30 Of The Most Entertaining ‘It Doesn’t Work Like That’ Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community

Each era has its own folklore and its own myths. In the old days, these were mighty heroes and terrible monsters, then noble knights and beautiful princesses, cowboys shooting without a single miss, and bulletproof superheroes. The contemporary world also has its own myths, and moreover, we face them literally every day.

Ask any software engineer you know how many times in their lives they have been asked to fix a desktop - simply because they are "programmers". Or how many times an accountant - even if they have never dealt with a tax report in their entire professional career - receives requests from acquaintances to sort out their taxes?

Myths, myths and more myths surround literally every profession, and we create these myths ourselves. Just from watching a couple of James Bond films, we are sure that spies spend their lives doing nothing but driving around in luxury cars wearing insanely expensive suits. Just from watching a couple of children's films, we will strongly believe that the workers at the animal shelter have the most wonderful job in the world, as they pet doggos and kitties all day long.

The list is literally endless, and a popular thread starter in the AskReddit community recently helped us by asking people the question: "What's your profession's myth that you regularly need to explain 'It doesn't work like that' to people?" In just a few days, the thread has racked up 2.5K upvotes and over 3.8K comments, bringing together an incredible collection of today's mythology.

To make it easier for you to figure out all this abundance, Bored Panda has made a list of the most popular comments of the original thread. So now feel free to read stories on debunking modern myths, scroll to the very end, and if you have your own professional experience that can also dispel some myth literally in the wind, please be sure to tell us about it in the comments.

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Your terminally ill grandmother isn't "becoming addicted" to her pain medication. She's dying in as much comfort and with as much dignity as we can provide.

Aggressivecleaning , Rick Kimpel Report

Final score:

537points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Pet euthanasia. There is a wildly popular post that goes around about how pets dropped off for euthanasia “look around for their owners” and know they’ve been “abandoned”. It’s nonsense, and I will defend clients dropping off until I myself die.

I’ve seen what happens when owners can’t say goodbye so they don’t. The animal suffers for days to weeks until their bodies finally give out. I have literally seen a dog rotting from the inside out, SOMEHOW still alive, but the owner couldn’t commit to euthanasia so she didn’t and that dog suffered tremendously for it.

Everyone has boundaries to what they can handle. Requiring an otherwise loving, doting, and responsible owner to be present when it was all they could do to make the appointment doesn’t help pets the way you think it does.

Furthermore, in the nine years I’ve worked in this industry, I have *never* experienced what is described in that post. Ever. And my colleagues overwhelmingly agree. We love on them and hug them, and tell them they’re a good boy until they pass. **By the logic in that post, you should also never drop off for sedated or anesthetic procedures either because the process begins the same way (with sedation). How is that pet to know that death is imminent? They don’t.**

You’re projecting your emotions onto people who are already suffering, and you’re not helping pets by shaming owners, and my local, professional cohort overwhelmingly agrees.

Graceishh , christopher cornelius Report

Final score:

517points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Weight loss surgery is NOT the easy way out. There is nothing easy about getting your stomach resized to hold a cup or less of food, it f***s up your metabolism, eating the wrong things can cause serious pain, and guess what you're on for the rest of your life? A restrictive diet. Because your stomach's tiny but you still need all the nutrients.

Weight loss medications are not the easy way out either. They don't work unless the patient does, and even then, sometimes it takes months to find the right combo of meds. And there's still nutrition and exercise requirements.

Basically, being obese is really hard, and getting to a point where one is no longer obese is also really hard, so when you see someone obese, assume that they're doing their best and could use some kindness.

insertcaffeine , Andres Ayrton Report

Final score:

383points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community No Ma'am, we aren't going to 'shock' (defibrillate) your family member because their heart isn't actually beating.

Defibrillators do not restart a heart, they reset a malfunctioning cardiac rhythm. If the heart isn't at least doing something then our options are CPR and meds until we get some kind of rhythm.

Sincerely,
Tired Medic

OTTB_Mama , Iain Cameron Report

Final score:

367points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Antibiotics don't work on viral diseases.

The_Max_V , Bytemarks Report

Final score:

346points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Child welfare investigator here

My job isn’t “hard” for the reasons most people think: constantly being exposed to and interviewing abused children

It’s hard because 90% of the time, it’s just disgruntled exes calling on each other over nothing..and dealing with grown adults’ drama is exhausting af.

KyleB2131 , Eren Li Report

Final score:

338points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Just because I’m a psychologist doesn’t mean I’m immune to psychological disorders or distress.

0_0moon0_0 , cottonbro Report

Final score:

301points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community I'm a retired used bookstore owner. People were always saying "Oh, I would love to own a bookstore. You can read all day.". Um, no. It's actually a lot of hard, physical work, (boxes of books are heavy), lots of bending and reaching. And then you get to clean the store and do the paperwork. Owning any retail store is not an easy job!

lmcbmc , VasenkaPhotography Report

Final score:

300points

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30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Retail. If an employee tells you they're sold out of that hot sale item. They're sold out. They're not hoarding them in the backroom, because f**k you. They know they're sold out, because you're the 10th person to ask about it, in the last 20 minutes.

RagingHolly , Clean Wal-Mart Report

Final score:

282points

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#10

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Former pastry chef, and still work in a hotel. No I do not make amazing food at home. I barely survive on a diet of cereal, sandwiches and chocolate bars. Pot noodles if I’m feeling fancy.

Also most people in the industry are either junkies or alcoholics to cope with the brutal schedule. My extended family still can’t fathom me working the amount out of hours a week I work.

Also we do not enjoy weddings, they are fun to attend, but nothing but a headache to run.

Catherineb84 , laredawg Report

Final score:

271points

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#11

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community When I was building decks I remember a lot of people asked for shorter railings because it'd look nicer. I totally agree, but if 42" is the minimum in this state we're gonna do 42"

LetzterMensch11 , ntm1909 Report

Final score:

265points

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#12

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Although I'm a skilled teacher the students need to do the learning. I can't do it for them.

MrsMisthios , MART PRODUCTION Report

Final score:

251points

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#13

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community No doctor does all aspects of medicine and surgery.. it’s specialized and sub specialized. Obviously in more rural areas people do more, but for the most part, complex things get sent to very specialized folks and a doctor like House would never exist (and anyone who acted like him would be fired in about a week)

nematocyst987 , Anna Shvets Report

Final score:

233points

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#14

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Being a car machenic that specializes in a couple of cars. We dont know everything about how to fix the car out of our heads. we use youtube a lot to figure out stuf we dont know.

potato13254 , neajjean Report

Final score:

228points

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#15

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community "I have this great idea for a book. You write it, and we'll split the profits."

Nope.

weird-oh , Sergey Torbik Report

Final score:

216points

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#16

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community That vet techs get to play with puppies and kittens all day. It’s a physically and mentally exhausting job.

Constant_Problem9387 , p.nguyen Report

Final score:

212points

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#17

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Wearing glasses doesn't make your eyes worse. There are so many misconceptions and so much false reasoning that goes into that one belief that I don't even know where to start. But I'll try anyway I guess.

1) "I noticed my eyes got blurry only after wearing glasses!" That is because your eyes have adjusted to seeing things with more clarity. So of course you're now going to notice when you're missing that clarity whether it be because you took off your glasses or your prescription has changed.
2) "Wearing glasses cause eye strain!" No it doesn't. Your usual eye strain is from working long hours or staring at screens. But you're only noticing it now because the adjustment period when getting glasses for the first time or when getting a new prescription does increase eye strain until you adjust.
3) "I used to never need glasses but now I need new ones every two years! My eyes are getting worse because of glasses!" Refer back to 1. But also you didn't need glasses previously because your eyesight wasn't s**tty enough for you to notice yet or be really othered by it yet. That doesn't mean you didn't actually need them. Your eyesight was probably changing every year even while you didn't notice. Now that you are used to seeing with clarity, you'll notice when things aren't clear and crisp anymore.

I have dealt with many adults who insist they don't need glasses, either distance or reading or both, because they just don't want to concede that their vision isn't great anymore. These are adults with nearsightedness, astigmatism, and sometimes who even need reading correction. And they can't see s**t. Like why are you so stubborn.

kirabera , Lisa Fotios Report

Final score:

211points

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#18

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community I work in childcare and no, I don’t just get to play all day and have fun. I have to deal with behavioral issues, developmental delays, diapers, injuries, curriculum, art projects, huge messes during mealtime, working with one other person to put 12+ toddlers down for nap, etc. Of course it’s fun at times but dealing with all of that is so stressful.

cocoavendorbecky , TeaMeister Report

Final score:

191points

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#19

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community The "defense attorney" aspect of law

It's not your job to lie, deceive, and cheat to get your client acquitted. You give them the best legal defense so that they receive the due process that everyone has a right to.

*"The job of the defense is to make sure the prosecution does theirs."*

If your client is guilty, then the prosecution should be able to prove it fair and square. If they can't then the quality of evidence does not meet the minimum standard and your client should go free. Full stop.

Does that mean the occasional guilty person gets away with it? Yeah. But far worse is a system where innocent people are more likely to go to jail because a s**tty prosecutor's weak arguments were accepted.

A good defense attorney would recognize a losing case and just try to get the best deal for their client, and getting the weaker charges dropped (in case the prosecutor just decides to "throw the book" at them)

NoStressAccount , Sadmir Kanovicki Report

Final score:

189points

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#20

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Computer animation doesn’t mean the computer does the animation…I do.

CheeseburgerBrown , Vancouver Film School Report

Final score:

166points

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#21

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community There are no skeleton keys. There is no "one key that fits all locks". There are master keys that have been painstakingly installed into a buildings locks, some of which might fit all the locks depending on that particular keys chosen mastering levels, but no. There is no skeleton key. I, a locksmith, use special tools to open locks. I have a big bag of them. Tools like picks, jiggle keys, bump keys 2in1 Lishi keys, and many more. Yes, I got into your house fast. That's because I know how your lock works and know how to defeat it. No I did not turn up with a working key (disclaimer: sometimes I do as I have codes recorded for places I've worked on and I can get codes from car dealers so I can make a key before I turn up.)

PapaOoMaoMao , plenty.r. Report

Final score:

161points

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#22

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Something being 'off the record'.

If you're speaking to a journalist, you can't just say 'off the record' and then spill your guts. You need to have agreed with the journalist beforehand that you will not be quoted.

Yossarian__ , CoWomen Report

Final score:

158points

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#23

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community University prof. I do not get summers off.

Teaching in front of classes is only about 30% of my job. The rest is one-on-one supervision of graduate students. Doing research, writing grant applications, writing research papers. Summer is the time of year when I finally have the time to do all that other stuff.

bigbrowbeater , eren {sea+prairie} Report

Final score:

141points

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#24

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Tax professional.

Most clients think that the best tax Pros necessarily get them bigger refunds. If you get a smaller refund in a particular year it may be because tax laws change, because you didn't pay in as much, or because you didn't have as many deductions. Explaining stuff to people doesn't work if their eyes are all glazed over because tax law discussions bore them

Going to another tax Pro to get a bigger refund, thinking that that tax Pro is "better" may just get you an audit

But the worst myth about taxes manifest itself when scammers call people on the phone climbing to be IRS agents. They tell folks that they owe money and that authorities are coming to their house to put them in jail if they don't pay up. The truth is that the real IRS does not call anyone on the phone unless they have contacted IRS first and are expecting them to return the call. IRS does not accuse you of text fraud. Even if they truly believe you have committed tax fraud they will simply send you a letter stating that they think you have underpaid your taxes. They will give you a chance to prove your case. If you don't do this or pay them what they say you owe, they will simply Levy your paycheck or your personal property. They do not show up at your house to put you in jail. So please if a scammer calls you do not give them your credit card information or give them payments in any form. Call the real IRS and report them.

Bebe_Bleau , Keith Cooper Report

Final score:

131points

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#25

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community That converting to salt water pools does not ‘get rid of the chlorine’. Salt is sodium chloride, salt gets converted to chlorine in a salt water pool, and you use the exact same test kits to monitor the chlorine levels in the pool water.

Malka8 , Aaron Toth Report

Final score:

120points

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#26

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Just because your old technical device (laptop, tablet, phone) is in good condition, doesn't actually mean that it's any "good" today.

wildfire98 , Alan Levine Report

Final score:

120points

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#27

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community I work in a hardware store and apparently people think we have a huge underground storage big enough to hide every product in existence. No, i can't just go and fetch a part for your 20 year old fireplace or power tool from the backroom.

Mjarf88 , L.C. Nøttaasen Report

Final score:

119points

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#28

I work in a bakery.

Baking stuff for 5000 people every day will take all night to do so when we run out of something during the day. We can't just slap something together in five minutes.

Come back tomorrow and we can get it for you.

AlleywayGum Report

Final score:

117points

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#29

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community If something isn't stocked on the shelf and I tell you it isn't in the back then it isn't in the back and I can't magically make it appear out of thin air... that being said if you are a d**k I also might just tell you it ain't in the back

m_g2468 , David Stewart Report

Final score:

113points

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#30

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Factory worker here.. Once a machine is set up, it can run all day, perfectly, without adjustment. Nope. Steel can vary in hardness, even within a continuous coil of wire. Humidity, ambient temperature, tooling wear can also spoil parts.

fafaxsake , Ekkasit Chaingam Report

Final score:

111points

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#31

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community That I do not magically know on the spot why your computer gives a BSOD or why a printer is slow to print large files. In order to solve the problem, I'm going to ask you a lot of questions, ask you to try to print different types of files to find the cause, ask someone else to print somethign to see if its account-related, etc. It's called elimination of possible causes.

But you're gonna have to cooperate to let me help you. If you just drop a problem at my feet that I can't directly reproduce, don't expect me to use telepathy to read your printer's mind and magically know the solution as if problems always have the same cause.

BlauweSjaars2 , Swaroop C H Report

Final score:

28points

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#32

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Being a lawyer is not like what you see on Suits. It's all the stuff they cut away from otherwise viewers would be too bored to watch it

koobus_venter1 , Sarah-Rose Report

Final score:

26points

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#33

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community As an engineer, I have to explain a lot of time that the law of energy and mass conservation can't be broken.

Bobraie , Kateryna Babaieva Report

Final score:

25points

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#34

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Its nothing like Charlie and the Chocolate factory

Thebreach46 , Sean MacEntee Report

Final score:

25points

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#35

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community It's not dinosaurs we're looking for, it's the remains of human activity. No, we didn't find any gold.

NunquamAccidet , Mike Bowler Report

Final score:

24points

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#36

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community There aren’t just buckets of grant money available for your wacky idea. You have to have a track record, an organization, a plan and a budget. It’s highly competitive.

Soobobaloula , pxhere Report

Final score:

23points

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#37

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Video production. Your only options in the edit are what the camera captured.

JhymnMusic , Matheus Bertelli Report

Final score:

23points

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#38

When someone finds out you're an accountant 90% of the time they will say "great, so you can help with my taxes haha" . There are loads of accountants who may never see taxes in their day-to-day and have minimal knowledge from their certification only.

dahliafluffy Report

Final score:

22points

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#39

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Putting an angled back cut when felling a tree against the lean does absolutely nothing and will result in a tree falling on your house. Just pay us to do the job

spjnr , Lee Haywood Report

Final score:

20points

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#40

I'm a software dev. Any time you say "it's simple, just _____", you're wrong. Hell, half the time I say it I'm wrong.

Aperture_T Report

Final score:

20points

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#41

Setting off a fire alarm system doesn't make all the sprinkler heads spew water.

jemihu23 Report

Final score:

19points

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#42

30 Of The Most Entertaining 'It Doesn't Work Like That' Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community Doing cash transactions under 10k to stay "under the radar" ...still gets us to do paperwork but ok buddy.

kannakantplay , Garrett Albright Report

Final score:

18points

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What do you think ?

Tracy 2 years ago

As a pharmacy technician, we do not set the prices of your medications, it’s your insurance company. They don’t tell us why your medication costs more than it did last month, nor do we know what your deductible is. You can use coupons like GoodRx which MIGHT make your medications cheaper, but it can’t be used with your insurance. Any questions about why your medications are so expensive can only be answered by your insurance company. Please call them and not yell at us. We just fill your medications

Emily Spector 2 years ago

You forgot the pharmaceutical companies.

11points

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Cat Chat 2 years ago

Well, to clarify, the pharmacy does set the price, based on what it cost them. How much of that price the customer actually pays is dependant on the insurance and what that covers.

2points

I Am LoKitty Of Meowsgard 2 years ago

Was a pharmacy tech for 12 years. Got sick of being yelled at, and covid made it worse. The nurses and doctors can also be extremely condescending, and they don't help when they tell a patient how much a medication should cost, or that it will be covered. They don't know that and need to stop telling the patients that, because those patients then get mad at us when their doctor was wrong. Anyway, I quit and I'm never looking back.

0points

Jinx 2 years ago

Animal rescue "oh it must be so great working with animals all day I love seeing the baby puppy pictures" no actually most of my job is either cleaning poop or heartbreaking. Most animals in rescue are sick and in terrible condition when they come in. They have trust issues they will bite. Dealing with half a litter dying or even the whole litter because their mom was practically dead when she came in because even though she'd been "hanging around a few weeks" you couldn't be bothered to call till now. Dealing with the people is just as bad. Older folks that just had to many to take care of but genuinely loved their dogs as much as you do,a*shats that breed pitt bulls even though shelters are over with them already because spaying they dog is "just wrong",the couple that are having a baby so no longer need a dog , ect. The animals that have purposely been beaten,shot,burned,cut ect. makes you loose all hope in humans.

But is is also the small things that keeps you trying. A 6oz preemie baby finally leveling out and eating normal, the fur growing back on mange puppies giving them a mohawk look for a couple of weeks,a dog finally wagging their tail at you instead of being scared of people, a tri-paw finally recovered enough after being hit by a car to play with others, finding the perfect forever home and getting updates with happy pictures. Also only working in rescue teaches you that you can actually be happy and animal is pooping everyday. 😂😂

7points

Serena 2 years ago

As an Artist, it doesn't mean since I'm doing what I love that it's not work. Everyday I am thinking of ideas, sketching, preparing, then gets into painting which can take days or months. I have to get things scanned in, take photographs and manage bookkeeping. What are my expenses, how much is the cost of supplies and running a website. Then I have to have social media accounts so people know this is what I'm doing all day. Not to mention reaching out to potential clients and doing art submissions. So no I am not going to make you a painting for free, or submit my art to a show/gallery where I am not paid for my time. No I am not going to join your art group with a membership fee or apply for a grant that won't guarantee me a steady income. Work is work no matter if you are in a field you enjoy. And if I'm not making money through my artwork then it would just be a hobby. Which it's not, so yeah just pay artists people.

1point

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30 Of The Most Entertaining ‘It Doesn’t Work Like That’ Stories, Told By Professionals In This Online Community

Games

Oleg Tarasenko

Oleg Tarasenko

Saulė Tolstych

Saulė Tolstych