the kids are gonna be alright
Our relief vet is working this week while our regular vet is on vacation, and her 13-year-old daughter is also here to shadow us because she wants to be a vet some day and wanted to see what the job was really like. Cue this conversation
Kid: What does the 'N' mean on the paper?
Vet: It means the cat is neutered, you remember what that means?
Kid: He can't have babies.
Vet: Right. We call it 'neutered' for boys and 'spayed' for girls.
Kid: But...what about nonbinary cats???
Vet: *tries not to die laughing*
Me: We get those too! Sometimes we have to spay AND neuter them, or neuter what looks lile a girl cat, or once there was even found a cat who had nothing at all! Its gender was 'cat'.
This is the same kid who told a client the coolest thing she'd learned here so far was that if cats eat fleas, they get buttworms.