Confrontations

I dislike confrontations. I really dislike them. In fact, I will do almost anything to avoid them....but there are times when that is impossible. Today was one of those times.
I have a new puppy, Gabrielle, who is almost ten weeks old. Since I have moved to North Carolina I needed to find a new vet and since there is only one in this town, I went to him first, when she was six weeks old.

The first time I called I thought I was talking to Ellie Mae from the Beverly Hillbillies and immediately chided myself for being judgmental and prejudiced against a person whose voice modulations and accents were different from mine. She was very kind and very friendly though and I found myself warming to her, especially when I went into the office and met her, a woman about my age, well coifed, neatly dressed, seemingly efficient and very upbeat. In fact the entire office seemed very efficient and upbeat. Everyone fawned over the new puppy, one of the women swooped down and whisked the stool sample off for testing and soon I met the vet, Himself.

Himself is probably thirty years old, or so, gentle with Gabrielle, sweet and friendly. He made small talk with me and the puppy, informed me the fecal test was negative and gave us some Revolution for fleas and heart worm. I paid his cheerful staff and made an appointment for three weeks later, September 29th. Oops, on the day of my appointment I took Gabrielle and another fecal sample into the cheerful little office only to be informed that my appointment was for the next week. I explained that I needed it to be that day because she needed this puppy shot and again they were very accommodating. The same woman swooped down to do the test on the stool sample, but then it turned out that they had no record of us ever being there before. The beaming clerk, was full of confidence while she informed me that they often don't keep track of first appointments? Anyway, it wasn't long before I was back in the little room with Himself.

He checked out the puppy, gave her some worm medicine and her puppy shot. The same woman who swooped in on the fecal matter, swooped in again to hold Gabrielle with great finesse, so that there was no question who was in charge. She was. Gabby didn't really care and neither did I. As I was paying the happy people at the front counter I was informed that once again the test was negative. It wasn't until I got home that the irony of this came to me. Why give a dog worm medicine if the test was negative? Oh well, I assumed maybe it was routine now.

About eight hours later, Gabrielle went to the bathroom and there were tons of little white worms wriggling all over and around it. It was truly gross and not something I had ever seen before. I called the vet the next morning and Ellie Mae answered. I told her the test was negative, but they had given her worm medicine anyway. She didn't miss a beat. That was common procedure, not to worry. I then told her about the tiny white worms and she literally oozed authority when she told me, "Well see darlin' she needed that worm medicine then, didn't she? Those are just round worms. All puppies have them." I tried to explain that these just didn't seem like round worms and I didn't understand why round worms would not show up on fecal tests two separate times. She was kind, slightly exasperated and placatingly explained how normal it was again.

Four days later I called back to say there were still live looking worm pieces coming out of my dog and she told me, once more, that it just took a while to kill all those nasty ole worms. By now I was pretty sure these were tape worm segments. I know tape worms often don't show up on the fecal tests and I know regular wormers don't work on them. I also know the segments coming out are just squirming pieces of the main creature that are filled with egg sacks and dry up after they hit the air.

I also knew I was not going to get to talk to this vet and this woman was not going to pay any attention to me. So, I called my old vet, back in Illinois, who immediately confirmed that they were almost surely tape worms. I had a choice. Pick a new vet in some other town, when this vet seems competent behind the cocoon of office workers around him, or find a way to talk with him. In the long run, everyone will be better off if something around him changes, so I scooped up another pile of worm infested _ _ _ _ and called the office.

I didn't ask anything. I told Ellie that I was pretty sure my dog had a tape worm and would like to bring a stool sample in to have the doctor look at it. She wasn't exactly thrilled, but she told me to come in. I did and there was the happy little twosome sitting behind the counter. I repeated what I had said on the telephone and one jumped up and grabbed the sac from my unsuspecting fingers. I grabbed it back. She looked at me, puzzled, and asked if I didn't want it tested and I told her again that it probably wouldn't show up this time either. I wanted the doctor to look at it and I would really like to speak to him if it was possible. She said, "Oh tapeworms are nothing. They don't hurt anything."

They all looked at each other with that look that says, how dare she, a common patient, be like this. Inside I was shaking. Outside I breathed quietly and said, "I'll wait." There was much running back and forth to little back rooms while I sat in the waiting room holding my little bag of worms and dog poo. It was not one of my finer moments, but on the whole I think I was being very reasonable. Soon the vet came running out full of vim, vigor and confidence to tell me my dog had spiro something or other and....oops was I not Dollie's owner? No, that was the guy looking concerned over there by the door, watching and listening to all the rest.

By the time he came over to talk to me, he was sort of ready. Well, he was smiling and being charming and trying to gloss over any unpleasantness, but I felt that after more than a week of worrying, I deserved to be heard. I quietly explained to him that I had called twice last week and been put off both times by a woman who appeared to have all the correct answers and simply brushed me off. He said he was sorry, but he didn't sound sorry. We then began a debate that I knew I was going to win.

I told him that I had to call my vet in Illinois to get a diagnosis, because I couldn't talk to him. He tried to tell me that tape worms were okay and I pointed out that each segment is filled with egg sacs that can be ingested by fleas and passed back around and besides, I cannot sleep with a puppy passing squirming little white worm segments out of its body. I said that I was sorry I was being so hard to get along with, but if we were going to have an ongoing relationship for the next 18 years, we needed to be able to communicate with each other.

He scurried back to his office and came out with a medicine bottle. Then he stopped and asked how much she weighed. I told him 3.5 pounds last Monday, but that I was sure she had put on weight this week. He smiled ingratiatingly and ran back to his office only to come out a few minutes later with a Praziquantel tablet. (That was a relief, because I know this works.) I paid his angry staff and told them I was sorry, but I couldn't live with the worms any longer.

I still feel wrung out. I hate confrontations, but whether it is a southern thing, a North Carolina thing, a Canton thing, or simply bad business, I have found this to be true across the board here. There is one mix up after another because the people who take care of the business don't know enough to do what they do and the one in charge is not available in person. I had the same problem with my Insurance agent, who is still trying to straighten out the mess he made when I transferred my business here, the bank, who finally got my checks ordered, and now the vet. Whatever happened to personal accountability?