Dr. Donita McCants: A Story of Resilience, Entrepreneurship, and Passion in Veterinary Medicine

Are you prepared to be inspired by a story of resilience and passion? Meet Dr. Donita McCants, a remarkable veterinarian who turned adversities into stepping-stones on her path to success. From battling ADHD and anxiety to overcoming financial barriers to start her mobile veterinary practice, this amazing woman is a powerhouse of determination and grit. Dr. McCants has created a successful mobile veterinary practice that allows her to give back to her community while also giving her the autonomy to create a balance that benefits her family's well being.

If you thought running a thriving veterinary practice was all she had on her plate, think again. Dr. Donita is also a mom and a competitive bodybuilder! You'll hear how she maintains equilibrium between her demanding work days and her focus on developing herself outside of work. I hope you are as inspired as I have been after hearing this wonderful conversation.

More about Donita McCants, DVM
Dr. Donita received her Bachelor’s degree in biological sciences from the University of Georgia in 2011 and then went on to Tuskegee University to complete Veterinary training in 2015. She was raised in Georgia but state hopped coming from a military family background. She has strong interests in surgery, internal medicine, and dermatology which comes in handy with Florida allergies! She enjoys learning new and innovative techniques to treat your furry babies. She loves to spend time with has a son named Stephen, her fiance Joe and their bernedoodle named Axel Rose! Dr. Donita is also fear free certified and loves all thing’s fitness and wellness! She competed in her first bodybuilding competition in June 2021. Dr. Donita enjoys giving back to the community by participating in various speaking engagements to inspire the youth. She also participates in events around Orlando, and is very active on her social media pages “Ask Dr. Donita” where she gives beyond first-class veterinary advice and speaks with others in the pet community to raise awareness about pet health and care!
www.askdrdonita.com
www.YouTube.com/@askdrdonita
IG @askdrdonita

Resources mentioned in the episode...
VetSetGo
BlendVet
Critter Fixer's Vet for a Day
Diversify VetMed Coalition
Multicultural Veterinary Medical Association

Transcript

Stacey Cordivano: 0:08

Do you feel like it's possible to find joy and positive change within veterinary medicine? Are you looking for a community that's striving for fulfillment rather than perfection? Hey there, I'm Dr Stacy Cordivano. I want veterinarians to learn to be happier, healthier, wealthier and more grateful for the lives that we've created. On this podcast, I will speak with outside-of-the-box thinkers to hear new ideas on ways to improve our day-to-day lives. Welcome to the whole veterinarian. I'm really excited to share with you this conversation today.

Stacey Cordivano: 0:54

My guest is Dr Donita McCants. She is the owner of Dr Donita's Veterinary Concierge Services in Orlando, florida. She enjoys spreading hope and joy to other veterinary professionals and future veterinarians around the world, so we definitely connect on that, and this conversation is so wonderful. We are all over the place. We cover learning differently and accommodations on the NAVLE, to finding a spot where you really fit in, to why working for yourself is a way to thrive in veterinary medicine, to creating more spaces for people of color within veterinary medicine. So I love this conversation. I loved getting to know her better. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did, and thanks again to Danita.

Platinum Performance: 1:44

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Stacey Cordivano: 2:02

Hey Donita, how are you Good? How are you I'm? That's a good question. If we're being honest, I'm feeling like a bit of a mess this last couple of weeks. How are you feeling?

Donita McCants: 2:14

Yeah, okay, honestly, the world has been a little shifty, so I live in Florida. Whoever knows what's going on in Florida? So it's a little concerning, but I'm making the best of it, yeah.

Stacey Cordivano: 2:30

Honestly Good, okay, well, yeah, I mean we're going to be real on this episode for sure. I don't want.

Donita McCants: 2:38

I mean myself I'm doing okay, but there's other outside stressors, for sure yeah.

Stacey Cordivano: 2:44

Sure, I can do my best to understand that, but it's why, probably, I don't live in Florida.

Donita McCants: 2:52

That's up for debate. That's up for debate. I might have a new conversation later on, so we'll see if you know I stay here forever. We'll see yeah.

Stacey Cordivano: 3:01

Okay, so let's give listeners a little bit of background about you. And honestly I don't know you that well. So tell us about yourself, kind of where you're from, where you went to school, how you got into vet men.

Donita McCants: 3:16

Okay, so I am originally from Georgia, so I'm from Atlanta. That's where I was raised. I'm from a military background, so I was born an Army brat. So originally I was born in North Carolina, fort Bragg, so my dad was in the Army, so we moved around a lot so I didn't really have stable roots per se. But I call Georgia home just because that's where I was the longest. That's where I graduated from high school so I went to college, so that's kind of how my little backstory started. I was raised by my mom, so I was raised by a single mom as well. Okay, so that's kind of my little my background. And then I eventually went on from University of Georgia, which is where I graduated from undergrad, and then I went to Tuskegee for vet school, so I graduated in 2015.

Donita McCants: 4:05

Like, my story is pretty similar to a lot of us. Like, I always wanted to be a vet since I was little. It started from just oh, cute sea dogs and cats to growing into, you know, enjoying science and all that kind of stuff. So the nerdy parts to me it all kind of meshed together and made the veterinary world make sense. So it's definitely a passion, you know, with everything that we're going through and have gone through in the vet world. You know it's still a passion of mine, no matter how annoying I get with it or upset or burnt out. I can't honestly say like okay, if I had to, would I do something else, like I don't have anything I can think of, so Okay.

Stacey Cordivano: 4:41

So do you feel supported in your desire, from a young age, to be a vet?

Donita McCants: 4:46

A hundred percent. Yeah, my mom, she tried to get me to do volunteering at like shelters, whatever I could do, because you know as a kid you can't do a lot but when I was young she would try to get me as involved as she could. Now you have so many options to get involved. Back then it wasn't as many options where you could really go inside a vet hospital and look around. I didn't get that type of experience when I was a kid, but it was just always, you know, an interest and I didn't have any pets or anything growing up. So it's just no, none at all. No, well, not at first. Eventually, when I became, like, I think, middle school, my mom finally let me get a small dog, but it took a while for her to finally like let me get a pet.

Stacey Cordivano: 5:29

Oh, got it. Okay, that's interesting. She just was not like a animal person.

Donita McCants: 5:34

Well, she has allergies and I think we were just kind of, we were moving around a lot, a lot. We were like we're like gypsies, we were gypsy. No man Okay. So we didn't have stability enough to have a pet. So eventually, once we had more stable roots, then we eventually got a pet.

Stacey Cordivano: 5:51

Well, yeah, no, I think that's an interesting continuation that maybe I don't have that perspective.

Donita McCants: 5:57

Yeah, Okay, Great, yeah. Well, my parents were married and then they eventually got divorced. So there was that whole roller coaster ride of my childhood which is, you know, that's a whole nother story, but that whole roller coaster ride kind of makes sense why I didn't have a pet until you know her life was stable enough to even consider that.

Stacey Cordivano: 6:20

Yeah, okay, great. I mean, and honestly, as a parent I can understand if I was juggling all that. I don't know that I would add pets into that either. Yeah. Okay, so Tuskegee for vet school. And then where did you go after that?

Donita McCants: 6:34

After that I did not pass my boards right away.

Donita McCants: 6:39

So honest, vet, we're having a whole honest moment here, so I had 1000 percent failed my board twice. Then I had an internship set when I graduated. So when I got my board's results I'm like, oh great. So I couldn't go to my internship because I had an internship set up in Miami because I originally wanted to become a boarded surgeon. So that was my first love. Is surgery Still my love? But that was my first love to become a surgeon. So that shifted my whole life. Because I was struggling and I couldn't pass my boards. So my mom told me to come and move with her, just take a break after graduating. So at that time she was back in North Carolina, she was in Durham. So I moved to Durham with my son he was still really little. I guess I had my son when I was in vet school.

Stacey Cordivano: 7:29

I forgot to say that, yeah, wow, that was a milestone that we glossed over. Yeah.

Donita McCants: 7:35

Sorry, I did have a child in that school.

Stacey Cordivano: 7:38

I can't.

Donita McCants: 7:39

How did you?

Stacey Cordivano: 7:40

juggle that.

Donita McCants: 7:41

I failed a couple of tests after I had him. I was a junior that year, so it was the first quarter because he was born in September. So yeah, it was the first quarter. When I went into labor I was coming up on first block of tests. So by the time I came back I was out probably two weeks because I was scared I was going to fail out If I stayed out too long. So I didn't have a long postpartum time. My child was still a newborn when I went back to class. So I went back after two weeks. I tried to go back and take as many tests as I could, as fast as I could, because by the time I started back we were already in second block. I was trying to learn and then test. I did the best I could to get through that weird situation at that time, oh God.

Donita McCants: 8:37

Was that a school?

Stacey Cordivano: 8:38

support.

Donita McCants: 8:40

Well, my mom came down to help me, so there's that. So she was there. I was definitely not married or anything. It was my high school sweetheart-ish. We had a baby and my mom came to help me and he was there a little bit. He came down but he kept going back and forth to Georgia. But me and my mom, they both supported me the first couple of months when he was really little to help me so that I wouldn't fail out. So them coming to help me is why did not fail? Because I had to go to class.

Donita McCants: 9:10

So no accommodations from the school they gave me like, oh, if you need to push it out, they kind of pushed out the tests type of thing and they were like well, if you need to take some later, you can, but then all I'm doing is pushing back the test even more.

Donita McCants: 9:25

And they were going into the next quarter. So I was like, ok, well, let me push back the ones that I know I might need more time on. And then you know, I was just trying to juggle it because I think Junior I had like five or six class. I don't remember how many classes I had, but I know it was a lot of classes. Yeah, third year classes, yeah, third year classes.

Donita McCants: 9:43

So I'm just like, oh crap, but it was first, it was first semester, so it wasn't, you know, I had time I definitely had to bring a couple of these. So, you know, by the end of the quarter though I think I ended up with like A's and B's, maybe one C, but I think that you know.

Stacey Cordivano: 10:00

Yeah, that's amazing. I think I ended up with less than that and I did not have a child, so that's amazing.

Donita McCants: 10:07

I was like I'll take it. You know I didn't fail, so I was like you know I'll take the C at this point, whatever.

Stacey Cordivano: 10:13

Got it.

Donita McCants: 10:14

Yeah.

Stacey Cordivano: 10:14

So then, ok, so then you're in North Carolina after and trying to figure out what the plan is for Right.

Donita McCants: 10:22

Yeah. So I went and got tested because I couldn't figure out what was going on, because I know I had really bad test anxiety, but I didn't know if there was something else going on. So I did get tested and then I was diagnosed with attention deficit, which I didn't know that I had. And then they also diagnosed me with generalized anxiety disorder. So at that point, you know, they started doing therapy, like medications, one to kind of help me study and readjust how I studied, because I was an overstudier. I just thought that was just something I had to do. But after I found out I'm like, oh, light bulb, that's why I've been studying like this for eight years of my life. So after eight years of studying, now I find out like, oh wow, I could have got this, you know, this could have been better.

Stacey Cordivano: 11:10

Oh, wonderful, you know right, because a lot of ADHD or the spectrum of attention deficit disorder is Sort of techniques right, like there are techniques, it's not just medication. I mean, I know this because we're like diving into it with my child but like, yeah, it's not just medication, there are really techniques that can help exactly, exactly, exactly.

Donita McCants: 11:32

So I was like, okay, so they gave me a few techniques to adjust. They're like, okay, and study instead of studying for three, four hours You're not gonna retain that anyways so just study for like an hour. I don't have take a break, you know, come back to it. And I was like, oh, you know, that makes sense, but I never studied like that. So, just making those adjustments, and then they also gave me accommodations as well, because, as you know, the Natalie is six hours. So they gave me accommodations over two days and I had longer breaks. Wow, it was wonderful.

Stacey Cordivano: 12:05

Yeah, that's amazing. Thank you so much for sharing that, because I really feel I've never heard anyone talk about getting accommodations on the Natalie, and it's something I Work with in my daily life with my son, I mean. He's at a special school that, like all they do is accommodations, and so, yeah, that's amazing. Thank you for sharing that.

Donita McCants: 12:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm dealing with the same thing with my son as well, because he was diagnosed a couple years ago. So I'm always advocating for him with his schools and everything, because now that I know what he's dealing with, I want to make sure that he doesn't have to deal with the same thing. So I'm like he needs accommodations, he needs this, he needs that.

Stacey Cordivano: 12:42

So, yeah, oh, wow, okay, wild, but thank you awesome for sharing. Yeah, okay, so I assume you passed the next time I did pass after that time I passed finally, and then I Finally got a job.

Donita McCants: 13:00

Of course, when I was working I was just working at a corporate Hospital. Definitely humbling, because I couldn't work as a veterinarian because I didn't have my license yet. So I was working like as a vet assistant, vet tech type of role. So definitely a humbling six to eight months of my life, for sure, like I'm been out for eight school and like I'm a doctor but I can't like practice. So it was. It was definitely a humbling time in my life. But after that, you know, I kind of started bouncing around to different hospitals. I was definitely struggling with that because, you know, I didn't have the, you know the support to know like, hey, make sure you vet the practices or, you know, ask those questions, don't just pick the first job you get. So I was just excited to just pass my test.

Stacey Cordivano: 13:43

I just like, oh, I'll just, I need to work right, well, and also like it was a little, it was probably just before the cusp of like it being very much a job Seekers market, right Like exactly.

Donita McCants: 13:56

Oh kind of yeah, okay, okay.

Donita McCants: 13:58

Yeah, yeah, the pay was, you know, incoming grants are getting now is definitely not what I was getting. So, oh, definitely a very different time. But eventually, you know, I bounced around. It was still in North Carolina, I Was out of practice, I was still playing with corporate at the time. But, like I said before, like my mom ended up moving to Florida. So that's how the Florida came in there and I visited her and I'm the only child and I have one son so she was like, oh, come visit. And then she kind of talked me into moving and that's how I ended up moving to Tampa.

Donita McCants: 14:35

It's where I was first and I just shifted my corporate job to Florida and the state with them for a while and then I just, you know, I wasn't satisfied because I still had that burning desire in my heart for surgery. So I Applied for internship again After I've been working. I did, I did, I wasn't, I wasn't fulfilled. I'm like I still love surgery. So I did apply for internship in Orlando. I got it. So I'm moving to Orlando, did a Rotten internship which was hard because I already had, you know, car and bills and it wasn't good.

Stacey Cordivano: 15:18

So what's the salary for a small animal internship in this juncture?

Donita McCants: 15:24

at that time it was 27,000. Oh, oh for the year.

Stacey Cordivano: 15:30

Wow, I would I mean equine's pretty bad, but I wouldn't have expected it to be lower than equine. It was not livable?

Donita McCants: 15:39

No, okay, and I tried and my son was still like a toddler and in daycare and Expensive, and I was like I went to my internship coordinator and told him like I can't afford to Do this. Like I love, I don't mind being a grunt worker. This is actually very, very exciting for me. Like I love this. I love, you know, rotating. I love everything about it. I just I can't survive like this. Is it possible for me to go to go do Like relief? Because some of the residents were doing relief at ERs and stuff, sometimes just to get extra money, and they were like no, we can't offer that to you, because if we offer to you like offer to everybody, you know the residents they've kind of gone through things and that's a little bit different and your schedule is more rigorous than theirs is and we need you to be available when we need to be available and I'm like okay, so I had to go Because I'm like I was. I literally did a whole spreadsheet and everything like these are my expenses, this is what I'm getting paid. I have a child. I literally can't like I'm just, I'm in the red, I can't. So Even after me presenting all of my reasons, they're like no, so I left, not willingly, I didn't want to, but I left and I just went back into the workforce.

Donita McCants: 16:59

But I didn't go right into the workforce. I did relief because I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. And then I eventually started working for a Practice where I was considering Buying in, but those things didn't work out and they kind of fell apart. And then I still had that interest and love for On in my own business, my own practice. At some point I just wasn't sure, and what capacity? And then I started playing with the idea of mobile. So that's how that Idea came about around like 2020, so that it was just a idea that I was playing with. But I always wanted to be a business owner because my mom was an Entrepreneur her whole life. She never really could keep a job. She was definitely Queen 1099. So that's all I saw, that's all I knew. So I was. You know, that's that's where everything kind of came from in the beginning.

Stacey Cordivano: 17:48

Wow, I feel like there are so many things to unpack there and like avenues to go down, like the one thing that sticks out the most to me is like what a loss for that internship and like our industry.

Donita McCants: 18:05

I was sad, yeah, I was distraught, yeah, and they were like we were going to give you the surgery, internship and everything. And I'm like I wanted it, like I was a good intern.

Stacey Cordivano: 18:17

Remember what like. Then you do like another year of like $30,000. I mean like that's.

Donita McCants: 18:22

But luckily it's changed. They got bought out by another corporate, larger facility, because they were private at the time. Now I think the pay is at least livable, like in the sixties, you know.

Stacey Cordivano: 18:36

Oh, is it? Oh, okay, so that was back then, yeah.

Donita McCants: 18:39

So I think overall most of the internship numbers have gotten much better, but that back then it was crazy.

Stacey Cordivano: 18:46

Yeah. Yeah, that's really interesting. I'm so deep into the equine world I can like give you all the stats for the equine numbers, which definitely have not gone up to 60 for internships, but they're creeping up. But I would have guessed it would be. It would have been more than that for small animal. That's horrifying.

Donita McCants: 19:03

Yeah, Some places are in their fifties but at this time that particular facility they were privately owned, so they were like it was honestly, it was cruel. I mean that's like slave labor, what is that?

Stacey Cordivano: 19:17

Yeah, I mean like yeah, literally Okay. Yeah, I think the AAP is like currently advocating for, like adjusting for cost of living right, like at least pay, like a living wage for the city, and then that's another thing.

Donita McCants: 19:32

Cost of living is crazy now, so I know they probably have to adjust it again.

Stacey Cordivano: 19:37

Yeah, okay. So you had sort of an entrepreneurial inspiration in your background, knew that practice ownership was for you, which is awesome. I think that's amazing. So tell us now sort of what your practice looks like.

Donita McCants: 19:55

So my practice currently. I started Dr Donita's veterinary concierge services in August of 2021. I started out of my SUV, so I don't. I didn't have a big, large vehicle at first, I just started out of my car. I couldn't get any loans, I couldn't get any financial assistance or anything like that, so I just used my savings to get supplies. I honestly just had to go off of faith and hope that it was going to do okay and just bought the bare minimum.

Donita McCants: 20:29

My now fiance he quit his job and he helped me in the beginning because he believed in the business and he believed in the vision and I was like, okay, well, if you're going to quit your job to help be my like fake assistant vet tech, then I'm going to do what I need to do to make sure that we survive. So I did relief work, whatever I could do extra on the side to make sure that we survived, regardless on if we had like full books or not. So that's pretty much what I did to make sure that we were okay until it got to the point where we had enough business and had enough clients where I didn't need the relief anymore to sustain us. And then eventually we grew and we grew more, and in March of 2022 is when we got the Mercedes Sprinter van and we grew to the full service vehicle. So we were just slowly getting there, but it was pretty quick. We did grow really fast, but we were working really hard. We were doing a lot of legwork out in the community, going to events. Our face was all out there everywhere, like social media, everything. So we were pretty well known in the community and we made it known that we were out here and people knew how to find us. So that's definitely played a really big part on our engagement with the community and how well we connected with them.

Donita McCants: 21:52

Because the basis of the business was to reconnect and get back to what I needed for myself. I was a family, I was overworked, I was exhausted, it was post-pandemic, so I was just like I burnt out and I was not in love with VetMed anymore at all. So I was like I have to figure out another way because in a minute, I'm just not about to do this anymore. So I was like, well, let me try something else where I have more control of my schedule and how I want this to go and the people that I want to be around and the clients that I want to accept and those things have really made a difference on my life overall, just because I'm not so focused on how many clients I get. I'm more focused on the quality of the clients that I received. And even when we were one appointment, we always were selective, even when we were broke. That's great.

Stacey Cordivano: 22:49

We were broke and selective. Yeah, I mean honestly okay. Well, first of all, congratulations, it's such an inspirational story, but so much better. I mean when I started and was broke and had one appointment or two appointments a week, I would take anybody and that is a quick recipe for, like a downhill dive into a dumpster fire a severe burnout. So, yes, kudos to you for doing it that way. I do want to ask how long did it take like months, wise before you felt like you could step away from the relief shifts?

Donita McCants: 23:24

Hmm, oh, that's a good question. It probably was close. It was close to six months because I got enough money where I could afford to put the down payment on building the van. So it definitely was probably within six months where it was getting to the point I was like slowly backing them down Like I would. First I'll do like maybe two shifts a week and then I went down the one shift a week and then like one a month just to kind of keep up with it.

Stacey Cordivano: 23:49

Yeah, yeah, I just I asked that question because I feel like a lot of people's hurdle in maybe starting a mobile practice would be like I'm not going to be busy. It's going to take too long to pay all this back, right? I also want to go back to this. Were the distributors not able to give you, like new practice deals?

Donita McCants: 24:11

I did get a couple of new practice deals. Zaweta gave me a really good one. They gave me a good Bogo deal for sure. One of the other companies put it and give me a perfect deal, but they gave me a couple of months, I think. One company gave me like six months up front and the other one gave me like a couple of months to get things up front because my credit wasn't amazing enough for them to say, oh here, take all of this, you know. Okay. So I would say, like, if your credit is amazing, they'll give you whatever, but if your credit is like, eh, they may not give you like everything. Okay, so if you're considering doing it like working your credit for sure, and then you'll be able to get more things up front from them and then pay them back. But I didn't want to owe too much. I was like it's okay.

Stacey Cordivano: 24:56

Yeah.

Donita McCants: 24:56

No sure.

Stacey Cordivano: 24:57

I mean, I think starting bare bones is smart.

Donita McCants: 25:00

Yeah, but I did get like blood machines, blood machines that they gave for free. Oh, okay, yeah, I did get blood machines for free with you know, you got to do a certain amount of purchasing and stuff. My X-ray was supposed to be free, but that's another story for another time.

Stacey Cordivano: 25:16

Yeah, it's hard to get traditional funding for a mobile practice, which is ridiculous because I actually think a mobile practice is like a pretty good bet, but I have I mean, I know that myself, but I've also heard that from the small animal side of things and it is hard Got it Okay. So, lots of involvement in the community, lots of presence on social media and then being selective, are you feeling like you're at a place where you're really comfortable and stable right now? I was.

Donita McCants: 25:51

But I think some of the factors out of my control as far as what I've done or what I could or couldn't do, I've tapped out on, like as far as my immediate market. So I'm probably going to just start branching out to other markets that I've been saying. Hey, you know they keep calling me from other service areas that I haven't been able to service. But I think a couple of issues are. My main service area has a lot of new practices opening, like there's like two or three new practices all within like a five minute distance of each other. So there's just too many saturated practices and, granted, the area itself has a lot of new people moving in, but so many practices within that range I just know that's probably affecting it. Now versus two years ago, three of those didn't exist. Now they have all of these. So the need for me versus the want for me factor is there, because some of them they may need me because they're disabled or they're pet's anxious all the reasons why they call a mobile bet but some of the ones that just they like the idea but it's just kind of out of their budget range. That's kind of what I'm starting to feel a difference, with which a lot of this is just the economy and what's going on right now in the world, and right now the cost of living here is astronomical. So it's a lot of different factors for why we're going through this kind of like this roller coaster ride right now.

Donita McCants: 27:16

But as far as we've been working, I definitely should be good, but we're still booking out. It's not like we don't have any appointments, we're in a good place, it's just. It just tells me like okay, now it's time for me to like kind of go back to my roots, like recondis my schedule a little bit, make some adjustments with payroll and go back to some of the things that I haven't been able to do, like fitness is part of my life that I love, like body building, all those other things that I haven't been able to do, and all still reasons why I started the business, so that I could do those. So I'm like you know what? This isn't a bad thing. This is kind of a reawakening. I'm like, hey, this is the time to go back to the things that you wanted to do anyway and just recondit your schedule so that now you can add back in the fun and the balance that you wanted in the first place because I was starting to lose that again and I was like oh Lord.

Stacey Cordivano: 28:03

So All right, it's that hustle, like we're hustler, like we're all hustlers. Right, that's how you get into vet school, how you get through vet school and then how you start your own business. But then it's like, okay, I do have to balance this. Yeah, so you said that you're a concierge service, so is that subscription based? Do they have access to you at all times? Can you like define a little bit how your mobile practice?

Donita McCants: 28:30

works. So when I named it I was basing it off of the clientele that I had seen previously at my other practice because I was working at that in a similar area. So I know I wanted it to be kind of like high quality, like first class service, because our motto is first class doorstep pet care. So that concierge word already sounds fancy. So I was going with my clientele that I usually see that were in that middle, higher income. You know, they wanted the best, they wanted perfection or whatever it is that they saw or in me or what they wanted. So I wanted to bring that like higher quality medicine and care and you know, just give them like that white glove service. So that's kind of where the name came from.

Donita McCants: 29:20

And some people they're like oh, concierge is expensive. So some people, you know, the first thing they're calling because of like how much is this? How much is that? Because they're trying to see like wait, is it going to be like thousands of dollars or or is it? You know, but we're pretty comparable to most of the you know the higher quality practices anyway, I mean, we're not low cost by any means, but we're not, you know, astronomical. But when they call it like oh, I was going to be, you know, so the name already, which isn't a bad thing. It kind of just tears. The people that we don't necessarily want, yeah, but the people that are interested, they call, they just inquire and they're like, oh, okay, I can do that and they're interested, so okay.

Stacey Cordivano: 29:59

And so you're doing full service care now that you have the Sprinter van, like pretty much everything.

Donita McCants: 30:04

Yeah, so we do. I have a surgery suite, so we have anesthesia unit. I do space neuters, dental cleanings, I have the blood machines on there that I mentioned. I also have x-ray capability, so I can do pretty much everything. I do cryo also now, so I can do like I can freeze off masses. I just partnered with a mobile ultrasound doctor, so now that's something that I'm offering clients as well. Where they can, you know, I meet them together with her and we can do ultrasounds at people's houses.

Stacey Cordivano: 30:38

There's also a mobile CT.

Donita McCants: 30:40

Exactly. And then there's also another person that does mobile CT scans here as well, so cool, yeah, yeah. So we have a lot of different collaborations where I could still be full service with the help of the community and other people that are doing mobile things as well.

Stacey Cordivano: 30:58

Yeah, we certainly do not all need to have a CT machine driving around with us. That's a great. I love that. It's not an option for me as a horse, that, but okay, I was going to ask something else. Oh, do you provide emergency services?

Donita McCants: 31:13

I do so on Fridays. That's kind of like my emergency urgent day Okay. So that's usually where I'll leave that open for like urgent things like that. I try to keep my schedule open a little bit at the end of the day for like urgent calls or like a same day access call. So I leave that space in there throughout the week for when people do call for those type of things.

Stacey Cordivano: 31:36

Oh, interesting, I love that. Do they get charged differently if it's the same day visit?

Donita McCants: 31:42

Definitely.

Stacey Cordivano: 31:43

Great, perfect, I love it. Okay, so that's a lot about your business and your how you got here. Thank you for sharing all that. What are some of these other things that you mentioned that you love doing? Because I think it's important, even if we're not the best at it, to try to at least have goals for life outside of veterinary medicine.

Donita McCants: 32:05

Yes, yes. So my secondary life hobby, which is a part time job when I'm doing it fully, is I'm a competitive bodybuilder. So, yeah, yeah, so that equals, you know, the whole shebang, like you know, eating every three hours, doing cardio twice a day, doing your workouts five times a week and, you know, getting ready for shows I've done. My first show was right before I opened my business, which is why I haven't been able to do another show, but and that was in June of 2021. So for that show, I lost 70 pounds. So I lost a lot of weight, definitely reconfigured my whole body.

Donita McCants: 32:42

So definitely not the same person, but that's one of my bigger accomplishments, for sure, because fitness and that's always been a staple for my life, but doing something that extreme, losing that kind of weight and that amount of body fat, is just, you know, it's commendable, because I didn't. You know, that was one of the hardest things I've ever done in my entire life, honestly, but still love it. I thought it was going to be like a one and done like a bucket list item, but it ended up becoming more of a passion now and I really enjoy it and for me, it's definitely stress relief. It's the parts of my day where I can, you know, release. Always when I talk to people, where I do talks, I always tell them like you need to find something, that where you can like release the day, and for me it's fitness, you know, just something to just blow off some steam and just relax and just have something for yourself, because we forget to just do that, and fitness is a way that I can have that time for myself.

Stacey Cordivano: 33:38

That's amazing. So I mean, aside from like being selective about clientele and who you take, how do you fit that in?

Donita McCants: 33:47

Oh, I have to schedule it honestly. Like I literally just finished readjusting my schedule for the 13th time to schedule it in. So it's one of those things. Like I have to physically schedule it, like, okay, I'm working these days, okay, these are my long days, so I can't do too much those days. Because you know, we have to be realistic with ourselves. Like for me, I'd be realistic as hot as heck out here right now. So 100 degree weather. I 1000%, I'm not going to work out when I get done with my day. It's just not going to happen. I'm exhausted.

Donita McCants: 34:17

So if I have to work out one of those days, it has to be early in the morning. You have to. You have to decide how bad you want things and how badly you want to make a change. So, even if your thing is just to get up and just meditate, you just have to get up a little bit earlier to make those changes for yourself. And even when I don't want to do it and I get up and then, once I get going, then I start feeling good and I'm like, okay, I didn't want to get up because I'm not a Mormon person. But once I got up I was like, oh, that was good. I needed that. I needed that. So once you start putting it in your routine and you make it a part of your regimen, then it just becomes second nature.

Stacey Cordivano: 34:54

Yeah, that's good advice. I still struggle to get you know workouts into my routine. It's sort of the thing that comes off my schedule first if something else has to get fit in. But yeah, making it a priority is important. Anything else you want to share with people, because I so appreciate your time and I don't want to take too much of it, but anything else you want to let people know or talk about?

Donita McCants: 35:19

Yeah, like I do a little bit of everything Like that's my side passion, but I also enjoy helping the community. I love helping the kids. When I do go out to the community I loved. My favorite recently was going down to Fort Lauderdale with the Critter Fixers. I know they have the little Vet for a Day program and they came to Fort Lauderdale back in October, november, I can't remember when, but it was with Dr Stephanie Jones. It was at her hospital and we were going to do it and I didn't realize that she wanted. I didn't realize she was that far away. I knew she was in Florida but I thought she was closer to me.

Donita McCants: 35:59

I thought she was closer to me at first and she's like, oh, I'm at Fort Lauderdale. And I was like, oh, okay, all right. And then she wanted me to be in the van and at first I said, yeah, sure, I bring the van. But I didn't know. It was like a three hour drive and I was like, oh crap. So by the time I realized it I haven't already committed to it and I was like, okay, so if you can't come, I'm like no, no, for the children, it's for the children. So I drove my van down there to Fort Lauderdale for the Vet for a Day program. It was great, they loved it.

Donita McCants: 36:30

I always loved talking to the kids, especially kind of like what we talked about with like mental health and, like, you know, getting accommodations. And you know, I just tell them the truth, because sometimes it's hard to get kids, they don't really listen. But when you can say something that relates to them, they start to listen and they get excited like, oh, okay. And after just telling them just a little bit about my story and what I went through, a couple of the parents came up. It's like, oh, my god, my daughter's dealing with that right now and thank you so much for just you know talking about it and being vulnerable and being honest because you know they need to hear that and that they can do something like that and that you know stuff like that. Just kind of it Just gets me all excited and warms my heart. I was like all the children so it was. I was like, okay, that was worth the drive.

Stacey Cordivano: 37:19

Yeah, I mean, it's something that I am passionate about is, you know, increasing the diversity in veterinary medicine. I'm always appreciative of anyone that can increase access to allowing kids to see people that look like them and Hopefully increasing the number of people that we have, because I think it would be a better profession for it, for sure. Anything you suggest that people can do to help with that access to care or increasing awareness.

Donita McCants: 37:50

There's so many options. Definitely, vet set go is an option that you can always do, especially for veterinarians. You can volunteer your time or your practice Some people they need more practices that are interested in volunteering their time, so that's definitely a big one. Obviously, of course, blend vet is doing a lot of great things in the community with kids. And then you know the one, the critter fixers, that for a day program they're all, they're kind of traveling all over. So that's always a good one. If you're interested or you have a hospital that will be interested in being a stop, that's always a good one too. There's so many now, like ever, I feel like everyone has like di programs now. So Dr Courtney Campbell he's in conjunction with one of the other D young at programs. Everyone is kind of doing a little bit of everything in different ways. So there's always, there's always an option, there's always an option. And if kids are asking you, then your community, to come to say yes, like they can't, they can just shadow, they don't have to touch anything, you know they can come in like I did that a few weeks ago.

Donita McCants: 38:59

A pre vet. She had been apparently watching me for a while on Instagram and she lived in Tampa and she came and did some shadow. I didn't even know she was coming from Tampa. I just was like she just would mess and be, like can I come in shadows? Like sure, she drove like early in the morning, got up at five o'clock in the morning to drive from Tampa, so it was so sweet. So if you just say yes, just say yes, you know she's starting her career, her vet career, so it's like okay, okay, every time I have those moments, it just, it just reminds me like hey, people are watching. If you can give more to your community or you can just continue to do what you're doing, just give advice, just teach them something, and people are watching. They may not always give you, you know, a pound the back, but someone's watching you and they, they want to know or they may want to be like you. So Awesome.

Stacey Cordivano: 39:47

Well, thank you so much for being so vulnerable and honest and sharing your story with us. I really appreciate it. It was really fun chatting with you. I ask all my guests what is one small thing that has brought you joy this past week?

Donita McCants: 40:01

being honest with myself and Giving back to myself this week because I haven't been doing that. So going honestly, going to the gym on Wednesday brought me the most joy. It's really weird, but when I finished and I was sweaty, the fact that I was sweaty brought me joy.

Stacey Cordivano: 40:23

I'm sure that resonates for a lot of people actually.

Donita McCants: 40:27

Yeah, we don't have to get enough time to get a full sweat on so yeah, yeah, like I finally broke a sweat and I hadn't done that in a while, so that was. That was really important for me. I was like finally I did something so great.

Stacey Cordivano: 40:42

Well, I'm so glad we connected. I definitely will say in touch and I thank you for your time, thank you. Thank you for having me. Thank you so much for tuning in to the whole veterinarian podcast. I so appreciate the time that you spend with me to connect. Please find me on Instagram at the whole veterinarian, or check out the website at the whole veterinarian calm, and you can sign up for our monthly newsletter as well. Thanks again and I'll talk to you soon. You.