5 Questions with Caitlin Venniker

One of my favorite things about reading is how a book can transport you into someone else’s life. It’s my favorite way to learn about different periods of time, professions and ways of living. It’s this reason why I loved Unleashed, because Caitlin Venniker allowed you rught into her life. And, for as long as I was between the covers of her book, I got to see what it would be like to study veterinarian medicine in South Africa, to go from student to vet and find yourself in doing what you love. 

After reading her book I sent her a handful of questions on sharing her story, mental health and writing. 

What inspired you to share your stories of training and practicing as a vet, and why now? 

After COVID my husband and I had recently moved to the UAE. I was a new mom and at that stage unregistered to work. I felt a bit lost and a bit lonely, far from home, far from the person I used to be. I set myself a goal of entering writing competitions for a year, like a shout out into the void to see if I got an echo. That went a lot better than I expected, so it seemed like the next step was to join a writing class. The fiction class I found, run by Mike Nicol, was closed at that time so I joined his non-fiction class and under his encouragement my submissions grew into a manuscript. 

There are plenty of good reasons to have written this book – like shedding a light on the mental health crisis in the veterinary profession, remembering the people and animals I met along the way, and celebrating the bond between pets and their owners that vets get to witness every day. Those things were part of it, but really I wrote it for the fun of it. Writing it was a joy. 

You speak a lot about mental health (or rather the lack thereof) within the veterinary industry. How do you protect your own mental health? 

I find hobbies very helpful, developing a skill in another area. For me that sense of progression, no matter how small, is such a good balance to a tough day at work or feelings of overwhelm. My absolute best is riding my horse but it could be anything that requires enough concentration to switch off everything else. Another thing that lifts my mood is feeling part of a community. If I know the car guard where I park and can have a chat, or ask the pharmacist about her family, those small interactions immediately brighten my day. 

How were you able to remember so many wonderful and hilarious stories – do you keep a journal or is it just pure memory recall. 

I’ve kept journals on and off throughout my life so that did help for parts of the book, as well as old photographs. Most of the memories felt very fresh though. It was a time of growth and learning and new experiences, big highs and lows, so many of the things that happened made quite an impression on me. Some conversations I could remember word for word! But a memoir differs from autobiography in that it is an impression of a time, so that took the pressure off having to be precise about peripheral details. 

You’ve written fiction, non-fiction and poetry – which is your favorite genre to write? 

That is such an interesting question! I’m not really sure. They are so different. Poems come to me erratically but usually quite quickly so if I get them right (and I get many wrong) it can be quite a rush. Fiction holds this incredible power of possibility and it feels so intimate creating a character. I always thought non-fiction wouldn’t appeal to me, but after writing this book I can appreciate how wonderful it is to write about real people. I could hear them in my head when I wrote dialogue in a way I couldn’t have made up. Real people are so interesting and surprising and funny, it was enlightening. You also don’t have to conjure up a plot, things just unspool in that inimitable way that life does. 

I read your book right after Falls the Shadow by Mike Nicol and it was somewhat serendipitous to read that you had done a writing course with him. What was the lesson you learnt from him that has had the most impact on your writing? 

Mike is a master of the craft but I don’t think there was any specific lesson that counted as much as the confidence he gave me. Whenever I thought I was being too much he was there cheering me on. I remember handing in a submission and feeling self conscious and he said, “Caity, I’d read your writing if it were upside down.” It was a flippant comment but I guess every now and then someone says something to you that changes the way you see yourself, and that did. Whenever the voices of doubt got loud after that, I could hear those words. He really believed in me.