Why I am Pursuing a Residency...

I feel like I should explain myself and my career goals...I think perhaps not everyone understands what exactly I am doing. I know there are people out there who think I am still in school...I am not...I have my license and I could go anywhere and work. What I have chosen to do is pursue further, higher training. I am in an internship now, yes, but this is still a job! I am working, getting paid, my patients are mine and I make the decisions on them. And after this year, yes I could just go work in a small vet clinic, but I do not want to do that kind of work. Vaccinations, broken toenails, spays, declaws are just not my life's goals...I want to specialize and so that is the reason for me pursuing a residency. It is still going to be a job...I will be working every day...it is just different kind of work, specialized...like when you go to the doctor for surgery you do not go to your regular practioner, or for GI issues they send you to the gastroenterologist...the same thing holds true for veterinary medicine. Human doctors have to go on and do internships and residencies as part of their training...veterinarians do not, but there are the select few of us who wish to do that and want to specialize in a certain aspect of veterinary medicine. That is me. I like internal medicine. What that means is that when you take your pet in to your local veterinarian and they diagnose it with thyroid disease or adrenal disease or it is losing weight and you can't figure out why or the treatment is not working and the pet is getting worse...they will refer you to someone like me...for further diagnostics, and treatments that are out of their capability both mentally and physically. Once I am done, I will never do vaccines or spay/neuters or broken toenails...I won't work in a small little practice with one vet and one technician...I hope to be in a specialty practice somewhere with other specialties like oncology, surgery, dermatoloy, exotics, pathology....why?...because I do not ever wish to do surgery or deal with dermatologic issues...and I never want to see rabbits/ferrets/birds/reptiles again...so you see...I have a special interest....internal medicine, and so that is why I wish to pursue higher training...so that I can be Board-certified in that specialty and deal with only internal medicine issues. If I went into regular practice I would be miserable...I would find it remedial and boring. So yes, this training is long and it may take me far away from family and friends....for a little while...but afterwards I will be happy with my career choice and I will be able to move anywhere and get a job...and then I can think about starting a family. I know it seems weird and people are skeptical about why I think I need to go all over the place and why can't I just get a job...but it doesn't work like that...not yet anyway... So, if you all care, here are the states I am applying to: Minnesota, North Carolina, Boston MA, California, Georgia, Texas, Tennessee, Michigan, Ohio, Alabama, Colorado, New York.,..in no particular order - I have not decided my rank order yet. So, I am really excited and I hope that I get a spot. This is a very competitive residency...there are hundreds of us applying for ONE SINGLE SPOT at a particular place!! Yes, that is crazy and I am scared that I will not get chosen...so I know that there are those who don't understand why I am going to be moving all over - but if you could just be happy for me and send up some prayers for me between now and March (when I find out)...I would appreciate it....I need your support now and throughout the training...even if that means I head somewhere else for 3 years...don't count me out of the family because at the end of it all hopefully my smiles will be well worth it.