Wellbeing in Vet Med: From Struggle to Purpose with Dr. Quincy Hawley

Veterinary burnout, wellbeing, empowerment ...

In this episode of Vet Life Reimagined, Dr. Quincy Hawley, a 2013 veterinary graduate from NC State,  shares his honest journey from early-career struggle and self-doubt to resilience, purpose, and leadership. Through personal development, connection, and faith, Quincy learned that true wellbeing is the ability to thrive despite challenges.

He now empowers veterinary professionals through Get Motiveted! and the Veterinary Burnout Preparedness Program, helping others build identity, resilience, and hope within the profession.

If you’ve ever questioned your place in veterinary medicine, this episode will remind you that you’re not alone and that change is possible.

Resources:

• Episode on YouTube
• Get Motiveted website

Transcript

Quincy Hawley: [00:00:00] We invest a lot of money into ourselves as veterinary professionals, but we don't invest in anything into the actual person who's playing the role of the veterinarian.

Megan Sprinkle: Welcome to Vet Life Reimagined. Have you ever felt overwhelmed, but didn't quite have the words to explain it? That quiet, heavy sense that something isn't right, but you can't quite name it as Bene Brown says, name it to tame it. Today's guest, Dr. Quincy Holly, will share his experience with these exact struggles.

As a new veterinary graduate,

quincy found himself in a stressful, isolating place surrounded by others who were also struggling, but without the language to call it what it was. Burnout. What changed everything though, was discovering the power of personal development, community, and connection. Through that journey, Quincy didn't just find words to name what he was experiencing.

He found the tools to rebuild his identity, strengthen his resilience, and ultimately create a mission-driven company called Get Motivated, focused on [00:01:00] empowerment within the veterinary profession. Quincy believes that true wellbeing isn't about avoiding challenges. It's about developing the ability to thrive despite them.

And what makes his story even more powerful is that he didn't wait until he had all the answers before taking action. He simply started one conversation, one connection, one courageous step at a time. If you care about the future of veterinary medicine, emotional resilience, and creating a more

sustainable profession. You'll want to lean into this episode, so let's get to the conversation with Dr. Quincy Hawley.

 ​when did you first realize you were interested in veterinary medicine?

quincy hawley: Yeah, that's, that's a great question. I'm so excited to be here and thank you, uh, so much Megan. And it started like, so early in my life, like my love for animals and things like that. So, I'm from a small town in, uh, North Carolina called Oxford, . Three, , [00:02:00] exits off the Interstate eight Highway 85, and I was born into a family with like over 20 animals.

So we had, um, beagles. 'cause my dad and brother, they were big rabbit hunters. , We lived, lived on six acres, kind of out in the country and. For all, all of the country people out there, you already know, like if you, if you live in the country, you're gonna see wild animals and lots of them typically from reptiles, like little lizards and things like that, to snakes and possums and deer and rabbits and squirrels.

Like anything and, and it came my yard at some point. and from there when I went to college, , I. Decided to do animal science right, because I just love animals so much. And my freshman year. The, the chairman of animal scientist, he, he saw all my GPA he asked me if I'd ever thought about going to veterinary school. And that hadn't really crossed my mind. And so I was like, uh, hadn't thought about that. And he kind of set out the path for me [00:03:00] to, , get into the veterinary science and things like that. And so that's kinda like that. First inkling, uh, of, you know, always love animals, but that was like my first big thing of I can actually become a veterinarian, you know?

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. Well that actually makes sense 'cause you had mentioned that you had some pretty interesting experiences early on, that were part of your journey. And you talked about meeting the director of DEI at NC State at a career fair. And you mentioned something about having a pitiful resume and so.

quincy hawley: my gosh, dude, if you can even call it a resume, it's like some words on the page, basically.

Megan Sprinkle: Well, and that makes sense. If you didn't really think about veterinary medicine until college, you know, you, you weren't necessarily like super active in getting all of this experience, but since that story kind of resonated with you when we were talking about your career journey, do you you mind reflecting and sharing a little bit about [00:04:00] that and, and how you were starting to discover interest and, and network within the profession?

quincy hawley: Yeah, absolutely. So, after the chairman of animal science mentioned, the veterinary path in and of itself. , One of the big things that he told me was to go get like summer internships, and I had never had a summer internship before and so I ended up doing like , a little summer internship at a small animal hospital in my hometown. And then the next year I wanted to apply for something cooler. Like I had friends who were going to work for Craft and Dow AgroSciences and all these cool veterinary schools and things like that. And I was like, I'm gonna give that a shot. And so, , I applied for like a bunch of summer internships and. Lo and behold, like letter after letter after letter of declination came in. So got six letters of declination from all the summer internships I was applying for, and I was pretty discouraged. And I [00:05:00] remember talking to, one of my advisors in animal science. He was like, go to the career fair, walk around, see what you can find.

And that, that's where, where I actually found Dr. Allen Kennedy, who's kinda like my big , mentor. He was the director of like multicultural services at the veterinary school and things like that. And he was at a table with Dr. Roberta Morales from the USDA, APHIS Veterinary Services. And so I introduced myself to them. , I got that internship and it, I was working with NC State, so I got to go out to the, the, the teaching animal unit, work with the small ruminants and stuff like that. It was really cool. Um, got to do some cool things with the USDA and they actually flew me out to Ames, Iowa to work at the National Veterinary Services Laboratories.

And that was a really cool experience where I got to sit two rows behind, Tom Vilsack, who was the Secretary of Agriculture at the time, and just really see a completely different side of veterinary medicine than most people are used to at that early stage in your career.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. So [00:06:00] initially were you kind of thinking small animal, you mentioned growing up with beagles and, and things like that, and your, your horizons are starting to broaden. , So from that, did you have an idea of what you wanted to do or were you like, okay, now I just know there's lots of opportunities, I'm just gonna like keep doing the next step.

quincy hawley: Yeah. So up until , the summer after my freshman year, I worked at the small animal hospital. My brain is still very limited in terms of the scope of veterinary, , medicine and things like that, right? Because, , I have the agricultural experiences being an animal science major, but it's not necessarily veterinary medicine because most people are gonna do animal industry, and things like that. And so it was really, um, just kind of thinking like, okay, I'll just be a veterinarian, work on dogs and cats at this point. And then when I got that, , summer experience of going out to the USDA and going to. NC State and Dr. Kennedy, he's a small ruminant and camelid specialist. Um, he's [00:07:00] probably like one of the best on the East coast and I would , ride out with him in the morning to work with, uh, on like little small goat farms and things like that. And so I really enjoyed working with goats and sheep a lot more than I enjoyed being in the small animal hospital setting because it's outside and I'm a country boy.

I'm used to being outside things like that. And so, I was like, oh, I can do veterinary medicine and not be in, in a tiny, like building the whole time, you know?

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. Although it, I mean, from my understanding, your, your first job out of vet school was in small animal medicine.

quincy hawley: For sure. So, yeah, so, so I got into veterinary school and I actually did another internship after the USDA NC State one, where I was working with Elanco Animal Health. I was a sales rep basically. For their main dairy product. It's called ru Mincing, using more milk per pound of feed, three to four pennies per head per [00:08:00] day.

I still remember that pitch a little bit, but, um, I would basically go and interview like dairy nutritionist, dairy veterinarians, and, dairy, feed food sales reps and things like that, right? And , at the feed mills. And so it was getting me more and more into the sort of food animal realm.

And so when I went to veterinary school, when I finally got in, I was a food animal focused student. So a lot of my experiences in veterinary school were with, , beef cattle, dairy cattle, swine, you know, goat, sheep the food animals, right? A little bit of poultry . So in my senior year of veterinary school, you know, doing all the, the externships, I did this huge dairy externship up in, uh, Michigan so I remember always waking me up in the middle of the night, like boom, boom, boom, on the door to do c-sections of cows in the freezing cold. And I just thought to myself. Doing cow surgeries is so cool, first and foremost, but, um, there's no way [00:09:00] I'm gonna be able to do this as like a married man with a family in the freezing cold in North Carolina, like all by myself. And so I graduated from veterinary school and went immediately into small animal. So I, I really appreciate all of my large animal experiences, but, I think small animal just. Fit a little better, if you will, at the time, at least. So, yep,

Megan Sprinkle: So you had the revelation? Um,

quincy hawley: I have the revelation.

Megan Sprinkle: I, I think all, all of us probably have some type of memory, even if it's from vet school. Sorry, you brought back memories for me, like in vet school, being the one student on call and you get the C-section in the middle of the night and I remember like holding the innards on the cold floor anyway.

Um, yes, yes. Um, sometimes it just takes one to know, okay, don't wanna do this for the rest of my life.

quincy hawley: Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: But anyway, so, okay, so you had your revelation and you graduate from vet school and you [00:10:00] get your first job. What is that like?

quincy hawley: Well, it was super cool because my wife's also a veterinarian, and we were working at the same hospital together, which is really cool. We had seven amazing docs. At the corporate hospital that I was working at, and the owner was amazing. He was such a good mentor in terms of like the clinical medicine and the surgery, and most importantly, like how you communicate well with clients.

He was a ninja master . Talking very smooth with the clients and things like that, and they just absolutely loved them. And so I always like paid attention to that, because I wanted, wanted to be like that with the clients as well. But anyway, the, downside of going to that practice was that it was extremely, extremely, extremely busy.

So, as a new grad, I was seeing 25 to 35 cases a day, like, uh, within like that second week of actually being there. So that first week they kind of, you know. Warm [00:11:00] you up a little bit and then by the, it's like you're, you're in the loop at this point. And on my surgery days I was doing about five to 15 anesthetic procedures, a day between dentals and actual like surgeries and things like that. And. The big thing was that because I didn't have like a lot of wellbeing tools and strategies and tactics and resources and principles and things like that, I, I got burnt out very, very quickly and didn't ha the healthy ways of coping and so, oh, I actually chose alcohol to deal with that, right? And so I would literally leave work.

To the first gas station. I obviously on the way home get an alcoholic beverage. I poured in a cup and I would drink and drive on the way home. And before I knew it, the days had turned. The weeks, weeks had turned the months. And those months, it turned to about two and a half years of living that way. And it was affecting my marriage poorly.

And wife and I were thinking about divorce. We had our one year-old daughter at the time, and so, uh, it, it was just. [00:12:00] A true subpar life of mediocrity is what I call it. And that lasted through till November of 2016. So from 2013 when I graduated until like November of 2016. And it, it really kind of sucked because, that's not why you come into the profession, right?

Like, you never really see that future for yourself. But, , that's where I was, you know?

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. And I remember you saying like, all you knew was you were supposed to show up to work, do the work, and go home, and then, and that was it. , Your wife too was probably stressed , 'cause as she was dealing with work as well, but still, that's hard.

So, so what was it that kind of, got you out of this point?

quincy hawley: That's, that's a great question because if you're one of those veterinarians right now, or, or veterinary professionals who is like me and the rest of my team at that time, there may not be anyone. On your team who even understands wellbeing or burnout or [00:13:00] how to help you at all. So I think it's just really important. And we were staying like an hour, two hours, sometimes three hours late, every single day. That was just. There's just a life and you have to be back there at eight o'clock in the morning. so for me, I ended up discovering what I call personal development. Right? Which is just the, and in my opinion, if I had to define it, it's the act of just doing lots of learning. And focus and really prioritizing the human aspect of yourself. So like we're all veterinary professionals. We study the veterinary science and things like that really hard. We invest a lot of money into ourselves as veterinary professionals, but we don't invest in anything into the actual person who's playing the role of the veterinarian, right.

Or the veterinary professional. I just really got heavily into that. The first thing that really keyed me off, I remember it was, an infomercial. How about that? An infomercial, right? the, [00:14:00] gen Zers probably don't know what an infomercial is, but anyway, it was Joyce Meyer and she's like one of one of his evangelists and. she was talking about the battlefield of the mind, I remember her saying something like, where the mind goes, the man follows. And she was talking about something called like stinking thinking. And so I just, really got into like this mindset aspect. What does the battlefield of the mind like, what does that actually mean? as I went down that path, I discovered. More books and more, people to listen to through podcasts and YouTube videos and, , that was kinda like the main thing that kind of kicked me off into that realm a little bit. And from there it is just been complete history, right?

I'm just. Still addicted to, personal development and trying to reach my full potential and just learning skills that allow me to thrive despite the challenges that are thrown at me. And I think that's like the ultimate, key or secret to life, [00:15:00] honestly. Right? It's like how do you thrive despite the difficulties.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah, this is something I related to as well. 'cause like, I remember the moment I discovered personal development and some people may laugh at some of these little sayings but they stick, it's that little sticky reminder that. Will follow you into those moments, of challenge. It.

quincy hawley: Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: Um, and, and the reaching outside of veterinary medicine sometimes for

quincy hawley: yes.

Megan Sprinkle: Perspective, I think is also helpful. 'cause that's where I started. Like I, I wasn't picking up veterinary books. I, I was picking up these, you know, motivational speaker kind of books and, and things.

quincy hawley: exactly.

Megan Sprinkle: it just kind of puts you in a different frame of mind that allowed you to kind of step back for a moment.

, And look at it from a different angle so that you could make a different next move.

quincy hawley: Yes. I think like personal development, it's a door. That leads to more doors and behind [00:16:00] each door is something awesome that leads you, it's like it just branches out, right? You meet one person and then that person maybe can introduce you to other people who can also have like a message or a lesson , and things like that.

And so it just became this huge like branching out experience where, It just really opens up life and I'm so glad I discovered it. I will always, talk about this and, and encourage other people to, to discover personal development. And, , one of the books that I discovered early on was, the Science of Getting Rich by Wallace Waddles because a part of. My personal development journey was wanting to do be better in my, my fi, my finances, in my relationships with my health. That full, uh, picture. And he also wrote a book called The Science of Being Great. And that book has just been [00:17:00] astronomical, to me. And there's a quote in the book where he says that, man is formed for growth. And he is under the necessity of growing. is essential to his happiness that he should continuously advance life without progress becomes unendurable the person who ceases from growth must either become imbecile like stupid or insane, and that the greater and more harmonious and well-rounded his growth, the happier man will be, or people will be. And so I really took that to heart, and I have Wallace Waddle quotes every single presentation that I do because they had such a astronomical impact and a positive impact on my life. And so I, I love to share those things.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. Well, and you started talking about, you know, just influences in life and I, I feel like that might also be a little bit of a theme your story definitely. But, but a lot of stories, I'm actually writing an article about this. [00:18:00] So , you're also, while you're working, you, you kind of get a unique opportunity too, , to join some different organizations and, , start to get involved with some A VMA things.

And so. And kind of interesting enough, um, I think I have the date right around 2016, you get nominated to be president of the North Carolina Association for Minority Veterinarians. And um, I did not know this. So is I, is this still the case? Is North Carolina still the only state to have a Minority Vet Association?

quincy hawley: Yeah, we're, we're still the only one. And the president, Dr. Andrea Gentry, uh, also North Carolina, a NT graduate, and NC State a CVM graduate as well. And she's, she's amazing. Doing amazing things with the organization. Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. So do you mind sharing a little bit about how you got, uh, involved there and then all of the trickle down connections to the.

quincy hawley: Oh my guys, you're like so many. It's like an intricate web. We need like AI to like draw out a tree or something like that. Okay. [00:19:00] Um, so. I used to go to the meetings, the NCMA have like two meetings each year, like a fall and a spring meeting. And, um, Dr. Kennedy, my mentor from earlier from the internship, the, the, the small ruminant guy, right? , He was the president and so he would always invite us out to the meetings. And so I would go to the meeting meetings. It's a great opportunity to network. , We would have like a, a speaker come in and do, do like a. Some CE credits and things like that. And one of the speakers was, I, I think her name was Beth Saban, , Dr.

Beth Saban from the AVMA. She came down and she was telling me about, the emerging leaders opportunity to go up to Illinois for the Veterinary Leadership Conference. And I applied for it. And I ended up getting that position. And so when I, when I went there,, it was just an opportunity to network with so many cool people from the AVMA , and when I got back. On like the next meeting for the N-C-A-M-V, they asked me [00:20:00] to talk about my experience of actually going there. And so I stood up and talked about , how cool it was to meet people like Betsy Charles, who's, um, really big for, I think it's the VLI Veterinary Leadership Institute, she's an amazing person. I think I met. Some other people, maybe Dr. Marie Holowaychuk, who's, uh, one of the, the GOATs of wellbeing for, , veterinary medicine. And I just became really inspired, right? But anyway, . Dr. Fuller, he's one of the old older veterinarians within N-C-A-M-V. He nominated me to be president, , for NCAMV.

'cause I was going out and doing these different things with the AVMA and I, I accepted that nomination. And then, I was the president. Over the next, like, maybe I think about five or six years. from there I really had the bug to go and explore. Uh, and so I learned a lot of things about like business entrepreneurship and a lot about business. Entrepreneurship is about networking, right? Like going out and, and expanding your network. And if you graduate from veterinary school and you go into a [00:21:00] small animal hospital, the networking really isn't something that's talked about much, I don't think for the average, like associate veterinarian.

It's like you go there and you work there for a long time, maybe you switch hospitals, maybe you, , buy into a hospital or buy your own practice, but networking wasn't really, talked about much, right when those first five five years of me being in that corporate hospital. But when I. Networked and I went to these different places in Schaumburg and I, um, went to that, it, it was called the Fix the Debt Summit in Lansing, Michigan. And that was back in 2016. You get to meet deans of veterinary schools and you know, the C-level leadership for the,, company that I was working for. Right. And, I got to meet, janet Donlin, the CEO of the AVMA at that time, we just sitting at the same table. I have no idea who she is, right, because I'm just going to work every single day.

And then I introduced myself to her and she introduced herself to me. And then she introduces me to like a lot of [00:22:00] other people. She like, kind of, kind of elevated me up. And, I saw that veterinary medicine was more than what was with within that corporate hospital walls. Um, and so that, that was really, really cool.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. Um, it, it is a really cool spark to go to the first conference. Where you're really able to network.

quincy hawley: Mm-hmm.

Megan Sprinkle: I do think sometimes the smaller ones, it's like if you are an introvert, go to the smaller ones because it's almost like it, it's a lot more natural. That it just happens. And I think sometimes at the la the large conferences, it's easier to go find a corner and hide.

quincy hawley: Right, right,

Megan Sprinkle: but yeah. So you were going to these like smaller, more intimate conferences where, you know. A really diverse range of people with different backgrounds are coming and, obviously not afraid to introduce themselves and start to introduce you to other people. And, and I think people actually like to introduce [00:23:00] people like, you know, that connector feeling.

Yeah. , That's a really cool part of your story. Now, , we're starting to like. You feel better. We're, we're going into personal development. But , you have like a really big career pivot too, , so how does that happen? How, how do you start to pull together everything that you're getting from personal development, the networking experience, your mind is being broadened by entrepreneur ideas, like how does that start to influence your next choice or decision in steps? 

quincy hawley: it's very simple. So the personal development, it literally saved my life, right? Like I was having suicidal ideation, um, just from feeling. So just like. this, there is like, like stuck in that burnout and just overall poor wellbeing and alcohol is so dumb. It's, it's, it's really bad. It's really bad if [00:24:00] you're struggling you're using that to make it better. Right. Trying to put out. A fire with gasoline, basically. Right? And so I have nothing against alcohol, but it was horrible for me, um, looking back. but since personal development was that thing that saved my life, and I knew that other people were struggling, felt obligated to share much of what I was learning, with, uh, other people who were out there especially for veterinary professionals. And so, I basically extrapolated. A lot of what I learned because like if you look behind me here, you see, , this bookshelf with all these different books on it. And my PlayStation, I, I love PlayStation too, I love video games.

But, um, anyway, uh, on the very bottom before , that's the only level of that shelf that had books on it. And they were all my veterinary textbooks, right? And so since 2016, I've accumulated over 200. Like books at this point. Um, on my Kindle I've got like probably 40, 50, [00:25:00] 60. Amazon's audible. I've got like over a hundred and something books.

But basically just that, the whole learning process, I extrapolated a lot of that and I applied it to veterinary medicine because I knew there wasn't that much out there. There were a few people who were doing it, and I was inspired by those people, like I said. , And I really wanted to share that information with other people. Because in the business world, like personal development in the, the entrepreneur, it's very commonplace, right? Like they have tons of conferences and just events where they're virtual in person, just about, building yourself up as a actual person. And the only one that I experienced in veterinary medicine was the Veterinary Leadership Conference. And there were only like 300 people there. So there's more than 300 people in vet med. You know what I mean? And so we're falling short essentially. And if you go to VMX or the big A VMA conferences and things like that, like 90% of the talks are are clinical, [00:26:00] which is really important. 'cause like we're clinical professionals, we need that. But the personal development, in my opinion, it's equally as important so that we don't actually lose great clinicians to leaving the profession or suicide or whatever it happens to be. Right? And so anyway, so that, that's kind of how I pivoted into my next stage. , I co-founded a company with Renee Michelle.

She's a vet assistant. worked , at the second hospital that I worked at, , and we were on this similar path. We created Get Motiveted! Veterinary Wellbeing Solutions. And then that was in 2018. And then in 2019 we created Get Motiveted University, the world's first school of Wellbeing specifically for veterinary professionals. And then in 2022, we created the Veterinary Burnout, prep certification program. And so, the very first thing we kind of did was go get our coaching certifications to be certified life coaches. And then we started doing a lot of speaking. So we joined Toastmasters. Um, it's a, a small club.

Are you familiar with Toastmasters?

Megan Sprinkle: am. [00:27:00] Yep. Yep.

quincy hawley: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So ToastMasters is really cool. People taught me how to speak there. , It was just great. More networking, more meeting super cool people who are doing super cool things. And so, um, yeah, get motivated. Just serve the veterinary profession and helping them to learn personal development. And I, I believe that wellbeing is your ability to thrive despite the challenges, and I think personal development is kind of that thing that helps you thrive. Despite the challenges, I just kind of shifted it over and extrapolated a lot.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. You know, one of the things I, I think about burnout and getting just to dark places in general is, is a lot of times feeling alone. And so I wonder was did you ever like, meet someone? Like what kind of sparked, and sometimes we just get excited and wanna share what, you know, what has helped us.

But did you start meeting other people where you were like, oh, like it's not just me, it's, it's other people as well [00:28:00] are struggling here. Like, did you have that moment where you were finding other people were struggling in veterinary medicine?

quincy hawley: So I didn't really find a community of struggling people. Any veterinary community community was struggling. People

Megan Sprinkle: Oh yes.

quincy hawley: at, at, at, at, at, at this point. Yeah. when you would go to like, um, the, the Veterinary Leadership Conference, the people who are like focusing on these minute issues that you may not even notice if you graduate, go to work for a hospital. And you're not branching out intentionally to find these different things because no one ever came to my hospital, right, to talk about wellbeing or burnout or anything like that. And so, I couldn't even like frame it as I'm burnt out. I couldn't even frame it as I have poor wellbeing 'cause I just didn't even have the terminology.

And so when you get outside of , your regular hospital environment right [00:29:00] outside your community, then people are talking about it because those are the hot topics of the day, essentially. And so it was like, , the economy of vet med was kinda struggling a little bit at the time.

 DEI was a hot topic, leadership. We need more leadership all the time. And then wellbeing was one as well. And , that kind of opened my eyes to it. And then, , the A VMA actually had 10 veterinarians who were the future leaders. So I, I was an emerging leader. The future leaders, like a more organized program, and their project that they chose was , they created like a wellness. Wellness something another, right? I forget exactly what it was that they could actually share with veterinary professionals. And so I was kind of looking at the future leaders tackling this big project of wellbeing and wellness within Vet Med. And so I kind of knew that that was a big thing. Just through the conferences, I, I knew that people were struggling with burnout, compassion fatigue , and things like [00:30:00] that. and that's kind of how I knew.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. You might be a really good person to pose this question because this is something I've, I've kind of been watching you and I graduated vet school about the same time. I think you're a 2013. I'm a 2014 grad, and so we've kind of seen an evolution of where we're talking more about this.

quincy hawley: Yes,

Megan Sprinkle: And, , I think thanks to social media and things, this is becoming even more public about the challenges within veterinary medicine around mental health, and I am seeing more and more c omments coming from concerned parents of children who want to become veterinary professionals. So not only the, the people who might be interested in veterinary medicine might be concerned, but like the parents are posting on, all I could hear about is that veterinary professionals have high suicide.

And my, my kid wants to be one of these people. [00:31:00] Um, like what do I do? Um.

quincy hawley: yeah. Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: like there's, I guess the question is coming from, this is important to talk about, is important to learn how to. Work on yourself so that when things that risk burnout, yet you are prepared and you know how to handle them. Like you said, when you first left vet school, you had no idea, you had no preparation, you had no tools, no nothing, , and probably didn't fully understand what was about to hit you.

Um,

quincy hawley: Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: And so now we do, but then also we have this. External reputation now for, for having this, challenge. So how do we, and I will pull out the word balance right this second, but how do we equip people with the tools and the understanding that we do have a challenging profession? [00:32:00] But it's

quincy hawley: I.

Megan Sprinkle: we a, a profession we love and is very rewarding.

And that we don't need to discourage people from coming into it. We just need to prepare them when they come in. And maybe you can tell me what your thoughts are, where we are right now with wellbeing and, and the profession and, and the, the appearance and the reputations and things, but, um.

So feel free to comment on that first, but then also like what can we do next? , What do you see as kind of the next phase of , this area?

quincy hawley: That's such an amazing question. Right. Um, because it's. Partially frustrating a little bit we are literally losing people who would've become veterinary professionals, maybe veterinarians, and would've been great at the job, but they are deciding to go elsewhere because of the wellbeing stuff. I think sometimes with social media, like [00:33:00] you're saying, is that if you don't, so one thing about Get Motiveted! myself and Renee is that we talk about wellbeing in such a positive way. We talk about burnout in such a positive way. and maybe positive is not the right word in an empowering way, right? And one of my quotes is, , veterinary burnout. It's real, but it doesn't have to be your reality, And so I think that's the major thing. It's all about preparedness and preparation, because the challenges aren't gonna go away. , But I remember a conversation that I actually had with, a young lady that I used to work with. I do a lot of relief work now and. I remember asking her because I, I used to be on NC State's admissions committee for four years as well, and so I'm really into helping people come into the profession if I can't help them out. And I asked her if , she thought about going to veterinary school and she said, well, I used to want to be a veterinarian, but this veterinarian that I worked [00:34:00] for told me that I, I should probably go do something else because it's really hard.

The challenges, the pays not good, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so she chose to go into to be a human surgical technician assistant, or whatever they call 'em. Right. And so there's a person gone and she was great. She was great with the clients, and she obviously loved animals.

Right? And that was frustrating to me because the people who were burnt out sometimes, , they're burnt out and having a bad experience. They're sharing that with other people. They're sharing it on social media, which is great to be vulnerable, but, you won't find in any of my content where I talk about my story and only leave it at the, at the negative down place because, or else people we see that. Many of the books behind me and the people that I listen to for [00:35:00] probably like the people you listen to. , My favorite category is people who overcame severe adversity to achieve great success I believe that veterinary medicine offers us an opportunity to overcome challenges challenges and difficulty and adversity I look at it the way Kobe Bryant kind of looked at, a difficult team that he was gonna be facing and that he was gonna get better, right? It was gonna prepare. He was gonna grow from the challenge of that. And so one of the things I like to talk about for vet medicine is that it really offers you an opportunity to advance yourself, as a human being in general. , There's so many difficulties about the profession that if you can prepare yourself well and, and find ways to actually thrive despite those challenges that it makes life outside of veterinary medicine even easier, because I think that just being a human in general is, is a little bit, um, I'm not, I'm not gonna [00:36:00] say easier, but it's different than veterinary medicine.

And that veterinary medicine comes with a lot of challenges just by its very nature, right? Sometimes pets die. You're doing surgery. Sometimes those surgeries go poorly or maybe you make a mistake because there's so much to learn the animals can't talk to you and tell you that it's this part of my body that's hurting or what, whatever.

And so. On the euthanasia, right? Which can be, something that lifts you up for something veterinary professional, something that kind of pulls you down depending on who you are. , But the point is, I, I kind of look at veterinary medicine as a training ground for becoming really good at life in general. And, yeah, , I like to encourage people for all those parents out there, there, if a parent finds themself here, here at this podcast, I don't think that burnout has to be. , The experience of anybody in veterinary medicine? I think that anyone can overcome burnout. I think it's gotta be. A thing where you prioritize [00:37:00] yourself and , you have to take action and you actually have to go do something. Right. I think you just continue to show up as you have been. Maybe you get lucky and things get super easy, but I'm not worried about easy or hard. When I, when I go into a hospital these days, I'm like, whatever it is, it's not going to decrease my wellbeing. You know? And I've got the tools to, to back that up, you know,

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah.

quincy hawley: , I'm ready for it.

Megan Sprinkle: I like that term empowered and, and I know maybe, maybe it's me, maybe I overuse it, but I, I think that is such a strong word in that it doesn't put us in a victim mindset. It puts us in a okay. Like, let's look at the situation. What can we do next? Right? Like, what do we have to work with? What are some options?

Because I truly believe that there are options, like maybe they're not all amazing options, but there are options. Uh.

quincy hawley: Oh, for sure. Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: [00:38:00] And, and I think that veterinary medicine, and maybe this is what you're kind of going with too, does allow us to have lots of options. Like the example that you gave with euthanasia, where euthanasia may just put one person in a terrible mindset, and another person looks at it as like, I feel like I am giving this family the best gift possible.

That is good data. Like if you.

quincy hawley: yes,

Megan Sprinkle: , Which person are you are go away from the one that you were not and go towards the one you are. And, and I think veterinary medicine allows us to have those opportunities. And the other thing is, you know, there are individuals who are really. Really good human beings in our profession.

, You talked about meeting some of these, a lot of people love to introduce, uh, especially if you are young, especially if you're young, like people love you.

quincy hawley: Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: Um, uh, they like [00:39:00] introducing Right. Be because I, I think there's a, it's a profession where we're very caring. We come into it because we,

we care about a bigger purpose, , and so those are really cool individuals to be around. And I think, with all those options, with good people around you, you're able to get in the right direction. And on top of it is the, you still need to work on yourself. You still have to take that empowerment and do something with it.

And if you're, you're combining understanding yourself, you can start to find the path and a world of options, if that makes sense.

quincy hawley: absolutely. 100%. 100%.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah. Well, I know we're about to run out of time. So, , where you are right now in your, career, you're still doing Get motiveted!, you're doing some relief work. What are you kind of excited to be working on right now and, and what are you excited about with your personal future, but also the future of veterinary medicine?

quincy hawley: Oh my goodness. Um, so [00:40:00] right now I'm excited about, my family, like I have a, a 1-year-old. We just turned one a couple of days ago on the 17th. And so I'm really excited I about spending as much time as humanly possible with baby Atlas. Right. And then I've got a 6-year-old daughter and a 10-year-old, , daughter as well.

Just spending a lot of time with them in terms of , with Get motivated, I'm I'm so excited, uh, continuing to grow. , The Veterinary Burnout, , prep certification program, we've got like over. 1200 people in the program at this point. Um, lots of people who are coming through and they're getting results both like quantitatively and qualitatively, which is great. , So they're feeling better. We've had some people come back to the profession after taking the program and some people who are thinking about leaving the profession and now they're staying. And not only staying, but having like better experiences and that just, , it really just lights me up, right. , Because I know that the stuff that we're teaching. That they have agency, basically, right? Because the, the profession may not change, but you know, you [00:41:00] can change your experience essentially. . And then we've also got, our veterinary Burnout Preparedness Summit of the year coming up, which will be our second annual. We did the first one in February of 2025, and the second one will probably be around, uh, February, March, April of 2026.

And so we're planning for that right now. Really excited about it. It was a two day event last year, and we had some really cool speakers like Amy Newfield, Michael Shirley, Tom Seeko and CJ Burnett come in, to speak as well. Myself, Renee, , Dr. Sonya Olson is a really good wellbeing person too. Uh, so we'll have different speakers this year, more than likely some really, really cool speakers. Hopefully Megan Sprinkle will be one of our speakers this year at Summit of the Year. Um, but I'm really excited about just continuing to find new and creative ways and entertaining ways and exciting ways and positive ways that good, right, to share. Everything that I know about burnouts, preparedness, uh, [00:42:00] wellbeing, and, you know, Dr. Feldman talks about mental health. , He's our mental health professional on staff. And so, , it's very rewarding. , For myself personally. And, I'll probably do this until the day I die. Honestly, I don't see myself stopping, so that'll be that, and then In personal life. We're going to Japan in the spring. That's exciting. It'll be my first time like going, truly intercontinental. So I've been like Barbados in Costa Rica and Nicaragua and Panama before in Jamaica, but never truly to another continent, so I'm really looking forward to that.

In, in the spring. Yeah.

Megan Sprinkle: That is super exciting. That's another way to , you know, we talked about kind of stepping back and being able to reflect. Traveling to a whole different culture is also a great way to step back , and just listen and reflect and on all the things. So I'm super excited for that trip for you.

Well, I, I think you already kind of shared a little bit about gratitude. I, I usually like to end on gratitude, but if you. I'll end with a slightly different question. Let me see how I [00:43:00] wanna ask this. And that is like, thinking back on your personal journey so far, , what do you think is one, I won't say it has to be the the top because that's too hard of a question.

What is one piece of wisdom that you would give others in veterinary professional? To have a, a happy and fulfilling life like you are right now, where you're full of gratitude. You're in a place where you're like, I wanna do this until I die. , What piece of advice would you give to people who are looking for that?

I.

quincy hawley: Yes. Um, so number one, and just remembering that, , vet med it does not suck, right? I still believe it's one of the most rewarding and prestigious professions on the face of the planet with so many opportunities, to fill yourself up to, to fill your cup. Um. There are like two skills that I would just just throw out there for people to really go [00:44:00] on a deep dive on these.

But the first one is mindfulness, right? Your ability to really be in the present moment that allows you to enjoy that puppy that's in front of you, right? Uh, and then perspective, right? Perspective is that thing that allows you to get better instead of bitter from the challenges that you're facing and to see opportunity where others see chaos, right?

And where maybe you saw chaos before. And so as you're. Going through the rest of your life and veterinary career, um, to take extreme amounts of agency and to realize that you have more control over your career and the trajectory of that career. And, , how that experience actually feels than you may actually realize , at this moment and the moment, you really grab the experience by the horn, so to speak. , And just really go down that path. Keep listening to Megan's podcast. Keep listening to all the podcasts that you can find. just keep [00:45:00] learning and growing and expanding because, I believe that if you're really looking for it, that , the right things that you need will come to you um, to, to never give up.

And if you have to like switch careers, if you have to switch practices, if you have to leave, if you have to change and go do something else, because what, what you're doing right now isn't working for you, that's totally fine, but make sure that you. Change yourself first or concurrently. Right. Do the personal development part of it and make sure you get the learning lesson from wherever you are so that you don't end up in the same place with a different name and location. 

Megan Sprinkle: Dr. Quincy's story is proof that rock bottom doesn't have to be the end of the road. Sometimes it's the beginning of a completely new way of thinking. Living and showing up in the world. Vet med is rewarding and challenging, but you don't have to feel [00:46:00] lost. Broken or stuck at least for very long. These feelings trigger a sign to pause and look for resources.

Dr. Quincy is an example of someone offering support tools and a growth mindset. He showed us that wellbeing isn't about avoiding hard things. It's about building the mindset and skills to thrive despite them. We can walk into life equipped with mindfulness perspective and the courage to take responsibility for our own growth as well as a community around us who can lift us up and not tear us down.

Thank you, Dr. Quincy, for your honesty, vulnerability, and for the work you're doing through Get Motivated and the Veterinary Burnout Preparedness Program to support this profession and the people inside of it. I also wanna thank our fan and supporter of the podcast, Dr. Kelly Cooper. If you wanna contribute to the podcast just a little bit a month, click the support the show link in the show notes,

and if this conversation impacted you, share it. That simple message could make a world of difference for someone. Until next time, let's keep [00:47:00] reimagining what's possible in veterinary life.