My Story

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Vet > Director of Veterinary Software

Sept. 2024, Suicide Prevention Month

OK, so I could make this into a whole novel, but to make a long story short, I grew up in vet med. Both of my parents are vets and have grown their now 3.5 doctor general practice (GP) into a successful small business over the past 30 years or so. My older brother is also a vet and has taken the helm at the family practice over the past few years. Something we were supposed to do together...

I followed the blueprint. I got perfect grades, did all the extra-curriculars, got into and graduated from the same vet school as my parents and older brother (Cornell), completed a rotating internship (during COVID, no less), and came home to join the family practice and FINALLY start practicing as a GP. But something wasn't right...

Crippling imposter syndrome, perfectionism, compassion fatigue, and the lack of any real sense of a work-life balance (I would spend hours after my shift writing records and researching my cases, and if I didn't would feel even WORSE) drove me to the brink mentally and physically. I skipped this part, but all throughout college and vet school I developed I guess what I'll call "anxiety-induced vomiting". “Wake up, throw up, go to class” - that was my motto. At first I thought it was just due to stress and pulling all-nighters studying, but then it started to happen more frequently... but never on the weekends or during the summers.

It got so bad that I was throwing up 10-15 times every single day. Pretty much every morning, and then sometimes having to run to the bathroom or the dog-walking area between appointments, desperately trying to hide it from my co-workers and terrified someone would hear. After a few weeks straight of this, and after reading a heart-wrenching NOMV facebook post from a former professor about one of my brother’s residents that we lost to suicide, I decided to finally come clean to my family. We did anything and everything we could think of to keep me practicing. Taking time off, therapy, medication, seeing wellness appointments only, part-time, etc, etc, etc. I even got scoped at one point like I was an IBD vs. lymphoma cat (normal thankfully). Finally, it became apparent that the answer was that I simply needed to stop practicing and find a new career.

Now I'll stop you here. Trust me, I have heard it ALL. This post is not a pity party or in any way asking for help or support getting back into practicing. In fact, it is the exact opposite of that. As difficult as it was to accept, I have accepted it. Even just the other day someone asked me if I thought I'd ever practice again and when I said no they said, “Never say never!” Obviously I know this was said with the best of intentions, and it's hard to explain exactly why, but it still hurts. I guess it’s because in that moment we both simultaneously realized / thought about the fact that I had a lifelong dream (becoming a veterinarian and taking over the family business) that I worked insanely hard for, only to be forced to give up on. But that’s still not what this post is about…

It is about coming through the other side. I have been suicidal more times than I can count over the past few years, or honestly over the past decade if I really think about it. Obviously the intrusive thoughts reached a fever pitch when I completely lost my identity and sense of purpose during this career change (some of you reading this may be feeling this - “If I’m not a vet, what am I?!”), but even before that in college and vet school, especially when I was secretly vomiting all the time, I had my moments. This all culminated when my wife was forced to bring me to an ER when the suicidal thoughts were at their worst.

This is the part I don’t really share with anyone. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately depending on how you look at it - this was my rock bottom to which I vowed to never return) what we thought would be a 24-hour hold on the ER turned into something very different. After 24 hours, instead of going home, I was transferred to an inpatient psychiatric facility on involuntary hold, where I stayed for 5 days. I don’t want to make this sound worse than it was, but to be honest it was a bit like a glorified prison. Uniforms (oddly enough the underwear was the worst part), double or triple rooms, rock-hard mattresses, no phone or internet, one shared communal room with a TV (boredom was the biggest thing), and one hour per day of supervised outdoor time, granted there was someone available to supervise us. Seemingly the only way out was if I agreed to take the meds they were prescribing, one of which was very difficult for me to get off of later due to withdrawal effects.

OK, so by now I’ve convinced you that it was bad. Possibly even as bad or worse than what you’re currently experiencing. I know mental health is not a competition, but I also know the mindset I was in during these times and how resistant I was to reaching out for help, or believing that anyone could possibly understand what I was going through.

Now, FINALLY, on to the actual point of this post - I came out the other side! It has NOT been easy (I’ve had 7 jobs in 3 years and we’ve moved across the country TWICE - my poor wife, I do not recommend), but I am now incredibly happy and fulfilled in my new profession of “vet software / PIMS guy”. This document is already long enough as it is, so instead of going into detail about how exactly I made this transition, I trust that if you are reading this and think I can help you in any way, or someone you know, you will reach out! Because this process of transitioning from a clinical > non-clinical vet is so personal to me, and I know as well as anyone that feeling of being “trapped”, I’ve been trying to reach out more and lend a helping hand to others that find themselves going through the same thing. (Edit: or those wanting to continue practicing! We need you!! Obviously I won’t be as helpful here, but even just as a fellow vet can empathize, or can speak to tools like AI scribes that can help you finish your records and get home on time!)

Please do not hesitate to contact me!

Addendum:

I do want to mention that my family, especially my poor wife and mother, have been incredibly supportive throughout this entire process. Not to mention my therapist! BIG plug for therapy!!! I actually had to go through 3 or 4 different therapists to find the right one, but boy oh boy did it make a HUGE difference!!

Mark Massaro, DVM

609-238-2845

markmassarodvm@gmail.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/markmassarodvm/

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Addendum 2:

The first thing I tell everyone who reaches out is to create a Linkedin if you don’t already have one, and join this group! It was created for the Covetrus folks after their layoffs, but anyone can join and myself and others have been re-posting tons of great non-clinical vet-related jobs in there!

Addendum 3:

As I mentioned at the end there, I didn’t really get to the software part. Here was my response to one of the comments that asked how I learned to be a programmer:

“Great question! So I actually am not a programmer, and to this day do not know how to write a single line of code.

I started out as the internal guy for a couple hospitals that just dealt with all the PIMS issues (believe it or not I got this job by private messaging a friend of a friend on Facebook). This then led to a job working for one of those PIMS. The joke was “if you want to complain about our program so much, then why don’t you come over here and help us fix it!”

The title I had there was “Product Manager”. This is where I really just learned on the job. My role was to direct the designers and software developers about what exactly I wanted them to build, and then double check that it worked as intended before release. Essentially I would look at the current state of the program and what our customers' biggest pain points were, and dream up how I would go about fixing it.

I learned how to write “tickets” in a special product manager language called “user stories” - “As a…., I want to be able to…., so that I can….”. It was actually a really amazing gig, but after a while I got tired of working remotely (I’m an extrovert and missed being around other humans) and missed being part of a clinic.

My dream was to go back to being the internal PIMS guy for hospitals, but on a larger scale. Which is exactly the job I have now! I'm making it sound simple when in reality it took 7 jobs in 3 years (including moving across the country TWICE and lots of interviews trying to convince companies to create this position for me) to find the right fit, but I’m super happy with where I ended up!

Hopefully that is a super long winded way of answering your question… a lot of people ask if I went back to school to learn about software- I did not. Everything I learned, I learned on the job!”