As a new graduate vet, you face many challenges – not all of which are related to your working environment and clinical experience, or knowledge. Not only are you embarking on the very first steps of a career with a phenomenally steep learning curve in the first few months, but you’re also faced with the challenge of adjusting to life beyond university.
While I think new grads are very aware of what they want from their first job, the reality of finding it can be very different. We all set out to find a team we fit in with, a location we like and the ability to continue hobbies outside our working lives, but the truth is that can be quite difficult to achieve.
Beyond the difficulties of being a newly graduated vet, you are still a person in a new place having just finished university. Vet or not, anybody in this position will no doubt experience some degree of loneliness.
Location, location, location
Some new grads will be lucky enough to move to areas of the country with friends not too far away, move back home close to family or drag their long-suffering other halves along with them; but many will be on their own.
Notoriously, location comes quite far down the list of priorities when finding your first job and, for those seeking mixed, farm or equine jobs (or even small animal positions in rural practices), you may find yourself in the middle of nowhere.
New graduates will have had a least some experience of living in a university city or town and, whether they prefer the countryside or not, the culture shock can be quite real. The pure location of many practices ultimately results in a feeling of isolation, but it is also the change in pace and lifestyle that can contribute to the loneliness.
Constant contact
At university, you will have likely lived with friends, seen them on a day-to-day basis around campus and had regular organised social gatherings (be that between your own friend groups or whole class or even university events).
You may have been part of a sports team or other society and would have another group of friends from there, with whom you attended regular training sessions, matches, meetings and socials.
You live in each others pockets, in a city where you can barely nip to the shop without seeing someone you know – there’s always something happening.
Then you qualify as a vet…
Isolation
Suddenly, you find yourself in picturesque countryside, miles from friends and family, with the nearest big supermarket a half-hour drive away, never mind a cinema, nightclub or netball pitch. Or maybe you did take a job in a thriving city, but you still don’t know anyone – there’s a lot happening somewhere in this metropolis, but you don’t know how to find out about events, nor do you have anyone to go to them with.
The loneliness and isolation can be crippling. So what can you do about it?
Stay in touch with your university friends
Arrange to meet up with them, no matter how hard it is to synchronise on-call schedules and weekend rotas.
Have a WhatsApp group to keep in contact on a more regular basis. If you had an awful day at work and have nobody to vent to, your fellow new grads will understand better than your non-vet friends as they’re going through exactly the same thing.
Make time for your non-vet friends and family
FaceTime or Skype are wonderful for this, especially if you’re struggling to find time to go “home-home” for the weekend. They will often give you some perspective and give you a break from the incessant vet chat.
Join a club
This can be harder than you may anticipate, especially in remote areas – it’s not quite as easy as wondering around freshers fair signing up for whatever you fancy.
Be prepared to put in some leg work to find out about local sports teams and how to get yourself there. It may take a bit of effort, but it will no doubt pay off to keep you sane.
Discover local events and tag along with colleagues
Those who have been working and living in the area for a while will know how to find out what’s happening locally. The longer you live somewhere, the more you find out about these things.
Join your Young Vet Network
Some are more active than others, but Young Vet Network events can provide a way of meeting up with other young vets to broaden your social circle further. Similarly, attending local CPD may give rise to newfound friendships in the area.
Attend or create a “meet-up”
www.meetup.com is a website that provides a platform for meeting new people. In many places, there will already be established meet-ups where you can meet for a drink, go bowling, ice skating, go for dinner or explore the tourist sites with a group of like-minded people.
Having attended “meet-ups” in a previous city and followed me to a new location, my partner set up his own meet up group because there wasn’t an active one. He intended it for young professionals new to the area, and after a number of meet-ups, has a regular group of acquaintances that are quickly becoming friends.
While not necessarily veterinary related, this does provide a great opportunity to help combat that new graduate feeling of isolation.
Social by nature
Luckily, for the most part, our day jobs are quite social and involve constant interaction with our work colleagues and the public. Many new graduates will find themselves becoming good friends with their work colleagues, which will help them settle, too.
If you really are not settling, don’t struggle in silence. You don’t have to stay in a job if you aren’t happy for whatever reason. Even the best job in the world clinically may not be right for you if you are alone and miserable outside of work. Life’s too short to to stay in a location you don’t fit with.
If all else fails, get a dog… or a cat.
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