I Found a Veterinary Career That Grows With My Life

How I built a veterinary career designed to evolve with my life for the long term.

Many veterinarians don’t want to leave veterinary medicine. What they’re really looking for is a way to stay in the profession without sacrificing the rest of their lives.

That was true for me.

Early in my career, I was working long weeks in a busy GP and urgent care setting. I loved the medicine and the mentorship, but I had little control over my schedule and very little life outside the clinic.

Like many new veterinarians, I wanted to learn as much as I could and prove myself clinically. The pace felt exciting at first, but it wasn’t something I could picture sustaining forever.

I wasn’t looking to leave veterinary medicine. I just needed to figure out how to keep practicing long term.

That search eventually led me to IndeVets. Seven and a half years later, I’m still here. Still practicing medicine in a way that actually works for my life.

When Your Career Takes Over Your Life

In my first role after vet school, the pace was intense and my schedule wasn’t mine to control.

Clinically, I learned a lot. But outside the hospital, there wasn’t much room for anything else.

Like a lot of veterinarians early in their careers, I loved the medicine and the relationships with clients and patients. What I struggled with was the structure. Limited schedule control made it hard to imagine sustaining that pace long term.

I didn’t want a different profession. I just wanted a way to practice that could fit into a full life.

Discovering a Different Model

I joined IndeVets in 2018 when the company was just getting started in Philadelphia, where I’m from and where I went to vet school.

What stood out immediately was that it was a veterinarian-led company built around supporting doctors, so we could focus on practicing great medicine instead of managing the business of practicing it.

The practical side appealed to me too. Knowing what I’d earn. Having great benefits. Not needing to run my own relief business, negotiate contracts, or chase down payments from hospitals.

Another big draw was the sense of community. Even early on, there were other veterinarians I could talk to about cases. That kind of collaboration makes a huge difference.

Within a few months, I knew this was where I wanted to build my career.

Today I still practice medicine as an IndeVet while also serving as Director of Clinical Recruiting, helping other veterinarians find the same kind of path.

 

A Career That Changes as Your Life Changes

What you want from your job changes as your life changes. That’s been one of the clearest lessons of my career.

When I first joined IndeVets, my priorities were pretty different than they are now.

Early in my career, I wanted the ability to work more and take advantage of opportunities to travel. I loved being able to pick up additional shifts and take long weekends whenever I wanted.

Back then, if I worked more, I simply earned more. Today IndeVets doctors also have the option to bank that additional time as PTO through our PTO Power Up program, which gives veterinarians even more control over how they use their time.

These days my life looks very different.

I have two young kids at home, and my priorities have shifted toward stability and predictability. I work defined days each week and know what my schedule will look like well in advance.

What’s been amazing to me is that the same career model has supported both of those phases of my life.

When I wanted more freedom to travel and work extra shifts, it worked. Now that I want more consistency and time with my family, it still works.

That ability to grow alongside your life is something I think a lot of veterinarians are looking for.

Why Structure Matters

When people hear “relief work,” they often picture instability. Constantly searching for shifts. Worrying about income gaps.

That’s not how we do it here at IndeVets.

IndeVets built a model that combines the schedule control many veterinarians appreciate in relief work with the stability many veterinarians actually want. Doctors are W-2 employees with guaranteed salaries and benefits, with no production pressure and no gambling on patient volume to hit your income target.

The scheduling team coordinates placements with partner hospitals, so our veterinarians don’t have to manage that themselves.

And even though we work across different hospitals, there’s a real professional network running through IndeVets. I’ve always had colleagues I could reach out to when I wanted to think through a difficult case or debrief after a tough day.

That support matters when you’re walking into a new hospital or navigating a complex case. You are never practicing alone.

That combination of schedule control, stability, and community is what has made this sustainable for me over the long term.

A Career You Can Stay In

Veterinary medicine is an extraordinary profession. But the traditional structure of the job makes it hard for a lot of veterinarians to picture doing it for decades.

Long hours. Limited schedule control. The constant feeling that your career is competing with the rest of your life.

Most veterinarians eventually reach a point where they ask the same question I did. Can my career grow with my life, or will it always work against it?

For me, the answer wasn’t to leave the profession. It was to find a different structure within it.

Veterinary medicine doesn’t have to be something you push through for a few years before burning out. With the right model, it can be a career you stay in and actually enjoy for decades.

Curious What This Could Look Like for You?

Every veterinarian’s career looks a little different. Some want to work more early on. Others need stability as their lives shift.

What matters is having a structure that can evolve with you.

If you’re curious about what practicing as an IndeVet looks like, connect with our team below.