This is who I am, but it does not define me.

So I was watching an episode of Anderson yesterday (Can I just take a second and say just how much I love Anderson Cooper? He's totally my celebrity crush of the moment) and he had his mother, Gloria Vanderbilt on. They were talking at one point about how Anderson's brother had committed suicide with his mother there to witness the whole thing, and how it had changed her life but that she does not allow it to define her as a person. So it got me thinking, is it possible to have something that makes you who you are, but also does not really define you as a person?

I'm an Animal Health Technician at a humane society. We are a full shelter, spay/neuter and adoption facility. I've worked there 2 years now and for the most part I love my job. I find that people don't really understand first off what I do, and secondly, how I do it.

Let me start off by telling you what a tech does. Everything. Ok, well not quite, but some days it feels that way. In a typical clinic you might see a tech counseling clients, taking Xrays, working out drug doses and administering them, delivering and monitoring anesthesia, taking blood and inserting IVs, applying bandages and cleaning wounds, cleaning and polishing teeth, and so on and so forth. Basically anything but actual surgery and the actual diagnosis of disease (although we can often tell what it is and what to do about it, we technically aren't supposed to make the actual diagnosis or prescribe the treatment). Another thing we are sometimes required to do is to euthanize animals. My job at the shelter involves all of these things that I have just listed (and then some!), but it seems that all people zero in on when I tell them what I do is the euthanasia part.

"I don't know how you do it!", "I love animals too much to do anything like that", "That's so terrible, why would anyone want to work there!". I get a lot of these kind of statements from friends, family, and people I have just met who find out what I do. It seems that everyone ignores the happy side of uniting people with pets and creating those bonds, just to focus on the harsh reality that yes, we do euthanize animals. And I'll tell you something that may startle you, but I encourage you to keep reading: I am glad that we do.

Now now, calm down. I assure you, I love animals. I couldn't survive in this job if I didn't. But I am truly lucky that euthanasia exists and that we are able to provide it to animals. Look at the harsh reality of any "no-kill" shelter and you will see why. Animals that are suffering are offered no alternative but to keep suffering. Animals that have no hope of making a recovery, that have a terminal illness or injury, are left to slowly and painfully fade away until they have nothing left. I am lucky in that I can look into an animal's eyes and see that pain and suffering and offer them a humane and gracious end to it. I am also lucky in that our shelter does not euthanize for time and space. This means that there's no ticking timeclock over their heads, that they can stay in the shelter as long as they are healthy mentally and physically until their forever home comes along. So we are not just euthanizing random animals all the time, there is always a reason. Sometimes they are cats that are too terrified to leave the back corner of their kennel, or dogs that are so scared of everyone and everything that they lash out and attempt to bite even the kindest hand that is offered to them. Sometimes it IS the sick, the old, the weary. There is always a reason, and that reason is open knowledge to all of the staff in the shelter, who can dispute the decision if they feel there is still something more that can be humanely done. So it is because we love these animals so much that we are willing to end their suffering. What quality has your life when you are too terrified to even eat and you are slowly starving to death?

Truth be told, I actually have to do the injection itself less at my current job then at the clinic jobs I had before it. Most days my job involves giving the sedative beforehand but not the actual lethal injection. This makes it easier on those more emotional days, I can tell myself that I am just making them sleepy, not "killing" them. This is particularly useful for those animals that become my favorites, but then fail the screening process because they are severely dog aggressive, or (in one of the hardest cases since I have worked there) it turns out that loving overweight cat has diabetes. Yes, sometimes emotions run high and tears are shed. But I am so lucky to work in a place where everyone shares that same love for animals and has too shed some tears at some time or another.

So what was my original point? Ah yes. I do euthanize animals. I also care for them on a daily basis. I commit 40 paid hours a week, plus often overtime, and numerous hours of unpaid time at work. I have 3 pets at home that want my love and affection the second I return home. Animals and my bond with them are both what I do and who I am. They are me. But I am so much more than a "tech" or a "euthanasia technician" or the "animal killer" label that people want to slap on me. Maybe sometimes when I do have to give that injection to an animal I love, I do die a little inside. But when I turn around and see a little girl whose family is adopting a kitten for the first time, and the joy that she has for that new bond; or the little puppy with the fractured leg who makes a full recovery and heads out to start a brand new life; or even when I come home to tail wags and purrs... that little piece of my heart is reborn.