprised by her response.

I apologized to the other owner thinking I might have scared her when I yelled, and she just kind of waved good naturedly and didn't say anything. I hooked my dog back up and we went on a hike instead.

I feel like such a dumbass, both for making a mistake and also because I was actually shaking when I left the park. I know I was overreacting, but it took awhile to really calm down. I still struggle with some leftover anxiety from the attack, especially since I was also injured during it, but I work with dogs daily and just kind of figured I was better at keeping my cool than this. I'm annoyed at myself for not being more careful, but I'm also worried about how shaken up I was afterwards. I just didn't even realize I carry this level of anxiety still. I don't really know what to do, I've been to therapy and I feel fine at work, I'm not sure if there's anything left I even can do to feel more in control of my own fear

I don’t really believe in the paranormal much. I think that most everything has an explanation. That’s not to say that I mock anyone who does believe, I just personally am more skeptical. But I was telling a friend this story and she thought I should share it here as people might find it interesting at the very least so here you go

I left home when I was young. Certainly not as young as some, but younger than any of my siblings. I moved across the country and into my own place just shy of my 20th birthday. I was renting this shitty little studio in a run down town in northern New York and was all alone for the first time in my life. And for a while I just chocked this voice up to loneliness, and maybe I still do, but I have a hard time really explaining some of the things it does …

The first time I heard it was when I had overslept for an early morning shift. It woke me up saying, “You’re late. Wake up, baby, you’re running late.” I rolled over and saw I was already 15mins into the start of my shift. I was so rushed I really didn’t have time to think about the voice until the next time I heard it.

About a month later, I had come home after a double shift and was super tired. I crashed on the couch and was out like a light. Maybe an hour or so in something started screaming at me to wake up. That same voice was yelling over and over again “Babe! You have to wake up! Baby WAKE UP! You need to get out of here!” I seriously thought it was my brother or dad or something, but no one in my family refers to me as “babe” or “baby”. I was so spooked that I jumped up and ran outside into the snow in my bare feet. Once I was outside I got really sick, throwing up, pounding headache, etc. I was also locked out (one of those self locking mechanisms on the main entrance) and had to call the police since it was like 2am. The cop that came immediately clocked carbon monoxide and called the fire department. No one was killed, but a few of my neighbors had to go to the ER for care.

Well after I moved out of there I figured I was leaving the voice behind. I assumed it was a product of carbon monoxide poisoning and/or a figment of my imagination. But about a year later I heard it again, this time when I was wide awake. I was taking the trash out one night and I heard it tell me to drop the bag and get back inside. I didn’t listen and ended up getting bowled into by a guy running from the cops. Nothing bad happened, the guy got up and ran away, the cop ran by me and didn’t even ask if I was okay lol, but again the voice was there and again it was right.

This voice has continued to be a thing, every few years or so I’ll hear it. It’s always a man, young but not a kid, and always heralding something strange or wrong. It’s warned me about car accidents, medical events, one time it alerted me to an earthquake minutes before my phone did, always things I could never know on my own. It always calls me “babe” or “baby” never my name. And it’s always been kind, never scary or cruel. I have no idea what it is, though I still kind of guess it’s something psychological even though that also doesn’t explain everything. And it’s just the one voice - it never changes and it never tells me anything other than warnings. Other than that it doesn’t follow any kind of pattern, I’ve gone years without hearing from it, it just kind of pops up and then disappears.

That’s it, that’s the whole story. I am interested in hearing any theories y’all have - paranormal or otherwise. I will say that I do know it’s not a tumor, I had an MRI about four years ago after a bad car accident and nothing abnormal came back except a concussion 😅 (and yes, the voice warned me about the accident too). But I’m open to people’s thoughts, maybe someone will mention something I haven’t thought of

ETA: Why mental health doesn’t explain everything -

Most disorders that lend themselves to auditory hallucinations can not be considered unless there is more than one voice (not my own) being heard. It is within normal function for people to occasionally hear up to 2 voices in their heads - their own and one additional one. The voice is the sole symptom, I do not suffer from delusions, psychosis or paranoia. I also do not have a family history of schizophrenia which significantly decreases though does not fully eliminate the possibility. (Source - my psychiatrist who explained schizophrenia to me when I was seeking a mental health diagnosis for unrelated symptoms so some aspects of this explanation maybe incorrect or misremembered)

I also want to say that someone mentioned the idea that I was picking up on things subconsciously and this is my brain’s way of supplementing information that I am not fully discerning and that makes the most sense to me. The only thing that I am still struggling to explain is the endearment and the fact that the voice does not sound like anyone I know. Brains don’t tend to invent voices or faces - they pull from memory. It’s possible that it’s just something I heard in passing at some point in my life and my brain is reusing it, but it’s a little fun to consider less secular explanations as well. Please feel free to continue suggesting explanations, this has been very interesting and I’m greatly enjoying everyone’s suggestions. Thank you all so much!

Background - two years ago my dog was attacked by my step sister’s dog changing my admittedly over-excited greeter into a full on fearful dog reactive dog. After the attack my parents admonished me for involving a trainer and told me i should just start taking my dog back to dog parks like they did for their dog after she was attacked. I did not take that advice, though I did ensure that Punk had a steady routine of play dates with known dogs that she liked and that she stayed in group classes which I attribute to her current success.

Punk is still reactive and still dislikes being approached by strange dogs but she can focus and work around other dogs, go to group classes, walk with and around other dogs without reactions, and generally is a normal dog who is just a bit … extreme in her warnings for dogs to get the fuck out of her face (lots of barking, snarling, and smacking of paws) so I just don’t allow her to interact with dogs she doesn’t know 🤷‍♀️

The current issue - my parents got a puppy. They did not tell me this, just invited me and my dog over. Punk loves my parents dogs so I had no concerns walking through the door. Cue loose, unknown, very rude puppy body slamming her and latching onto her face and Punk losing her mind. After we got them separated and ensured no physical harm was done - my step mother began to lecture me about having a “poorly trained, aggressive dog”.

Punk is my 2nd reactive dog, the first being reactive when I adopted him. So my parents spent the entirety of my visit telling me that I should just accept that I am a bad dog owner and shouldn’t have dogs and that i should really consider putting Punk down and just having cats instead. They back tracked when I pointed out that it was actually only an issue because they had not warned me about the puppy and had not ensured proper barriers in place for meeting a new dog, but they continued to berate me and tell me that “normal dogs” would never get mad at a puppy.

Mind you, once the puppy was put away in his pen, Punk did come out and investigate him with soft body language and a few barks which I redirected to playing with the other dogs. As long as the puppy was separated from her she was neutral, choosing to ignore him or occasionally sniff around his pen with a nice loose wag and neutral body language. I still would not want them to meet face to face any time soon, but I know my dog was not being pathological or unreasonable in her reaction. The puppy was not injured though he did manage to take a good chunk of fur and some skin off my dog 🙄 still some how I am the villain here who doesn’t know how to raise a dog

I’m sorry, I know this is probably a stupid thing to be upset about. I am not planning on bringing Punk back to my parents for a good long time, but I just left feeling so defeated and shitty about myself and I just needed to get it all out before it ate me alive. Thank you for reading and may you all have wonderful, reaction free walks tonight <3

After over two years of reactivity following an attack we are now reaction free for months. I've really restricted typical walks around the neighborhood and figured I just wasn't seeing reactions because there weren't triggers to react to, but with the opening of paddleboarding season, I've actually noticed her reactivity has significantly lowered.

The year following the attack, Punk would bark, lunge and even throw herself into the water to get at other dogs on nearby boats/docks/shore. It was startling and disconcerting and ended up capsizing us multiple times. I actually started to seriously consider retiring her from the activity all together despite it being one of her favorites since she was a puppy. Instead I managed to lower her anxiety levels by going to the river at odd times of day instead and just not having nearly as much foot traffic around (I am a very strong and experienced open water swimmer and take major precautions on the water to prevent us getting hurt, so this particular risk didn't bother me in the grand scheme of things). And I would only get on the water in the super early part of the season or super late after the tourists started heading home.

This year I went out with a few friends right at the beginning of the season and noticed that Punk has been significantly less reactive to local dogs on the beach or on private decks. She's interested (maybe even a bit hyper focused) but she remains quiet and most importantly she stays on the board. I was curious so I started taking her out more and more, and the pattern remained the same - she sees a dog and might stare at them for a bit, might get excited and stand up to see them better, but she doesn't bark or whine, doesn't lunge or try to approach them.

The big test came as we were passing another dog on a board with their owner. We came around a bend in the river and both startled each other. Both dogs stood up and were interested, but when I called Punk to me, she disengaged and turned right around to look at me instead. She listened to my cues (like leave it, lay down, and stay) and we had no trouble.

I don't know if this particular activity has just kind of re-set in her mind as something harmless and fun, or maybe she's so worn out from swimming and balancing that by the time she sees any other dogs, she's just too tired to engage. But whatever it is, it's brilliant. I'm so thrilled to have my paddleboard buddy back!

A friend of mine who works in dog behavior and training mentioned to me in passing once something about instinctual behaviors (like breed-specific activities) being linked to stress reduction. Punk is a pointer so she's pretty comfortable in the water. I wonder if maybe this breed-specific exercise is helping boost her confidence or something? Just a theory though

Just wanted to share the little bit of good in case anyone needed a bit of hope.

❤️

my girl is a hunting breed so prolonged carries while walking is a skill that is both instinctual and something we’ve worked on back before the attack. now it’s something I use to manage reactions on walks!

Punk has a specific “walking” toy - a cheap little fleecy bone thing - she must pick up and hold before the walk will start, can’t bark with your mouth full of toy! (not quite true but it’s kind of like a little security blanket, she seems more comfortable when she’s holding it). she doesn’t always hold it the whole walk but then I get to use the squeaker as a quick little interrupter when she hyper focuses on triggers.

what’s your favorite unhinged/unorthodox trick?