I am so Excited! For good reason???

Okay, I am going to give some background on what is going on here. I am making a major career change. Well... not major, but pretty significant. I have a master's degree in Microbiology and Immunology and have worked in research laboratories for 12 years. However, I have had a hard time finding a "home." i.e. somewhere I feel I could settle down and work for the rest of my life. I keep moving labs almost every two years and keep looking for something I am not finding. Some joy in my daily work.

During my undergrad years, I focused on Zoology and did lots and lots of work with animals. Bats, Otters, Lizards, etc. I have always loved animals (as I am sure we all do). But in a search for the big paycheck, in 1996 I moved into genetics/biotech and decided to work "at the bench." This unfortunately is not that rewarding for me.

In the last two months, I decided I need to get back to animal work. I asked around as far as what would be available to someone with a Master's degree and LOTS of animal experience in research - research involving blood sampling, surgeries, etc - in other words, I have had tons of animal experience, but never directed toward animal health - more directed toward human health and using animal models to find ways to improve human health.

Long story short, I begin my new position as vet tech in exactly one week. My first day will be May 1. I have no idea what to expect. I hear that the place I will be working has tons of problems with management and job allocation etc. In fact, all I hear are complaints from the employees. So I am a bit concerned. But I figure okay... with a higher salary and less working hours than my previous job, I should give it a try.

So I plan to keep this blog and write about everything, my first day, and all that. One of the reasons I wanted to keep this blog is that I am so concerned about this career change that I am bugging everyone around me about it constantly!! My boyfriend finally told me, keep a journal and leave us alone!!

I am going to give it a shot for at least six months to a year. I will always look for other jobs and keep my eyes open in case I hate it and that way I will be able to move back into research if needed.

One thing that looks promising is that I have a Master's degree and not many vet tech's do. So there is a big possibility to move up into a supervisory role. This would never be the case in research. And I am very big into management and organizations of teams. So that is kind of my ultimate goal. If I like this work, I plan to get manager certifications and become a husbandry supervisor or other. With a Master's I think there are alot of possibilities that would allow me to work with animals and get paid well. Who knew!