Don't blame me, fucknugget!

The BBQ Pit
1

To the assmonkey who called the climic last night when I was tired and cranky, past quitting time, and in pain:

Look, I’m sorry you can’t afford to get your dog fixed. If we could do it, we’d fix them all, but we just can’t. I’m sorry that you spent $4000 on a splenectomy here in December, and that you paid $1000 for a bloat surgery last month. Yes, I realize that’s a lot of money to spend on a dog in five months, and I’m sorry that you think he’s bloating again. I’m sorry you’re unemployed and about to lose your house.

You know what, though? I didn’t fucking screw up your dog’s spleen, nor did I make his stomach torse last month. I didn’t wave my magic bloat wand and make his fucking stomach torse tonight. Furthermore, I didn’t make you spend $5k on your dog, at the price of losing your home. I imagine that money would have paid your rent/mortgage for a long fucking time.

No, you balding, micropenised, syphilitic moose felcher, I am NOT going to “patch you through” to the surgeon who did your dog’s splenectomy. For starters, you ill-mannered asshat, he’s not the surgeon on call this weekend. Furthermore, he doesn’t set the financial policies any more than I do, and I’m not getting my ass served on a silver platter for calling him at 3AM to deal with you. Besided, he couldn’t do a bloat any better than the emergency staff, anyway.

Look, you pig-fucking son of a bitch, I’ll tell you what the on-call vet will have to say about this situation. Since I’ve been double-checking every single thing I’ve told you with her, she’ll give you the same options I’ve given you. Find the money to bring it in and get checked out, bring the dog in for free humane euthanasia, or sit there and watch him die a very painful death. Those are the unfortunate facts of life.

I didn’t make this situation. Not your dog’s health problems, nor your financial problems, nor the clinic’s financial policies. I can’t snap my fingers and fix it all, so yelling at me isn’t going to do you any good, assmunch. It just ends an already shitty shift on an even sourer note.

2

Wow. Charity, sympathy and understanding, all combined. On Easter Sunday.

3

Isn’t there an emergency vet someplace that he could be referred to that uses a sliding scale or payments? I know one of our vet techs on the board has referred to such a system before where the vets DO have the ability to treat an animal of someone who can’t afford it.

My heart breaks for someone who has to beg for their animal’s life because they can’t afford any more treatment. Maybe the vet WOULD have treated it anyway. I don’t know- seems worth asking to me. (Not at 3 in the morning, maybe, but that’s why I wondered about an emergency clinic that might have a treatment fund)

4

I don’t think CrazyCatLady adequately expressed the vitriol this man was showing towards her; it was not a matter of “begging for his dog’s life”, but a matter of him being very nasty and profane with her (she wouldn’t even tell me what he said, exactly, and that’s something) because they wouldn’t treat his dog for free and because they wouldn’t wake up the surgeon–who was not on call–at 3:00 on Sunday morning.

As for another clinic that might do it for free or on the cheap, that’s unlikely. I don’t doubt that such clinics exist, and most vets will end up doing some pro bono work here and there in very extraordinary circumstances, but you can’t get in a habit of it. This was not an extraordinary circumstance. Every single day, CCL deals with animals who need expensive care and owners who can’t pay for it. Several of them. There’s no way that they could ever treat all of them free or cheap, and even if there were another clinic they could refer them to, there’s no way they could ever treat all of them.

The harshest reality of veterinary medicine is that you just can’t save them all. It’s the main reason I could never personally do vet medicine, and it’s one of many reasons that I have so much respect for what my wife does every day.

Dr. J

5

Well, DoctorJ, i’m sure everything you say is true.

But i’m afraid, in that case, that i have to award this rant a D-, because lack of information combined with abusive tone just makes the OP sound cruel and uncharitable.

Resubmit for a passing grade.

6

Maybe CCL didn’t discuss this guy’s conduct as clearly as she might have, but in my initial reading, his attitude came through loud and clear in his request/demand, at 3am on a Sunday morning, to be ‘patched through’ to the surgeon who’d done the previous surgery on his dog.

First tipoff was the hour of the night. Second was the fact that he clearly kept on asking to be put through to that particular surgeon after being informed that he wasn’t the doctor on call. Third was that, IME, normal people don’t just out-of-the-blue ask to be ‘patched through’ to anyone.

Whatever ‘patching through’ means, in the caller’s mind, most of us generally don’t assume that the person on the other end has that capability, if pushed hard enough. IME, this seems to be a big-shot, or big-ego, affectation. Especially when someone’s insisting on it at 3:00 in the Og-damned morning.

It conveyed, to me at least, a clear picture of someone who was used to being able to push people around, until he got booted from his job. Now he’s unemployed, but still trying to push people around as if he were ‘somebody’, and playing the victim card to boot.

Also, CCL didn’t omit the fact that this guy was yelling at her; see the second-to-last sentence of the OP.

7

This animal is going through its second gastric torsion in just a few weeks time? The owner is doing something wrong. Is this guy playing frisbee with his pet right after feeding it? I saved my own pet from a gastric torsion and you better believe he never had another.

(In this case it was a small pet door that had made him fall. I moved from the location immediately.)

8

:::cautiously wading into the pit for the 1st time:::

Zenster, as a Great Dane owner who has done a lot of research on the subject of bloat and torsion, I feel confident in stating that there is no one definitive school of thought as to the cause of such. There are several (dubious, IMO) studies to date that point to one cause or another…blatantly contradicting each other. I decided on a gatropexy for my girl due to several risk factors and hope that I made a wise decision.

As to the OP, while I do understand how difficult it can be dealing with seemingly unreasonable people, I just don’t understand the raging indignation that the OP had for the dog owner. While I would like to think that I would be level headed under such circumstances, I know if my girl were that ill I might just turn into a raving lunatic.

Look, it’s obvious that the guy cared for his dog in that he has previously spent time/money on the pup. The OP just sounded so cold-hearted.

9

utter hijack - I just thought of a new word - ‘nuckfugget’

( 'les someone else has already thought og it)

10

Wait, DoctorJ and CrazyCatLady are married?

Gee, recently I’ve been learning more in the Pit than in GQ.

11

I think CrazyCatLady, and anyone else who does this type of work for a living, has to have a certain measure of thick skin in order to get through it. It isn’t fair for The Fucknugget to try and make her feel guilty for not being able to help his dog; nor is it fair for him to make his financial problems her problem. And screaming and swearing are no way to get what you want. He was just letting off steam at that point. Which is bullshit. Nobody deserves that.

Fact is, there’s nothing she can do for this guy, and it sounds to me as if he was a totally over-the-top asshole about the entire affair. When you have absolutely no responsibility for a situation, and absolutely no way of rectifying it, why should you have to put up with abuse over it? And why should you be generous in your estimation of people who’d expect you to?

I’d react pretty much the same way, I think.

12

Not only that, the guy is (gasp!) balding! The evilness of it all… :rolleyes:

13

Poor guy. I hope he found some help for his dog.

14

Poor guy, my ass. Poor dog. When I brought up the subject of humane euthanasia (we do free, no-exam euthanasias for people who can’t even afford exams so that the animals at least don’t suffer), this guy told me…well, let’s just say he’d rather take care of it himself. It’s part of that bit I’ll never repeat to anyone, not even my husband.

I felt pretty damn bad for the guy up till that point, even with his massive attitude problem. Hell, it’s a shitty situation to be in, and it’s one I’d be in if one of our girls needed something expensive. When he said that, though, my sympathy was instantly replaced with seething rage.

I still feel damn bad for the dog, though, who probably died a nasty, painful death because his owner wouldn’t let us make sure he didn’t suffer.

15

I want one of the phones they use at CCL’s climic.

You know, the one that allows her to know that the caller is a “balding, micropenised, syphilitic moose felcher.”

Nah … on second thought, I couldn’t handle the immense bandwidth obviously required for such a phone.

I’m marking this rant down a few points because although the caller was definitely a maroon, the OP had some bad attitude of her own going on.

16

Sweet Jeebus, Spiff, if you’d go back and read the OP, you’d see that CrazyCatLady was acquainted with the caller from his pet’s previous health problems. Granted, she may be assuming the micropenis, but I’m sure she’s certain he’s balding.

17

Actually, this dog was in about month before I started here, and the bloat was done at the emergency clinic in the city where this man lives. So, no, I’ve never actually laid eyes on this guy. The balding and micropenised comments stem purely from my experience that people who act like huge dicks are overcompensating, either for hair loss or other perceived inadequacies.

18

Sorry, “poor dog” was more appropriate; I apologize.

I can just imagine the rude things I might say to someone if I were desperate. That’s still no excuse though.

19

Oh the poor puppy.

And the poor guy, sounds like it was one issue too many and a rough night for all.

Sorry you had to be there for it CCL.

20

In that case, carry on, Spiff.

Just joking, CrazyCatLady. We crazy cat ladies gotta stick together, and I have no problem with speculating on the physical shortcomings of jerkwads like the one you described.