Nick Trout > Quotes

“It may be a cat, a bird, a ferret, or a guinea pig, but the chances are high that when someone close to you dies, a pet will be there to pick up the slack. Pets devour the loneliness. They give us purpose, responsibility, a reason for getting up in the morning, and a reason to look to the future. They ground us, help us escape the grief, make us laugh, and take full advantage of our weakness by exploiting our furniture, our beds, and our refrigerator. We wouldn't have it any other way. Pets are our seat belts on the emotional roller coaster of life--they can be trusted, they keep us safe, and they sure do smooth out the ride.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“Over the years I've come to appreciate how animals enter our lives prepared to teach and far from being burdened by an inability to speak they have many different ways to communicate. It is up to us to listen more than hear, to look into more than past.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“Perhaps the greatest gift an animal has to offer is a permanent reminder of who we really are.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“There are many reasons why so many of us choose to share our lives with a pet--it's the perfect antidote for loneliness, providing an endless supply of smiles and the certainty of unwavering companionship, and many of us have seen the way a pet can make a family feel whole.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“Our pets are the kids who never leave home, and that's absolutely fine by us because these kids don't ask for the keys to the car, don't turn up drunk at two in the morning, and don't complain if you turn their bedroom into a home gym. Their presence in times of upheaval and transition acts as a touchstone, a reminder of normalcy, of comfort, and the certainty of a love that can get you through.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“. . . mistakes are inevitable, but what is not, and what will set us apart, is our ability to learn from them”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“Do you want to die, or do you want to die trying? Give up or give it a shot.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“Pets are our seat belts on the emotional roller coaster of life--they can be trusted, they keep us safe, and they sure do smooth out the ride.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“Here was my lesson in the reach of veterinary medicine, in how an animal doctor may not be the one standing up when disaster strikes and someone shouts, 'Is there a doctor in the house?' but occasionally, if he or she is lucky, a vet can help heal a sick loved one.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“Dogs choose us, not the other way around.”
― Nick Trout, The Wonder of Lost Causes

“When you cry about losing a dog, it means the dog did its job. It means the dog made a connection.”
― Nick Trout, The Wonder of Lost Causes

“The amount of actual time is irrelevant because the intensity of the moment is guaranteed to last. It doesn't matter because what remains and what can never be lost is a spirit.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“Our pets will never be with us for long enough, at least physically, but when they have been blessed with opportunity and been able to live a full life, how can we respond with anything less than pride and celebration?”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“Without fail, he always signed off on these letters with love and he always included Whiskey and Bess in the list of individuals sending this love my way. At the time it made me laugh, it made me embarrassed, but as soon as I softened, as soon as I matured back into his son, I came to appreciate what he was saying -- an endearing and magnanimous reminder of how family will always be the sum of its individual members, be they human or animal.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“I haven’t been around dogs for as long as you, but everything I see tells me they live their lives like this is heaven, as good as it gets, like if we only get one go around, they’re not going to miss a thing.”
― Nick Trout, The Wonder of Lost Causes

“Please, if necessary, blame my British indoctrination or blame my affiliation to the MSPCA (the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals refuses to perform ear cropping, tail docking, debarking, or cat declawing), but I have a problem with slicing off a hefty chunk of healthy skin and associated cartilage and then submitting an animal to weeks of ridiculous taping and splinting as you strive to achieve the desirable degree of erectness.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“And as for those high school students who tell me they would rather be a cat than an MD because they prefer to deal with animals and not to deal with people, I let them know they have it all wrong. Veterinarians get to work with animals. We get to work for people.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“When the cure for insecurity and meaningful conversation is to slap a cell phone against your ear, hide within your iPod, or tap out a cryptic instant message, is it any wonder that we find comfort and solace in hairy, furry, and scaly companions?”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“Burt’s eyes may be sad and brown and tangled in a spider web of wrinkles, but I reckon he’s lived my version of a perfect life—a life full of dogs.”
― Nick Trout, The Wonder of Lost Causes

“Returning home can be awkward for any college-age kid. We spend our teenage years learning to be obnoxious and short with our parents. We prefer to confide in friends. We connive, we become reclusive, we strive to become remote. We may still have a little voice somewhere deep inside pleading, 'Just keep loving me, I'll come back,' but for the most part, coming home from college is like reaching for the end of an umbilical cord we worked so hard to cut. We enjoy the security, the lazy familiarity, but we have left the nest, proven our capacity for independence, and now demand the respect afforded adults.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“...hoping that he might peek through a gap in the fance and see that Patch was really a big softy, all bark and no bite, or, as they sometimes say in England, "All mouth and no trousers"!”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“I don't want to be an inspiration. I want to be normal. I want to get through a day without needing to cry.”
― Nick Trout, The Wonder of Lost Causes

“Most likely my thoughts were overshadowed by a hankering for a smaller hand size or a larger breed of patient. This was going to be tight – one-handed bomb disposal down a rabbit hole. This close to a beating heart, cutting the wrong connection or failing to cut it clean could be fatal.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“See, Danny died” The words came out and then she laughed, defending against the tears poised to ruin her mascara. “I was with him for eighteen years. He was Danny’s dog, but Danny knew I stole Blue’s heart as much as Blue stole mine. This dog hasn’t just changed my life, this dog saved my life.”

Her voice began to falter as she added, “Blue is my last connection to him. If this dog ever dies I die.”
― Nick Trout, Love Is the Best Medicine: What Two Dogs Taught One Veterinarian about Hope, Humility, and Everyday Miracles

“It's just part of me feels like I owe it to the animal to be strong, to be supportive in their place now that they are gone.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“delivering the order.”
― Nick Trout, Ever By My Side: A Memoir in Eight [Acts] Pets

“Sometimes nature can take its course and shove it. Our commitment to protecting our cat or dog is life-long and sadly, sometimes, that includes protection from discomfort and pain, even if, in the vet's opinion, this means euthanasia.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“We pour our heart and soul into the animals in our lives, insisting that they are our children, that we love them no less than if they shared our DNA, and we do this with a certainty that for all this joy, we are guaranteed to lose them, to bury them, and somehow, to face life without them once again.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“and make me proud and grateful to be doing what I do.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon

“It was not the magic of the surgeon: it was the magic of surgery. It was not simply the dramatic nature of Norman’s recovery; it was the struggle, the fear, the danger, and the perseverance that made it possible.”
― Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon