Hey. Everybody today we are here with
Doctor Wade and we are going to talk a little bit about her
journey as a veterinarian going through vet school and her
experiences being a black woman in vet Med.
I think it's a really important topic to bring up, especially as
we're, you know, in the middle of Black History Month.
And I think the current statistic is 1.2% of
veterinarians are black. And being a black woman in
veterinary medicine is even rarer.
And I couldn't even find a statistic on it.
That's how kind of rare it is. So we're going to get into a
little bit of everything today. So, Doctor Wade, could you tell
us a little more about yourself? Yes, I am Doctor Alexia Wade, I
am initially from Nashville, TN. I went to the University of
Tennessee, Knoxville for both my undergrad in my veterinary
school. And then I found an internship
at the clinic that I currently practice at in the Fort Worth
area of Texas. And so I did a mixed animal
rotating internship for a year directly out of school, then
decided to stay in mixed animal medicine, where I've been
practicing for the last about two years or so.
And I really like mixed animal medicine because it's never the
same thing every day, especially being in rural mixed animal
medicine where I feel like we get to see a little bit more of
variety as far as kind of the hecticness of everything.
So going through your history, could you tell us more about
what made you want to apply to veterinary school and what was
your path specifically? We have a lot of pre vets in our
audience and they would love to know more.
Yeah, absolutely. So I think there was
unfortunately, but fortunately no other option for me as far as
I knew that I loved animals. As soon as I knew what a dog or
cat was, my grandmother on my mom's side was always, she got
me my first hamster, she got me my first Bunny rabbit.
So she was always kind of feeding into that dream of mine.
And I knew that I wanted to help animals.
The tough part is I really didn't know how I was going to
accomplish that. You know, I knew what a
veterinarian was, but I didn't know how to get into that
school. I didn't know any of those
things. And so I think a lot of it for
me was self driven and I think that maybe made the process a
little bit harder. And I think that's why I
advocate for being there for other pre veterinary students,
actually black pre veterinary students, because I want to show
people that yes, the path is hard, but there are ways you can
make this more accessible to yourself.
And so I essentially started looking at colleges in high
school. I went to an academic specific
high school because I knew veterinarians are smart and I
have to be smart and I have to do good in school.
So I went to an academic high school and I went to a lot of
the job fairs and career fairs and college fairs and all of the
things just to kind of learn more about how do I even get to
vet school. And so figured out that I wanted
to stay at least in Tennessee for college.
So applied to, I think I applied to school in Georgia and I
applied to a school in Tennessee too.
And same for vet school. But I decided I wanted to say at
the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, while I was at the
University of Tennessee Knoxville, thank goodness they
have a animal science major with a pre veterinary concentration.
And so really I just kind of followed the path that they gave
me. Of course, I did things outside
of school, which I always try to emphasize to anyone who is
following the pre vet path. You know, we are veterinarians
through and through and we love animals, but everyone knows that
we love animals. And so I encourage everyone to
do things outside of school that also make you happy.
And so I joined a sorority in undergrad and I also was an
ambassador for the College of Agriculture.
And so I think that those things kind of rounded me a little bit
more and I had a lot of people in that pre vet cohort
specifically that maybe had more resources than I had or had more
knowledge accessible than I did. And so I kind of leaned on them
a little bit more. As far as applying the vet
school, doing the vim cast, I didn't even know what a vim cast
was. You know, by taking my GRE, all
of those things. The school part of it wasn't
necessarily hard. It was the figuring out how the
heck to make all the puzzle pieces fit together.
And so luckily I did it. Luckily, I thank God I got
accepted to University of Tennessee on my first try and
got through that school there. Even in that school and ending.
That's why I didn't know what I didn't know what I wanted to do.
I didn't always want to be a mixed animal event.
I wanted to do zoom in and I wanted to do wildlife at first,
but then kind of through school learned that's just really not
accessible either. And so it, it will always have a
special place in my heart. But I think just through
learning and in clinics and, and that's why also I encourage
people to do all the things. You know, you may think that you
want to be a small animal vet or you may think that you want to
be a large animal vet, but try everything out.
You know, we have this degree and it gives us the opportunity
to do so much. Don't limit yourself.
And I think that's exactly why I'm in mixed animal medicine
today. I think that's a great way to
put it. I, we're about to do something
with, you know, what do you do if you weren't accepted or if
you're wait listed or something like that?
And one of the things that we were going to talk about is
don't limit yourself to the small animal practice you've
been working at for five, 6-7 years.
Like go out, try something new. And I think the point you
brought up about not knowing how to apply or how to become a vet
is really important because growing up in the middle of
nowhere, I didn't have any of those resources.
And I came from, like, you know, apologize, educated family, all
connected. Like, I don't know, in my head,
I don't know how to describe it. It was like, OK, well, I'm going
to go to Auburn and they're going to let me into vet school
because I went to Auburn. And that's just not how it
works. Like, but in high school, nobody
was there to tell me any different.
That's just how I thought it worked.
And that wasn't arrogance. That was genuine ignorance.
Nobody talked about it. Nobody told me, you know, you
have to, like, apply. And it's really hard to get in.
I thought if you got good grades and you showed you want to do
it, you would just get in, and that's just not true.
So I think a lot of people have that misconception going in and
that's why we see a lot of high drop rates in that first year or
two because they see what it's going to take or how long of a
process it is, and then they get a little scared off.
And I don't like when that happens.
I wish there was more high school involvement, maybe at a
national level. Something we tried to look at
when we were serving with a PVMA was, you know, how do we reach
younger audiences? Because they're not even
thinking about that. Maybe they haven't even decided
they want to be a vet yet. So how do we get to them and
say, here's what you need to start doing, Here's what you
need to start looking at? Like I think, I don't know what
the answer to that is, but I think there does need to be
something for younger ages and actually talking about how to
get in and not just encouraging you, yes, be a vet and not
telling you anything about how to be that.
Exactly that. And and I do, I think living in
Texas has actually exposed me to a lot of the agriculture and
like the side of things where a lot of these times these high
school kids are actually getting the access to, you know,
showing, showing their first cow or showing their first pig or
all of these things. And these kids love these
animals and they say, you know, how am I going to care for my
pig when it's sick or how am I going to do these things to
build the human animal bond? And I just think that that is a
beautiful thing in itself. And I wish that that was
honestly more accessible everywhere because had there
been an AG program for me in high school, I 100% would have
done it. But I do sometimes think it's
probably area dependent and Texas is very big on history
culture so. Yeah, especially in the Fort
Worth area, the show cattle can get.
I grew up in Texas, and I showed pigs and goats and my friends
showed sheep. So I saw a little bit of
everything. My brother showed rabbits.
It is a thing. It is a big thing.
And it wasn't what made me want to be a vet, but it certainly
solidified it. But like I said, it was like,
well, I showed animals in high school.
I'll get into that school. Right.
Like, I don't know, just something about there's just a
disconnect between high school and then you show up for that
first. I know Auburn, like our very
first left for orientation animal science was an entire
lecture on debt to income ratio and like scary, scary, scary
things about becoming a vet because they're like, we're not
trying to scare you off, but we're trying to like tell you
these things and be realistic. If this is not attractive to you
and you're not willing to sign up for this, then, you know,
first day of freshman year, you might want to switch.
And people do switch after I almost switched because I was
like terrified of the just the debt, just the debt alone.
I was like, I don't know if I can do that.
Didn't know about that in high school, didn't know it costed
that much. But it's just crazy.
No, it is and and I definitely agree.
I think that there is a lot of push back and push away from the
vet field as a whole and it's it's a little discouraging
because I think that at the end of the day you're becoming a
veterinarian because it's something that you're extremely
passionate about. Yes, we should preface with the
things that you are going to have to deal with because it is
very mentally taxing. You know, the debt to income
ratio is very real, but I think it's also one of those things
where if we lay it out in a way where people can digest it a
little bit more and know how they can take the appropriate
steps to get to where they need to be.
I think we would have a lot more successful veterinarians to be
honest and not you know, 50% of people switching out of the pre
that freshman year. Yeah.
And it gets, it gets even scarier when you start talking
about the loan caps and we already have an episode on that.
So if you want to know more about that, go check that out.
But the point is it gets scarier as we continue on and it gets
more exclusive. And I think it's been getting
more exclusive because not to generalize, but a lot of in my
personal experience, the people of color and people from rural
communities and people who just have diverse backgrounds, If you
didn't grow up in a very niche like high income white
household, it's already really hard to pay for undergrad, let
alone vet school. And your access to certain
things is, are limited. You know, when they talk about
diversity of experience, I had a hard time getting that in high
school or going home for the summer.
I only had one vet practice within like a 40 mile radius.
That's just the world, you know? And I know I'm not the only
person who can say that. I know there are plenty of
communities that have one practice and maybe it's only
small animal and it's hard to diversify experiences.
It's hard to get in. You're cut off financially.
There's just a lot going on right now.
And switching gears a little bit, it all comes back to, you
know, representation. Somebody needs to be there to
say you can do it. If you're from the middle of
nowhere, that doesn't mean you're not going to fit in with
all of these small animal medicine people.
If you're from a lower income household, that doesn't mean
you're not going to fit in and veterinary medicine.
And I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about
representation in the field as a black veterinarian or growing up
and maybe seeing, we're not seeing people who inspired you
to do what you do. Yeah, that is a very, very big
topic in Vietnam because there is such a lack of
representation. And you know, I, I posted a
video on Instagram basically saying, you know, the reason why
I finally made a veterinarian Instagram is because I did not
meet my first black veterinarian in the real world until a
clinical externship. So my fourth year in vet school,
I was externing at a emergency hospital in Georgia and there
were multiple black doctors. And when I tell you I was really
speechless, to be honest, I was like, this exists.
This this not only one black doctor, but multiple black
doctors in one hospital. I mean, in vet school, there was
me and one other student in the class of 110 people.
And it just not, I'm not going to say that it's not what I
expected to be honest with you, because I grew up, I went to a
magnet academic middle school where I only had a couple of
black friends. I went to an academic magnet
high school that was more diverse, but still not very many
black people. And of course, and on top of
that, how many black people that wanted to be veterinarians.
And so it's like, I can relate to you in the real world, but I
can't relate to you in what I want to do.
And it just kind of sucked, to be honest with you.
It sucked, but now I think this has fueled me to just want to be
a small part of that representation and, you know, do
everything that I can to show Black girls and Black boys out
there that you can do this. You absolutely can do this.
And whatever I need to do to help you not only believe in
yourself, but to make this more accessible for you.
I want to do that again because this is already such a hard
field to get into anyone. And then you add the non access
of being a black person to that and it's, it makes it even
tougher. It is, it is very, very tough.
And I am very thankful to have not only worked with one other,
I had one black intern mate, but now I've got 4 black interns
that work under me. And it is, it is amazing.
I mean, it is to walk into work and again, know that I can
relate to you culturally and I can relate to you in the
workplace and we can go through these things together.
You know, me being out of school for almost three years now and
then just getting out of school, knowing that I can even be
somewhat of a mentor to them, I think just means everything to
me. I.
Would love to talk to you about that, how you now have interns
working under you. So I go to University of
Missouri. I went to U of I Urbana
Champagne for undergrad. It's incredibly diverse at U of
I because you are getting everyone from Chicagoland, and I
loved it because I felt like I got to experience a little bit
of the world. St.
Louis, MO is not as diverse, so that's why I chose U of I and I
loved it. Now that I am back in Missouri,
I feel the weight of having a less diverse class
significantly, especially with what's going on in the world.
And I want to say I don't like that I'm not a part of having
more voices around me and having more diverse opinions.
And, and I think we need people who are in the majority to
recognize that. Like, I am the typical white
girl who grew up in suburbs, applied to veterinary school.
My class was not incredibly diverse in high school and
college. It was.
But I believe in educating ourselves and the voices that
are not in the room who need to be in the room.
So thank you for doing what you do.
Yeah. And thank you for not only kind
of recognizing the privilege that you have, but and saying I
want to be a part of the change. I I think that's very important.
Thanks. I would love to talk about you
had a post saying that you were first generation doctor.
I have a friend who had a similar experience to you when
she was applying to veterinary school.
You know, she did some research, became like you were talking
about, she got good grades, she worked at a couple clinics.
She thought she had done everything to the T that she was
going to get in. But because she lacked
mentorship and accessibility, she didn't know how much you had
to have like the gap that existed because of lack of
accessibility. And so she actually stepped away
from the field after getting rejected her first time were
five years and then came back, got into 8 schools.
I say like these gaps can cause like she is phenomenal.
She's one of the best people in our entire class.
I just can't believe that lack of access would cause someone to
maybe not come back into the field.
Yeah. And I think that's a very real
thing. And it's a very tough thing to
digest because there's so much more than just applying to that
school. You know, there, there's so much
beneath the surface level that you don't realize until you kind
of get into the thick of it. And you say, well, now I have to
pay for these applications. Now I'm, I have to travel to
multiple places to interview to these places.
Now I have to provide housing accommodations when I go and
interview for all these places. It's, it's a lot.
It's a lot mentally, you know, how do I make myself look good
on this application? What are they even looking for?
You know, I make good grades, but what else?
What else? What do I even say in my
interview? What do I, what am I going to do
when I don't get in? But if I don't get in, what am I
going to do? There's just all of these things
that go into it that you really don't know unless you maybe know
someone that's been through it or you have again, the resources
to know these things. And unfortunately a lot of
people don't. And again, that's why I am so
thankful for that pre debt cohort at the University of
Tennessee Knoxville, because I just feel like there were so
many things that I did not know because everyone was talking
about it. There was the first clinic that
I worked at which again, I didn't even know that I needed
to work at a clinic to get into that school to be honest with
you or have clinical experience. I did not.
I was like, why? I I love animals like that makes
you a great candidate. I know I want to be a vet, but I
had heard of kind of at least two different people in my pre
veterinary cohort that had gotten a job at this one small
animal clinic. And they would just kind of talk
about it. And I just kind of talked with
them one day, like, hey, do you know if they're still hiring?
Because I knew that they were applying to vet school too.
And they said yeah. And so four of us, four of us
total, all works there together. And there was another technician
there that was actively in vet school and another that was
applying to vet school. And so I am very, very thankful
for that first kennel tech job to this day because I think it
provided me with at least the baseline knowledge of the things
that I needed to start applying to vet school or looking into
that score, just those things that go again, beyond that
surface level of just the vet school application I wanted to.
Talk a little bit about your Instagram, which is how we found
you and why we felt the need to have you on here because a,
you're just so interesting to talk to and I love watching all
of your content because I think we were talking about it
previously. But it's really important to
find a nice balance between showing the public what we do on
a day-to-day basis because there's a lot of misconceptions
about the puppies and kitties, not real doctors, all of that.
So showing them kind of what you're doing on a day-to-day
basis, and it's not always pretty and it's not always just
the Wellness appointments is really important to me.
And, you know, it's not something I've had the privilege
to be engaged in as a student because of social media policies
and etcetera. And I just wanted to know what
inspired you to start talking about it and start showing the
realness of what you do everyday.
Yeah. I struggled with or I went back
and forth for the longest time about making an Instagram.
I wanted to start when I was in vet school.
But of course, similarly to you guys, we had very strict social
media policies. So when I would post myself with
an animal, I'd cover the face. Like I'd have to get permission
from the owner, then I'd still have to cover the face of the
animal and it just kind of takes away, but it, it just kind of
doesn't give you the umph that you kind of want the posts to
have. And so, and I honestly kind of
got swallowed in clinicals and all of the things.
And so I just never got around to making an, a separate
Instagram. But I always got such a positive
response, even when I would post things from the clinic that I
was working at on my personal Instagram.
And everyone just really liked keeping up with me.
And so I just kind of said, one day I'm, I'm going to do it.
And I think that there's so much hesitation that comes with
social media, especially being in the medical field on social
media, because it opens the floor for anybody to say
anything, for anybody to misconstrue anything that you're
doing, Especially with me being in rural large animal medicine
as well. There are so many things that we
do in large animal medicine that are different from small
animals. You know, I posted a video of me
castrating a pig and it kind of got on the wrong side of
Instagram and people were like, why is the pig moving?
And I'm like, well, honestly, in 40% of other places, they don't
even sedate these things. So it just you have those
moments still where you wish people would understand.
But I think that when I decided to start my Instagram, I knew
that I didn't want it to be puppies and rainbows all the
time. Like, I just knew that I wanted
to show people what rural mixed animal medicine looks like.
It's not pretty and there are some days where I work 16 hours
and then I'm on call and I have to be back at the clinic after
sleeping for four hours. But at the end of the day, I
love what I do and I hope that that is always the core of what
shines on my Instagram, But I I never want to fake it for social
media. I always told myself if I put
myself out there, it's going to be wholeheartedly.
I've gotten such a positive response and I'm I'm very
thankful that I just, I went ahead and decided to do it, but
I think I just really woke up and told myself one day.
I think I just want to start putting myself out there.
I know that there. Are people who are really
interested, especially pre vets, they love to see.
I loved to see. I was just a pre vet a year ago.
I'm not, you know, saying anything bad, but pre vets love
to see what their future is going to look like and all of
the different possibilities. Not the only person at LSU with
of that focused Instagram. I'm not the only person on the
Internet with that focused Instagram.
When it gets really big and you have people not in veterinary
medicine seeing your content, like you said, that can be
scary. Or even just people in
veterinary medicine and being like putting yourself out there
and saying this is kind of scary.
I don't really want my peers to judge me.
Or, for example, somebody at a professor of mine knew my name
and I had never introduced myself and I was like, why do
you know me? Did I do something bad?
Didn't like my thing get reported?
Like that was my first thought. Obviously nothing, probably bad.
I don't know why he knew that, but it's just those are the
thoughts that kind of run through my head.
I get a little scared with social media and
misunderstanding, and it doesn't matter what field you're in,
there's going to be conflict. If everybody had the same
opinion, we wouldn't do what we do.
But I think it's interesting and fun to post.
So if you're thinking about starting one, start 1.
I don't know. I know, I think I started mine
the night before I started that school and I was like terrified
for no reason. I was like, I have Instagram.
It's not like I'm doing something new.
I'm just making a new account. I'd run APVMA national accounts,
I'd run multiple. Like most of my club positions
were running social media. So I don't know why I was so
terrified, but I just same thing.
I was just like, no, I'm just going to do it at, like,
midnight the night before school.
And I was already nervous, and I thought that was a great idea.
And here we are. And so it's just inspiring to
see other people thrive on social media and keep it
positive and not let all of the misconceptions and possible hate
or negativity get to them and stop posting or doing what they
do. So yeah.
Absolutely. It is.
Again, it is very scary. But I think what's even scarier
too is all of the misinformation online in the veterinary world.
And so I do think a part of my platform is used to try to just
educate people. Like 90% of my following are
other veterinary professionals or maybe people who are pre vet
or things like that. But if by chance some of my
content comes across people who are pet parents or owners or
things like that, I want them to also be educated on the things
that we do. Because Facebook, let me tell
you, Facebook is constantly putting out crazy, crazy things
and like scaling your own dog's teeth at home and just just
crazy stuff, crazy stuff. So I think it's just very
important also to use your platform for the good of the
general population. I love.
You talking about misinformation because I see so much of it on
Facebook and it drives me in sane.
Or people think that they know more than you because they saw a
TikTok from someone who doesn't have a degree and you know you
don't need a degree to know a lot.
Access to education is difficult.
You could use ChatGPT to breakdown a research paper if
you don't understand the research paper to summarize it.
Double check though, you could watch YouTube videos posted by
doctors. So thank you for contributing
good information. I'd love to hear about how you
operate this account within your practice and also like the team
culture of your practice. Yeah.
So I work at a very large practice and I think one of the
reasons that I decided to stay at the practice after my
internship was just the true mentorship that I got there.
And I think mentorship is such almost like a trigger word in
veterinary medicine because I think a lot of people want to
mentor and they hear you should have a mentor, mentor, mentor.
But what does that really mean to a lot of people?
And I think that's kind of what I push people to figure out,
especially when these pre vets, now that I've created the social
media, when these pre vet students come to me and ask me
to be their mentor, you know, I kind of tell them to take a step
back and say, well, what are you looking for in a mentor?
What does mentor mean to you? And then you tell me.
And then let's see if our our goals align because I would love
to be that for you. But I also want to make sure
that you know what it is that you were looking for.
And so I think that I had to kind of figure that out for
myself during my, my intern year.
But I think that the reason again, that I, I stayed after my
internship at the practice that I'm at is because it really does
feel like a team, you know, and there are good things and bad
things about every practice, but there are so many doctors.
I think we have 15 doctors total, 15 to 16 doctors total at
my practice. There are a lot of doctors that
I can ask for anything at any point, especially during my
intern year where I felt like a chicken with my head cut off and
you know, I was drinking from a fire hose and all of the things.
I felt like there were multiple doctors at all points that I
could call it 2:00 AM when I had a cat stuck and I couldn't get
it out and they were gonna come up there and help me.
And so I do think that that is very, very important, especially
as a young veterinarian practicing crazy rural mixed
animal medicine. Like I think there's so many
things that honestly could go wrong with that and just
learning traditional medicine and all of these crazy things.
But I think that all of us do our best to keep each other on
our toes and push each other to be our best selves.
Luckily, when I started my Instagram, I had two years worth
of content already because I'm just someone who loves to whip
out my phone or take a picture or take a bit, especially if
like all the wounds and things that I have just for me to look
back on myself. And so I think that that's maybe
what made my process into social media a little bit more seamless
because I already had all of these things.
And I genuinely do love being creative.
I think that I am very chronically online and so I see
a lot of these like TikTok trends or things like that.
And I'm like, how can I make this a bit meant because that is
1 goal of my page 2 is like, I think I'm the funniest person in
the world. So, you know, I love to keep
myself on my toes and I love to like see trends where people are
talking about their toxic boyfriend.
And I'm like, how can I make this about that Med?
So I think I'm constantly like pushing myself to be better,
especially when it comes to social media.
And I'm doing all of it on my own.
So it's a lot of work. But again, luckily I have a lot
of content that I can pull from and there's days where I'll just
scroll through my pictures and I'm like, I specifically
remember this case from a year and a half ago.
I need to post about it. So I think that that is what
makes it at least a little bit easier for me to kind of be on
social media. And I just had.
Some logistics questions, I don't know what the clinic
social media policy is. Is it just kind of like with
it's livestock, it's probably fine or if it's a pet, no
identifiers, what does that look like?
Do you ask each client or do you just kind of it's in the new
client paperwork and it's whatever, What does that look
like? Yeah.
So if it is a picture of something like a wound or
there's no identifiers, typically if it's gonna be
something gross or it's a sensitive situation, then I ask
the owner. And if there are identifiers
like I'm posting the animal's face or they may have their name
on their collar or things like that, then I'm definitely asking
the owner. Our clinic does doesn't do
social media. My my clinic is run by three
white men in their piece. So they all hate social media,
to be honest with you, and I'm I'm the first one I think that
has come in their clinic and been kind of all about social
media. So it's very new for them.
And so I, I think I take it upon myself to chat with clients
like, Hey, I have an Instagram. This is a really cool case.
Do you mind if I post about it just because they, you know, and
they have a Facebook. Facebook is, is for I think the
40 plus mainly, but you know, I think they, they put they don't
really post much on their Facebook.
So I kind of take it upon myself to say, OK, if I'm going to put
something out here on social media, I would hate for an owner
to see it and would have not wanted me to post it, especially
with sensitive situations like the animal ended up being
euthanized or the animal was still sick or things like that.
So I tried to mainly post about the things that the animal is
doing well. But if it's a situation that is
kind of a little sensitive, most of the time I just won't post
about it. Or I will like take a picture of
1 specific thing like maybe the animal's par or something and be
like had a really tough case, you know?
And that way, I'm not saying anything specifically about that
animal and I'm just trying. I'm trying to educate people but
also be sensitive to the owners you mentioned.
The owners of the clinic being, you know, older white men and
it's an interesting point side written down on here, even
though the field is now, I don't know, 80 plus percentage percent
female leadership positions are still held by mostly men.
Thoughts, concerns, like, I don't know, I just wanted to
talk about that. Yeah.
I have I have a lot of thoughts. I think about that specifically.
I would, I would love to see more women run clinics
specifically because I think there's just something
empathetic about a woman, you know, and there's just something
understanding about a woman and open minded about a woman.
And not to say I'm like sexist or anything, but I just also
think there are a lot of traditional views that naturally
come with a 50 to 60 plus year old white male running a
company, especially in a rural part of Texas.
And so you can imagine, you can imagine how awkward things feel
at times, especially as a black woman and especially during
certain interactions with clients or things like that.
Do I 100% expect all of my bosses to have my back at every
point? I'd love to say yes, but I think
as a black woman in that Med, I've kind of had to learn to
have my own back when it comes to these things.
And that's nothing on my boss's specifically.
I think they're great, but I think I also have to address the
inherent kind of biases that are there.
Yeah, I. Know that there's just some
nightmare situations. Rural Texas, old fashioned, I've
heard it. I find myself, I don't know if
it's because I was raised there or just general society.
I don't know. But like sometimes I think about
it and I'm like going into a practice and I'm like, oh, I
want that vet. And then I might have gone to a
new vet and I have like a young woman that and I'm like, I don't
know if I like her. And then I had to kind of sit
down and think about it because I was like, why did I say that?
She didn't do anything, And I just had to turn it around and
say like, no, I bet she's awesome.
And then when I thought about it, I was like, but why?
Why don't I trust them as much? I never really quite placed it,
but I was like, that's such an awful thing to think.
And the fact that that's been beaten to us as women is
upsetting. Even though we're still a
majority of the field. When you go to a vet, I feel
that a lot of people, even people in that school, even
women in that school will still choose and older, more
experienced, like straight white guy over a younger, you know,
new grad, that female. I don't know.
It's just something interesting that I thought about here
recently. Yeah.
And, and I think that goes along with majority of the population
to be honest with you. Like when I walk into a room, I
think sometimes you just get that feeling of like this
person's not going to trust anything I say, especially
enlarge animal because not only am IA woman, but I'm a black
woman. And then I go out there and I
tell a farmer that's been doing this for 20 plus years, maybe
you should change this. Or maybe this is what your cow
got into. And they look at me like I'm the
dumbest person in the world. And that is humbling to say the
least. And it's, it's a little, it's
very upsetting, but it's, it's just something that I think has
forced me to toughen my skin, honestly.
It obviously comes from a place of ignorance.
And I think it just forces me to stand my ground even more
because I am educated and I do know what I'm talking about.
And you can choose to believe me or you can choose not to believe
me. But my boss is going to come out
here and tell you the same thing.
And then maybe that'll kind of set it into stone for you.
So I think I wish things were different and I don't, I really
don't foresee them changing, especially in the area that I'm
in specifically. It just sucks.
It sucks. And then that Med specifically,
because I feel like me as a black woman, maybe I have a
little bit of a different mindset, but like when I'm
looking for a doctor or when I'm looking for like an OBGYN or I'm
looking for anything, I'm like, I want a black doctor.
I want someone who is going to listen to me and is going to
understand me. And you know what, she can be
straight out of school. And so I think that maybe my
experience is just a little bit, and maybe I'm looking at it from
a little bit of a different lens.
And I wish that maybe people, and my least favorite thing to
hear people say is can I get an experienced vet or can I, can I
get a senior vet? And I'm just like, what do you
mean by that? What do you mean by that?
Like you, you know that people who are graduating school now
are graduating with some of the most up to date information.
There is a world of veterinary medicine.
Yeah. So it is.
It's tough. It is tough, yeah.
And I've seen it in practice. Same kind of scenario.
Rural vet, Med straight. Why?
Guy owner and he hires a new grad and it's usually a woman
because we're majority female now.
And I know I've watched it happen in front of my eyes
because I worked at that clinic. And even when I wasn't working
there, I was there with my pets. And so there were specific times
where the 52 tiny little like new grad veterinarian female
would come out and work on something in the barn.
And then the people that were there would say, well, where's
the other doctor? OK, well, she's here for a
reason and he hired her for a reason.
Like she is competent, she is skilled and she knows what she's
doing. But then they would make all of
these comments, even if they were accepting her and letting
her do what she needed to do. Then you get all the comments.
Well, you're just so tiny. Like I can't believe you're
doing this. I can't believe you're palpating
this cow when you're so tiny and you're such a woman.
Like that's those are the comments that drive me crazy.
And this is a totally different experience.
I'm not comparing it to being a black woman or being a black
woman in veterinary medicine, but I grew up in a 75% Hispanic
town and I got told I was too white to work where I was
working at. Like it is universal.
It is females, it is, it's just a mess.
Like all of this is just a mess. And I wish people, even if you
think that and you need to go home and rethink that, maybe
just don't say it out loud. There was no reason that you
needed to tell 16 year old Michaela, well, you're too white
to work here. What does that mean?
Hey, and I know that I'm not the only person that has an
experience like that. So regardless of your situation,
there's always somebody out there that's going to not trust
you, prey on your downfall. Like for whatever reason, I
don't know, everybody's got their biases and it's just an
interesting topic to talk about because you could go on forever,
especially in veterinary medicine or doctors in general,
because people have a certain trust level with the traditional
image of a doctor. And if you don't need that, then
they're not going to trust you. So I'd like.
To talk about something related to that too.
So we just recently spoke to Doctor Bailey, who's the
president of the AVMA, and in our conversation after the
episode ended, I asked what made him want to run for his
position. And this is public information
too, so don't worry, we can share this.
He said he had gone up as far as he could in the AVMA and his
state level, and he was looking at the field and how far he
could go. And he said there has never been
a black AVM, a president. And I ran because that needed to
change. And I felt his tone and I felt
the weight of his words. And it's not just like that we
dare to dream. It's this pressure because we we
see that ignorance all the time. When you're the young
veterinarian who doesn't represent their normal, typical
rural veterinarian, you automatically are hit with bias,
and he wants to change that. I would love to hear if you have
ever felt pressure to have to go above and beyond a normal
veterinarian because of how you look.
Yeah. Absolutely.
And I think it really goes back to the saying that are like a
black woman has to work twice as hard for the exact same result.
I think that I've never felt that more until I got into rural
mixed animal medicine, to be honest with you.
And I don't know if I would have felt that same way going into a
small animal practice in a metropolitan area, you know, and
where people are maybe more used to seeing at least some
diversity. But where I'm at is a very small
town. And it is even the people that
I, the staff, you know, are very small town minded.
They don't leave their small town, you know, they still know
everyone they went to high school with and all of the
things. And so it was a very, very much
so a culture shock for me. And I do feel like especially
during my intern year where there were times where I
probably was second guessing myself a lot, I had to go above
and beyond to again, prove the exact same thing that my boss
would have done. And you can just hear people not
trusting you. And I think at first I would
cower, you know, at first I would be like, OK, you're
probably right. We'll try this your way.
But then I had to realize like, no, I deserve to have space in
this field and I deserve to have space in this clinic and I
deserve to have space in the large animal realm, you know,
because I'm capable of this. And so I think it just came with
a mindset shift for me and kind of gave me the the determination
to prove people wrong. So it was one of those things
where, you know, I am going to take all the large animal cards
for today because I need to prove to people and to prove to
our client base, our large animal client base that I am
competent. And I hate that it has to be
that way. You know, I hate that I have to
overwork myself to prove myself. But it's one of those things
where I feel like there may be no other way, especially in the
the part of town that I'm in, you know, unfortunately.
Is there anything? Else you wanted to talk about
today before we start wrapping up.
I think there's no. I think this has been honestly a
really a really good talk just about experiences as a black
woman in Batman. I think I hope that people watch
this and and get a little bit more insight to not only.
The. Inaccessibility and how hard it
is really, but also to show you that you really can do it.
Yeah, and thank. You for coming on.
I know I was kind of scared. I talked to people in my class
about it because I was like, I need somebody to like give me
permission to this isn't my space.
I am not a black woman. I am not any minority, you know
what I mean? Like I, Gretel and I represent
the largest demographic in the field.
So I felt a little uncomfortable saying, OK, well, I'm not
trying. We don't monetize off this.
We don't even really get a lot of views.
We're genuinely doing this to, you know, promote Black
veterinarians and how awesome just everybody can be.
And it's Black History Month and it just seemed like a nice
little setup. So thank you for coming on and
giving us the opportunity to do that.
Because like I said, I was, I was a little scared.
I was like, people are going to tell me that this isn't my
place. This isn't what I should be
doing and it's not about me. I wasn't trying to make it about
me. So I'm really grateful that you
would come on and talk about everything with us.
And one thing that we're going to start doing as of this
episode is kind of ending off with like a little positivity
boost, especially after such a heavy topic.
And we couldn't decide between a couple, so we were going to let
you choose. And we just have silly little
questions, but we'll let you choose which one.
And then we'll just do that for the rest of our episodes.
That's cool with you. Yeah.
So we have what's bringing you joy today, Something simple,
open-ended, whatever you want. What's something good about
veterinary medicine right now? Or if you want to get even
simpler, what's your favorite song right now?
Just something positive to wrap up all of our episodes with.
And we just thought you would be able to choose one for us.
Yeah. Yeah, let's do it first.
I think the first is is good. All right, well, what's?
Bringing you joy today so. What's bringing me joy is I'm
actually at home in Nashville for the weekend.
It's my niece's third birthday. It is so crazy how time flies
and I am just such a family girl and it has been honestly very
hard being away from my family in Texas.
But it makes me really value the time that I spend at home more.
Oh, really just my heart is just full being home, being with my
niece, being with my family. So then that made me happy,
really happy today. All right, Well, thank.
You again? And what is your Instagram?
Where can people find you? You can find me at lex dot the
Vet Play on words. So let's talk the vet on
Instagram, Doctor Alexia Wade. My DMS are always open to anyone
who has any questions at any point.
My e-mail is also in my bio so feel free to shoot me a DM,
follow me, send me an e-mail. I'm a one woman show so I may
not get back to you immediately but I will.
All right. Thanks.
Everybody for listening and we'll see you next time.