Wow, we’re reaching the end of another crazy year in the veterinary world. A record number of pet adoptions, shifting safety protocols, pet parents still spending more time and noticing more issues with their pets, and a backlog of delayed care and complications—it’s all added up to enduring veterinary clinic overwhelm.

While many kids you encounter at upcoming Thanksgiving and holiday festivities may think you have the coolest jobs in the world (and you do!) we at PetDesk also recognize the above-and-beyond sacrifice every member of the veterinary community has made over the past 20 pandemic months and counting.

You put Care First and we are grateful for everything you do.

We are grateful for the practice managers who have somehow kept their cool while they’ve kept the office staff together, the supplies flowing, and the books straight amidst some of the most hectic times any of us has ever known.

We are grateful for the front desk teams who have been confronted by more calls, texts, emails and DMs from more pet parents with more types of questions and somehow still have a smile for every human and animal who comes in.

We are grateful to the veterinary technicians for your expertise in making a veterinary appointment—even the needles!—as comfortable as possible for the pets in your charge.

We are grateful for the veterinary assistants who prioritize each animal’s happiness as you usher them through appointments, keep watch over them after procedures, and care for them when they’re staying over.

And where would any of us be without the doctors of veterinary medicine? It takes a special type of person to combine your depth of knowledge and dedication to pet well-being with a healthy dose of personality. We at PetDesk couldn’t be more grateful to have jobs that entail working with you!

Because caring for pets is your day-to-day, it can be easy to overlook the incredible, positive impact you have on lives, including on the pet lovers and our pet kids here at PetDesk. Just a reminder, together your work benefits more than 200 million companion animals and hundreds of millions of humans who consider these furry, scaley, feathered, and sometimes bald friends true members of the family.

We assume your patients would thank you in their own way if they could (oh the cacophony!). In their stead, however, we’ll offer up a human toast, our well wishes for a Happy Thanksgiving and a holiday season full of joy, and a well-intentioned exhortation for you to put Self-Care First, too. Because you deserve it!