Dr. Mary Gardner returns for a poignant discussion on pet aftercare and communicating it with clients.. Dr. Gardner, co-founder of Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice and an expert in end-of-life care, dives into the nuances of pet cremation and aftercare services, elucidating common misconceptions and concerns that pet owners and veterinary professionals have. The conversation dives deep into the importance of understanding and choosing the right aftercare options, encouraging veterinary professionals to visit crematories to ensure they meet standards before recommending them to pet owners.
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LINKS
Dr. Mary Gardner: https://www.drmarygardner.com/
Dr. Mary Gardner Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drmarygardner/
Dr. Know-It-All Card Game: https://drandyroark.com/in-the-know/
Dr. Andy Roark Exam Room Communication Tool Box Team Training Course: https://drandyroark.com/on-demand-staff-training/
Dr. Andy Roark Charming the Angry Client Team Training Course: https://drandyroark.com/charming-the-angry-client/
Dr. Andy Roark Swag: drandyroark.com/shop
All Links: linktr.ee/DrAndyRoark
ABOUT OUR GUEST
There is nothing better to Dr. Gardner than a dog with a grey muzzle or skinny old cat! Her professional goal is to increase awareness and medical care for the geriatric veterinary patient and to help make the final life stage to be as peaceful as possible, surrounded with dignity and support for all involved.
A University of Florida graduate (AND ANDY’S CLASSMATE!), she discovered her niche in end-of-life care and is the co-founder and CIO of Lap of Love which has over 350 veterinarians around the country dedicated to veterinary hospice and euthanasia in the home.
Dr. Gardner is co-author of the textbook “The Treatment and Care of the Veterinary Patient”, co-author of a children’s activity book focused on saying goodbye to a dog called “Forever Friend”, and the author of a book dedicated to pet owners “It’s Never Long Enough: A practical guide to caring for your geriatric dog”. Dr. Gardner also won VMX Small Animal Speaker of the year in 2020!”, Dr. Andy Roark is a practicing veterinarian in Greenville SC and the founder of the Uncharted Veterinary Conference. He has received the NAVC Practice Management Speaker of the Year Award three times, the WVC Practice Management Educator of the Year Award, the Outstanding Young Alumni Award from the University of Florida’s College of Veterinary Medicine, and the Veterinarian of the Year Award from the South Carolina Association of Veterinarians.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Dr. Andy Roark: Welcome everybody to the Cone of Shame veterinary podcast. I am your host, Dr. Andrew Roark. I’m here with my dear, dear good friend, Dr. Mary Gardner today. If you have not heard of Dr. Mary Gardner episode you’re in for a treat. I just, I love having her on the podcast. She’s so interesting. She’s so insightful.
She’s so funny. We went to vet school together. You’ll, you’ll be able to tell that. She’s amazing. Co founder of lap of love at hospitals. She owns a crematorium and so that’s sort of where this episode comes from. We talked about aftercare in the crematorium world and and and things like that And so it’s a really it’s a really interesting conversation a lot of things.
I didn’t know and I feel like you. It’s one of those things where you’re like, I should have asked that question. Why haven’t I asked that question before? That’s kind of the vibe on this podcast. And then I ended up asking her a question at the end about end of life care, that from a previous conversation that’s just kind of nagged at me ever since we had it.
And when we go back, we have a really good conversation about about the questions that we ask pet owners during the euthanasia process. So anyway, this is a euthanasia episode , I hope you’re going to enjoy it. I love this episode. Let’s get into it.
Kelsey Beth Carpenter: (singing) This is your show. We’re glad you’re here. We want to help you in your veterinary career. Welcome to the Cone of Shame with Dr. Andy Roark.
Dr. Andy Roark: Welcome to the podcast, Dr. Mary Gardner! How are you, my friend?
Dr. Mary Gardner: I’m good, Andy.
Dr. Andy Roark: It’s good to have you back here. One of my favorite people to talk to.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I– listen, I think you’re probably the podcast I’ve been on the most.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, yeah, I just, yeah. That’s not a quality metric, I’m very well aware. It’s like, you’re the podcast that has invited me the most times.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I don’t know who’s that, what’s that telling about me or you. I don’t know.
Dr. Andy Roark: I think he’s exactly right. I’m not, I have to, I’m going to have to sit and parse apart what that means for both, for both of us. I’ll tell you what it does mean.
It means I enjoy talking to you very much. That’s, that’s without a doubt. For those who don’t know you, and I can’t believe people don’t know you, but for those who don’t know you, you are the co-founder of Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice. You are an international lecturer. You have not one, but Two outstanding books for pet owners on senior years and end of life care.
One for dogs, one for cats. I had you on the podcast. We talked about your books when they came out. Yeah, you are just genuinely a wonderful, thoughtful, insightful person. And I was reaching out to you recently, I was like, what are you fired up to talk about? And you were saying you were sort of telling me about some of the questions you get around cremation, because you run a crematory.
But you asked me questions about cremation and afterlife– aftercare.
Dr. Mary Gardner: No, not after life, after care. Listen, you asked me what I’m fired up about.
Dr. Andy Roark: No, I love it.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Get it? The pun?
Dr. Andy Roark: Fired up about, okay, gotcha, okay, the crematory, okay. Okay. It’s gonna be that kind of episode.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Well, listen, I own a crematory, so I got to be a little weird.
Dr. Andy Roark: It’s gonna be yeah, I already titled this episode awkward conversations around cremation and after so I just I had a feeling that’s where it would go.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I love it.
Dr. Andy Roark: Talk, talk, talk to me a bit about conversations around cremation aftercare. So you again like you Co-founded Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice, and you own a crematorium, and so you are very tapped in to this ritual here.
Talk, talk to me about, is there anything in this area that you have been surprised about? About questions that you get? What, what do, what do people not know about sort of aftercare that you feel like they probably should?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Oh, this is a good question. What I find interesting is that a lot of people don’t understand more than just cremation. We’re such a death adverse society and then definitely even more body care adverse.
Like they don’t want to know about it. But a lot of people don’t understand the difference, the true difference between a private and an individual and a communal. And then they think we’re burning pets and I do aquamation. So then they’re like, are you melting pets? And nobody really knows and nobody they all want to know, but they’re a little scared to ask
Dr. Andy Roark: Do they ask? Do they want to know?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Well, hold on. Who? The families? Not necessarily.
Dr. Andy Roark: That’s what I was thinking. Okay.
Dr. Mary Gardner: The families, no, but, but, but veterinarians, technicians, they, I don’t know if they want to know either, but then they’re like, wow, I had no idea when I tell them these things. Cause I’ve, I’ve lectured on it and they’re like, I didn’t know. And I want people to go visit their crematory.
If you’re going to own a clinic or you’re going to, you know, be a leader in a clinic or do an in-home euthanasia, you should go visit that crematory and see how they, how they track the pets, how they have, you know, quality control measures. What do they do with the ashes afterwards? Because I can, I’ve got some thoughts on that.
So, if you would allow your own pet to be handled by that crematory, that’s a good measuring stick. If you wouldn’t and you’re scared, find another crematory.
Dr. Andy Roark: Okay. So, talk to me about this because I’ve never done this. I want to unpack this a little bit. So I, let’s just say, you know, I’ve, I’ve got a crematorium that we’ve been using at the practice. What is it? And I listened to Mary Gardner and I’m like, you know what? I would like to kind of see how the sausage is made, if you will.
And so. I’m gonna, I’m gonna go there. What, what am I looking for? Talk to me a little bit about, about sort of what a visit to the crematory would look like, because I, I imagine me as like the most incompetent OSHA inspector ever, you know what I mean? Who just, who shows up, doesn’t know what he’s looking for, doesn’t know what he’s looking at.
Dr. Mary Gardner: No comes in with flip flops Like yeah, I’d like…
Dr. Andy Roark: Help me understand what I’m doing here.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Okay. So first of all, some crematories may not be open to the public and I’m air quoting here, right? So they may not be open to the public and that I understand why some may not be but I also then question and they may just be completely wholesale.
So they’re only doing business to business. So, they’re only you know servicing clinics, but for instance, in my crematory, we also not only do we service clinics, but we also service families that their pet died, you know, at home and they want to, you know, they woke up and their pet has gone as they come directly to us.
So, if you’re, if your clinic or sorry, your crematory allows you to go visit, show up at any time to, you know, that’s, we have an open door policy. You don’t have to make an appointment. You know, I may not want you visiting the back at that moment if we’ve got pets out and it may be a little bit shocking to some people.
You know, we’re in the, we’re in the vet space so we have seen pets that are not alive, but not everybody has. But anyway, so the first thing I want to do is how do they answer their phones? Are they polite? Are they, are they lovely? Are they compassionate? Do they sound like they’ve got a mouthful of marbles?
Because your families may be calling them or they’ll look it up and they’ll say, hey Who do you use? Oh, you use rainbow bridge crematory, then they might call up. So, So how are they with customer service? Because and and how you know, how they handle everything is a reflection of how they handle the pet and how is their lobby because if you’ve got a family that that you know you’re you’re taking care of a golden retriever andy and the the goldens got osteosarcoma and and they and the dog passes on a sunday and your clinic’s closed. And they’re going to have to, and what are they going to do with that pet?
They could bring it to an emergency clinic, maybe, or they can bring it directly to the crematory. So you should know this. What are the hours of operation of your crematory? Can it, do they have pickup services? So let’s say now the family has to bring Rocky to the crematory on Sunday. How is their lobby?
You know, it, does it look nice or does it look like a mass production site? Because you know, they’re going to be doing, you know, hundreds of pets a month, you know, cremation. So you’re going to see a lot, but you don’t want the lobby to look like that. So how’s the lobby? How are they, you know, what is their hours, things like that.
So then if they’re willing to show you, and also their insurance, you know, cause there is stuff going on in the back that they may not have insurance to cover strangers or whatever, but most of the time you could go to the, into the back. So you’re going to look, how do they store the pets? How do they track the pets?
So when they come into the building, how, how will I know if Rocky is going through the process appropriately? How do they take the paw prints? How do they do the fur clipping? How do they make sure that Rocky’s paw print doesn’t go into, you know, Misty the cat’s bag. And that’s going to be totally two different paw prints.
How are they handling that pet? Are they just tossing them into the machine? The big thing is, is ensuring that you’ve, you’re tracking the pet correctly. And then, and then you’re going to ask like, what do they do with the pet afterwards if it’s a, if it’s a communal. And so, and that’s a whole other, that’s a whole other topic.
But the big thing is tracking and, and ask them what happens if a mistake is made. and I will tell you for us, what happens when a mistake is made, cause we’ve had mistakes. And that’s the first thing. Is that a crematory better say they’ve had a mistake and not hiding that because it’s, it’s rare.
You’re going to be doing tens of thousands of pets. And not have somebody didn’t follow a process, right? Like, listen, there’s, there’s, there’s doors coming off of airplanes now, right? Like stuff happens even with the best of checklists. And, and for us at my crematory we, we will refund that family absolute your cost.
So even though I, you know, I only charge you $90, but you charge the family $250. We’ll refund the family $250. We’ll get the memorial items. We’re going to ask them to send a picture. We’re going to get an etching done. Like we go above and beyond because we know how horrible that is. And we want to protect you as the clinic from being the bad guy, because that’s who that you, we are a reflection of you.
And if we screw up, you guys picked the wrong crematory. So we take it on. We call that family. We don’t ask the receptionist to call and say, sorry, we misplaced your ashes. You know, like that’s just horrible. And it’s, it’s only happened to us in six years, three times. And, and, and we know that what happened and we fixed it and it hasn’t happened in a long time.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah. That, that makes sense. I actually had that thought when we were sort of talking earlier, you know? I mean, it happens at, it happens at vet clinics where you know, the box gets checked on the paperwork, but the tag doesn’t get done correctly. It’s just, human error is, is just real.
Dr. Mary Gardner: It’s real. I’m going to say something too. And so, and so many people blame a crematory for doing things, but we as clinicians and technicians and the staff have to make sure that it’s done correctly at the clinic. And I’m telling you, it is a shock to see what some clinics do. So my, my brother runs the crematory that I own Monarch in South, in South Florida.
And he sometimes calls me to ask what should he do? Because he has, he has arrived to clinics And there’s maybe 10 bags in their freezer, not identified at all. He’s arrived. Yeah. And so then they’re scrambling. And he’s like, well, if you put the wrong tag on Misty versus Rusty and we do the pop, then it’s going to be looking like we did it wrong.
Right? So we also ask for the, the the breed, the color, the age, like all these things, because when we’re opening the bag, we want to make sure that we’re looking at a black cat, not an orange cat. Right.
Dr. Andy Roark: That totally makes sense. Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: And then there was another time. It was so sad. He’s like, Mary, they didn’t call us to come pick up.
They had, you know, a lot of influx of animals. So they put a pet on top of the freezer, not inside the freezer. And and by the time we got that pet, it was not in a state that we could make memorial items. We couldn’t do paw prints and stuff like that. So you, we could have told, we would have come and picked it.
But they’re not even thinking. They’re like, well, what do you want us to do? So it starts with us on how we treat at the clinic, sorry, not the cream at the clinic of how we treat that pet and make sure they’re identified immediately and check the right boxes.
Dr. Andy Roark: That’s wow. That, that, that totally makes sense. Let’s, let’s start, let’s start at the clinic and kind of work backwards a little bit. When, so in your experience with Lap of Love, and you lecture on euthanasia and end of life care, how do you talk about cremation and sort of uh, aftercare options? What do you say to pet owners?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Okay. So when they’re calling in, obviously they know what they’re calling for. And so, and when I lecture, I, I, I give, I give really good examples. So when they call in, they probably haven’t thought about it. Like they may have, but they don’t know. They don’t know what the burial options are. So we’ll typically ask.
Have you thought about what you want to do with Rusty’s body afterwards? And because we shouldn’t assume anything and I’ll usually ask an audience, like who here doesn’t want their ashes back for their pet? And there’s always a handful of people that don’t want it. And so then I’ll say, Oh, what? Do you not love your pet?
You know, because we have such a stigma that getting ashes back equals love your pet more. And it doesn’t. It just means you’re not attached to the, to the ashes. Right?
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, I have I have ashes in a closet in my house and I ask my every time I find them. I’m like Why do I why do I have that like again? It doesn’t I don’t know maybe again. Everybody’s different I’m not saying other people should feel differently, but I was like I just I don’t display them.
It makes sad.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I’ve got whole urns. It makes me sad. Like, I think sometimes it’s a bridge during your grieving process to have those things back. And then after 10 years, you may be like, I’m going to go to the beach and scatter them, right? Or the mountains. But, but it doesn’t mean you love your pet less if you don’t want those ashes.
So when you are on the tel, on the phone and the family, and you’re asking, what have you thought about what you want to do with Rusty afterwards? And they’re like, Oh, I want to get him cremated. Then what most people say is, do you want his ashes back or not? And just by saying not is a negative word. So instead of saying that, why don’t we say, Would you like Rusty’s ashes back or would you prefer the crematory spread them for you?
Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, I like it. Yeah
Dr. Mary Gardner: Right? Something as simple as that because the first wasn’t wrong. Would you like the ashes back or not? Right? No, but the other way is a lot gentler and it also gives them permission that it’s okay to not get them back. Like, don’t feel obligated to get them back. And so that’s step one. And then if they go into more questions, your, your staff needs to know exactly what’s what to, what to say, what not to say little things like, well, when is the crematory going to come pick up?
How long is he going to stay there in your clinic? Or is it going to come the next day? Like, cause people will ask all these things. They ask us a lot because we’re taking the pet with us in our car. And you know, are you going to go now to the crematory? And we don’t, we go to our homes. We, we all have freezers in our, in our homes that we put them in.
But, but you know, they’ll, and never lie, never say that you’re going to go, I’m dropping them off at the crematory. Cause then they’re going to call the crematory. Okay. And say, Oh, is Rocky there? And then the crematory is gonna be like, Rocky who?
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah. Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Starting with the phone call is important to, and then, and I don’t also upsell urns.
I don’t feel because in humans, in humans, you know, we die naturally. And a week later you’re planned or that during that, you know, days later, you’re planning the funeral, you’re planning urn, you’re planning a, a basket and stuff like that. So when we do a euthanasia, it’s. It’s, it’s, it’s the death, it’s the, it’s the funeral, it’s everything all at once.
And to, and to upsell an urn, I don’t like. So I like to pick a really nice urn, don’t, as a clinic, don’t just buy it. Pick the boring box, you know, like pick a nice one. That’s that’s gonna be you know that they can have and then Afterwards if a family wants a different urn, I always just go on Etsy.
There’s so many options out there. It’s amazing I can’t carry enough to show you all the cool options even at my crematory we don’t carry urns because there’s thousands.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: and they’re awesome.
Dr. Andy Roark: So if, you know, if, if, if I’m talking to the pet owner, I’m like, Oh, you know, would you, would you like the ashes back or would you like to have the crematory spread them for you? The first question I has, where are they going to spread them?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Very good question.
Dr. Andy Roark: I don’t think I could, I don’t think I could accurately, immediately answer that question in all honesty.
Dr. Mary Gardner: So, a lot will say, Oh, we have a memorial garden that we spread them out. Which, or they have acres of land that they spread them on. So, which may be true. But, we have so much ashes that we have to spread per month. It would kill any garden…
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, it seems, it seems amazing.
Dr. Mary Gardner: in six months I could probably fill my bedroom full of ashes.
Like So you’re not placing that on a memorial garden? And I’m a small crematory, right? I do, we do 800 a month, so, and about 30% are, or 40% are communal. So for, for what we do at Mar, we actually spread them out to sea. So we go three miles out and we spread them out to sea. And and so I think it’s just good to know what they do now.
They may just take a teaspoon and, and put it in the memorial garden. Some may, let’s just be honest, they may put them in the garbage.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah?
Dr. Mary Gardner: How do you say that then, right?
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah! I Yeah, I think
Dr. Mary Gardner: I don’t know.
Dr. Andy Roark: We have to figure out our phrasing of that for that one.
Dr. Mary Gardner: We do. Oh my
Dr. Andy Roark: Again, I don’t and again I don’t want to. I don’t want to mislead people either. You know, it’s it’s this is yeah, this is these are these are questions. I have not asked that that question.
Dr. Mary Gardner: And it sucks sometimes if that’s, so maybe that’s not the best option. I don’t know. Well, there was one time I was lecturing and it was in, it was in Texas. And this girl, she raised her hand and she’s like, well we have on our sheet like it’s either private or disposal and I’m like, no, no, no, don’t say disposal.
Like, don’t, don’t say that. And so she’s like, no, no, but that’s what it is. I’m like, no, no, it’s a communal. And then she’s like, no, no, it’s actually disposal. I’m like, I’m sorry, tell me the words that you’re speaking here. And so she says the crematory, there’s only two options and it’s a private cremation or they, they dump the body, the whole into the landfill.
Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, no
Dr. Mary Gardner: There is no communal at all, which is totally legal. They, they, they throw the body, you know, into the, into the landfills. And this is somewhere like, and she’s like, and that’s two hours away. It’s like Boofoo, Texas. And I’m like, I don’t know how to make that better. I don’t have the answer for that. I don’t know what to say.
But I just said, it’s still aftercare. Like, you know, or would, but sometimes you just can’t make things pretty.
Dr. Andy Roark: You can’t sugarcoat it. Yeah, I mean..
Dr. Mary Gardner: You can’t sugar coat that. I’m still working on that one. So don’t say disposal though. Yeah. Or would you like, yeah. Anyway. And think about in third, 30 years ago, there was no pet crematories.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: That’s what they did.
Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, yeah. Oh totally. Oh, yeah, I I I had this, I had this mentor, I had this mentor, and it was like, you know, I was a young, young vet, and I worked for this guy, and he was great, he was a great guy. And we would, you know, you know, I always love it when the older vets tell the younger vets about mistakes they made in their career. I think that’s so healthy.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Yeah. Totally.
Dr. Andy Roark: It’s so helpful for everybody and for the profession is just to sort of share that, share that back. And but he talked about it’s back in the day and he put a horse to sleep and they took it to the dump And he did not use enough pentobarbital and the horse woke up And was running around the dump and they had to go to the dump and and get the get the horse.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Oh my God.
Dr. Andy Roark: I’ve never I’ve never forgotten the phone call from the dump about you need to come get this horse. And so, anyway, when you say that, if part of me is like, I can’t believe that that’s, that’s what happened, but yeah, I, I, I know it is.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I know. And you know, I’ve heard, it’s crazy. One time I heard a story, I was doing euthanasia and the family was like, Oh, this is so much better than last time. I’m like, Oh really? What happened last time? And yeah, they felt like I could tell they wanted to share. And they said, Oh, the veterinarian put my dog in a black bag and shucked it over his shoulder and carried him out.
I’m like, like Santa Claus. And they said, yeah. And I’m like, when was that? Andy? I thought they were talking 30 years
Dr. Andy Roark: 30 years ago. Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Two years ago. I’m like, what? Yeah. Like it’s surprising. And then one, another time, my brother, he was helping a mobile vet and she’s like a general mobile vet. And she’s like, Oh, can you come help?
Because it’s a great dane. So he came in and her and her tech to the house. Her and the technician were carrying the Great Dane out by its legs, hanging in the head was flopped out, carrying outside the house. They didn’t even think about this is, this is the last two years. And so he’s like, stop, let me go get my stretcher.
And so then he went in with this and they’re like, Oh, we didn’t even think about a stretcher. This is like now it happens. It’s crazy. And he’s like, oh, please here’s our stretcher and you know, it’s 70 bucks Like it’s so worth it.
Dr. Andy Roark: I mean, yeah. Oh, absolutely. But again, to to be, to, you know, to be kind to our people, which is, is, it’s, if no one ever shows you the stretcher, you know, I, I, I, you know, like, again, I, I know it’s, it seems ridiculous, but if you’ve never thought about it and you’ve got this pet and you’re like, I guess I’ll take the bottom side and you’ll take the top side, you know, like, it, it’s I, I.
Dr. Mary Gardner: It’s true. I don’t mean to bash talk.
Dr. Andy Roark: but but that’s that’s the most terrifying thing to me in aftercare is when you’re not thinking and then all of a sudden you can see yourself from the outside and you’re like, oh no
Dr. Mary Gardner: no, right, right. You know what?
Dr. Andy Roark: like that’s that stuff gives me nightmares
Dr. Mary Gardner: Totally. I remember I was speaking for a conference that we, I was in Zion National Park in October and the loveliest gentleman, oh, it’s so good. It was
Dr. Andy Roark: I would totally speak there
Dr. Mary Gardner: Oh my God.
Dr. Andy Roark: Zion, if you’re out there, I’d totally speak at that conference.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Exactly. Hook me up. Hit me. DM me. So there’s this gentleman comes up afterwards and he’s probably in his late sixties or so.
And he’s, and it’s just the sweetest guy. And sometimes I get a little like, I don’t know, you know, they’ve been in this field longer than us. What am I going to teach them? You know, that kind of thing. Right. And so he’s like, ah, thank you so much. What I’ve realized, and he started to cry. He’s like, I’ve been doing it all wrong.
Dr. Andy Roark: Wow.
Dr. Mary Gardner: And I felt, I’m like, no, no, no, no. Like you just, you didn’t know like that, that it, what you could do. And he was so happy to change a few things. And that was both euthanasia and aftercare and stuff like that. But it was just so, it was sad to see him cry, but lovely that he, that he was humbled by it and could say, thanks for teaching me new stuff.
Dr. Andy Roark: Well, isn’t that, isn’t that the soul that we all want to have, you know, is to, I, I, I want to be the person, you know, in my sixties and seventies, who’s listening to someone who’s got new ideas and going, Oh man. I get that. That’s, that’s better. Or yeah, that’s, that’s better. I’m gonna, I’m gonna, I’m gonna try that. I think, I think that’s huge.
Guys, I have got some huge news. My new card game is out. That’s right. If you are a fan of the last card game that me and my team made it was called what’s on my scrubs. You’re going to love our brand new card game. It’s called Dr. Know It All. It is a trivia game meant to be played in teams.
It’s a mixture of trivia and BS and it is guaranteed to make your team laugh. All of the questions are meant to be challenging for your whole team.
They are based on the difficulty level of the VTNE exam. So this is the veterinary technician, national examination. It is great to play with your veterinarians. It doesn’t need your veterinarians. It can be toned up and down in difficulty. We have a number of different ways to play the game so that if you have a newer team or a team that is learning we can tone game down very quickly and make it fun and engaging and educational for them.
And if you have got a bunch of vets that want to go hard in the paint, we can go hard in the paint and it has made the game has made to turn up to that level. It’s really flexible that way.
it is going to be fun and your people are going to enjoy it. It is made to be played in small teams. That’s the team building part.
We get people together. It’s just like regular trivia. When you go to the restaurant or the bar and they didn’t have groups and everybody gets some time to quickly figure out what do you think? What’s our answer if it is there in very much that, so it is perfect to be played in five minute bursts.
You can put it at the beginning of your staff meetings just to make people laugh. You could do a couple of rounds of trivia and then get into your business. Or You can just say, Hey guys, we’re going to have a team meeting. We’re just going to do some trivia.
We’re going to get some food. We’re going to hang out together. We’re going to laugh together. We’re going to trivia. We’re gonna play some music. We’re gonna do whatever we do. And then everybody’s going to leave with a smile on their face. Guys, I wanted to make that for you. I had such a great time with our first game.
I think this game is going to be really fantastic. I think people are going to really love it. Head over to drandyroark.com right now to learn all about it and get your copy sent to either you or your practice, Check it out. Let’s get. Get back into this episode.
Dr. Andy Roark: Let me, I want to shift conversation here a little bit. This is a personal shift for me. You know, we’ve talked many times before, and, and one thing that you said on your previous visits that has sort of stuck with me a little bit and I always think about every time I do a euthanasia I think about it. So, you you and I had talked about having conversations with pet owners who were putting their pets to sleep and you said and I’m sort of paraphrasing but basically you were like You know, they probably don’t Don’t want to talk or or they don’t want to necessarily reminisce about pets. Or they’ve already they’ve been through a lot and and maybe bringing up memories or things is not something that’s beneficial And so I and I really wrestled with that and sat with that in that one of the things that I have seen people really light up about is if if they and again this it’s you have to read the room,
Dr. Mary Gardner: That’s what I was going to say. You got to read a room.
Dr. Andy Roark: But, but some, some people really, because I’m walking, some people really seem to open up that way. And I, so I’ll walk in, and I’ll see someone, and I don’t know them very well. And I feel like this is a really important thing. And I don’t, I don’t want to say, you know, I’m not, I’m not trying to do a ceremony here.
You know, I’m not trying to take, I’m not trying to take the spotlight away from anything. But I, I, I always think to myself, is there something I could say or a question that I could ask that would try to frame this into a happier memory than what it is? And then I sort of hear your voice going, well, you know, they’ve already been through a lot and you’re kind of bringing these things up.
Can you walk me around through this one more time and sort of, sort of help, help me out here?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Okay. I’m, I’m glad you brought this up cause I, cause I want to make sure I like kind of explain myself. Well, I think what I mean by that is, is many people, especially in this awkward moment or stressful moment, and they don’t know what to say. So they ramble and they talk and they ask questions that are not meaningful or like they don’t understand they just they’re scared of silence.
I think that’s there’s it’s silence is okay and I think we’re scared of silence in these awkward moments. So you ramble and that I just want to avoid rambling and read the room. I’m if i’m can barely breathe because i’m sobbing so much crying over my pet don’t ask Like, what’s your favorite memory?
Right? Like, I can’t. If, I tell you, when people say, what’s the number one, you know, thing that’s can make a great Lap of Love vet, right? And they’re like, compassion? I’m like, no. We all have compassion, guys. We’re oozing out of our pores with compassion. It’s knowing how to read a room. Like you gotta know.
And, and I just, so I just want those that find if they’re, when they’re in an awkward situation, they ramble, enjoy the silence a little bit. And then I think my, like, what is your favorite memory? Like if you can, if you can find that space and then, and they might say, I have so many, you know, and that’s, I know me too.
And just, you have to have an organic, natural. I think when, when people know that I’ve done thousands of euthanasias, right, they’re like, Oh, you must not cry anymore, you know, cause you’re so used to it. And I’m like, no, no, no. I definitely cry more now because my medicine and my process is down pat. I could be in the, in a, in a blackout room.
I know every, where my doctor bag is. I could hit any organ. I got it. Like I could do it. The doctor stuff down. So I now focus on the experience and that family and that relationship. And I’m like, you know, he helped you to get like, and I’m hearing their stories and I’m in it and I’m not just asking.
Almost with a void like oh, what’s your favorite moment? Like that’s You have to be behind that question. And that’s, that’s what I mean by that. So I’m glad we brought it up. Cause I hope that’s helpful.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, that, that definitely does help. I, I’ve always, I, I, you, you have such insight and knowledge, and I’ve always, I respect you so much, and you have so much insight in these things, and I just kind of rolled around with that backwards and forwards, and my, my, one of my go to questions is, and again, you read the room, and some people don’t want to talk, and you know, that, that’s sort of it one of my go to questions is, you know, how did, how did Buster come to live with you?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Yeah. If you don’t know them, right?
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, that’s exactly it. How did Buster, how did Buster come into your life?
Dr. Mary Gardner: To you as a family?
Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, and I’ve heard some great stories. I mean, just great stories. And again, it’s and their, their, their face brightens up because this is the happiest time of the, the pet is arriving and joining the family. And, and it’s, it’s, it’s kind of a guaranteed kind of, kind of, I don’t know, kind of
Dr. Mary Gardner: No, I, I love it. And I think if they’re also struggling with like, or they’re, they’re, they’re standing over Buster and they’re like, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I, you know, there’s, there’s, there’s, I got to try to shift that a little bit. So I think it’s not, it’s, it’s, it almost does an injustice to that moment for me to say, do this.
Cause you really have to, at that moment, pull out your different, I have a Rolodex of cards of things I’m going to say, things I’m going to do. Right. And. By the way, I have, you know how you said, you like people who admit mistakes. I have, I’ve said stupid things sometimes and I’m like, Oh, I can’t say that again. Right.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I’ll joke, like there’ll be a great family and they’ll joke. And I’m like, damn, that was good. But I can never say that again anywhere else. Cause it’ll never have that situation again.
Dr. Andy Roark: We’ll never land again like that.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I’ve heard my favorite, my, my, one of my worst ones with was this dog. And And so I was talking about the sedation and I was like, Oh, this may sting a little on the way and sort of like a tequila shot.
And they were cool. Oh, wait, hold on. Let me back it up. They were a, a, a row of Harley Davidson’s were out front. It was a clan. So it was a clan of guys with big beards, like ZZ Top bandanas. All that stuff, right? And so I’m like, Oh, so Harley’s the dog’s name. You know, I’m like, it’s going to be like a shot of tequila.
Now I might have assumed I made some assumptions there. Okay. I did. And so afterwards he, and he’s, and he’s holding him and he’s, and he’s rocking back and forth sobbing. And he looks and he says, he was my sobriety dog.
Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, no.
Dr. Mary Gardner: And I’m like, Oh my God, the whole clan was a sobriety clan.
Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah. Oh,
Dr. Mary Gardner: So I like, I didn’t read the room well then
Dr. Andy Roark: No, but yeah, you make, you make an assumption. Yeah,
Dr. Mary Gardner: I made an assumption.
Dr. Andy Roark: You, you do. But so, anyway, we could do a whole other podcast on this. But like, but here’s, but here’s the thing about, about being a vet, right? And I’ve wrestled with this in my career. Not making assumptions about people has a cost as well.
You know what I mean? If you’re like, I’m not going to say anything to you unless I am 100 percent certain of its relevance to you. Do you know what I mean? Then, then it, you’re not going to make that connection. And again, sometimes, again, we want to be smart. Sometimes we sort of try to connect with people.
We have to, we have to have some grace. I think I wouldn’t. I would want, if as the pet owner going in, I would like to work with people who, who try to connect with me. And if they occasionally kind of put their foot in their mouth, I think I would give grace to that over someone who’s like, we’re not gonna talk to this guy because he’s upset and we don’t know him.
And so we’re gonna lean back. And there’s always, there’s just nuance there. And I think. I think it’s so important to give yourself grace as the vet because you get drawn into all kinds of ridiculous situations that you, you never signed up for.
Dr. Mary Gardner: I wish, yeah, you know what? I wish I got graded a little more heavily on my like personal skills because I was not the smartest when it came to didactic stuff. And so I thought when we were in clinics, that’s where I shined. And I think, I think people, people, people appreciate that. And I always say, do not.
Do not make your chase of perfection hurt you, hurt you just being good. Like it’s okay to be really good, but people are chasing perfection and that’s, it’s the enemy of good. And like, trust me, I am hashtag not perfect.
Dr. Andy Roark: I Think you’re pretty pretty freaking great. Dr. Mary Gardner. Thanks for being here today. Where can people follow your adventures and exploits?
Dr. Mary Gardner: Well, if they could just follow me following you, is that Dr. Andy Roark, but
Dr. Andy Roark: Stay stay subscribe to the Cone of Shame Podcast. Apparently.
Dr. Mary Gardner: Right? I’ll be on. No. So Dr. Mary Gardner is, is where you can find me, my website and social media and stuff like that.
Dr. Andy Roark: Awesome. Thanks so much for being here guys. Thanks for tuning in and listen. Take care of yourselves everybody
And that’s what I got guys. Thanks for joining. Thanks Mary Garner for being here. Boy, I just, I enjoy the heck out of her. If you enjoyed this episode, please tell a friend, pass it on, share it to people, write me an honest review wherever you get your podcasts.
That means the world to me. It really does. Anyway, guys, take care of yourselves. I’ll talk to you later. Bye.
