It’s a part of vet med life - you get to work, it’s bloody busy and you have to wait your turn to take your lunch break. 1pm rolls around, 1:15, 1:30, next thing you know it’s 2pm and you haven’t eaten yet. You’re starving and people keep asking you questions. Then the vet walks out with an admission - ultrasound and rads. Aaaaaggggghhhhhhhhh! Not cool. Going too long in between meals can be detrimental to your health in the long term when it’s happening on regular basis. Check out a couple of reasons why -

Your decision making skills are compromised

Glucose (the energy we get from food) is our brain’s ONLY source of energy. If we haven’t eaten to keep a steady flow going to the brain, the brain does not want to function at it’s optimal level and will focus more on fuelling mechanical functions over cognitive. It then becomes more difficult to make simple decisions.

Your mood is affected

Hello hangry. It’s real and it does not make for good workplace relations. Vet med is hard enough to work in without someone snapping at you.

It adds extra stress to your body

Vet nursing is super stressful. When our body hasn’t eaten in a while and we haven’t listened to the cues from our body to fuel it, the body assumes there is some sort of threat and will release stress hormones. In a job that is already stressful, adding to this puts extra strain on the body. Consistent release of stress hormones can cause inflammation as well as have obvious detrimental effects on our mental health.

So what should you do?

There are 2 options -

• Find more efficient ways to manage lunch breaks in your clinic so that someone isn’t eating at 3pm.

OR

• Bring snacks! Easy grab and go, even in a packet so you don’t have to stop what you’re doing to wash hands, etc. Even a hearty hot drink will help. My favourites are bliss balls, mini sandwiches I’ve pre-made, hot chocolate or a cup of soup.

I hope this has been helpful. I know stopping to eat isn’t always feasible, but try to plan to bring healthy snacks to work, and even better, bring some to share with the team.