From a young age, it was clear Diana Watkins would dedicate her life’s mission to working with animals.

 

By age 9, she had started a local dog walking business in her suburban Michigan neighborhood, and by 14, had earned enough from working in a stable and teaching riding lessons to purchase and board her very own horse, Flora.

 

Determined to put herself through veterinary school, she moved to Boston, starting college at Boston University but quickly switching to the pre-vet animal studies track at UNH, graduating in 2001. 

 

After a post-college stint as a biomed scientist for Wyeth pharmaceutical company, she seemed to be headed down a different path before suddenly reconsidering. 

 

“I didn’t want to look back on my life and not be a vet,” Diana recalls.

 

In 2006, she applied and was accepted into a highly-selective spot training in veterinary care at Tufts Veterinary School. There, she pioneered a student surgical program and served as president of the student chapter of the American Veterinary Medical Association before graduating in 2010. 

 

Being a vet requires an investment in schooling comparable to a medical degree – but typically with far less lucrative outcomes. 

 

You also, Diana has found, have to “leave your ego” behind.

 

But the rewards have been immense. 

 

After moving to Cohasset in 2013 and spending the past decade treating animals in clinics around the South Shore and Lynnfield, Diana took the leap last March to open her very own hometown practice, 143 Veterinary Services in the Cohasset Village Plaza. 

 

The practice now cares for hundreds of beloved family pets, providing wellness visits, vaccines, dental care, on-site surgery – and even making old-fashioned house calls as needed.

 

One ethos at 143 is that "going to the vet doesn't have to be a frightening experience,” Diana says. “Pets that otherwise shake with fear at their vet appointments seem excited to come in our door.  Many of our clients have been quite shocked.”

 

Diana has committed to an atmosphere of calm: pets are ushered straight to a private exam room, versus a crowded waiting room. To further reduce animal anxiety, there are separate rooms dedicated to cats versus dogs, each diffusing a calming scent specific for that species.  Extended 30-45 minute exam times allow for a thorough, unrushed experience.

 

Pet owners are also assured by the clinic’s open layout, with the surgical and treatment areas on display. “There should be absolutely nothing to hide at a veterinary clinic,” Diana says.” I am proud of every single interaction we have with pets and want to show it off. Come for a tour anytime.”  

 

The past year for Diana has been a rush, tending to her four-legged patients’ needs and learning to be a ‘benevolent leader” understanding leader of a growing staff, while also serving her community the gold standard care she believes in. 

 

Some highlights included visits to Cohasset schools for Career Expert Day, Trunk and Treat for the PSO, and serving on the Scituate Animal Shelter’s board, helping them select their own staff veterinarian. 

 

And above all, saving animals’ lives. 

 

This year, Diana performed emergency surgery on Thelma, a shelter dog who had consumed a life-threatening quantity of rubber matting. “She was adopted and is doing fabulous.”

 

Another stray animal, Sylvester the cat, was brought in paralyzed and unable to walk, likely with a case of tetanus. The clinic nursed him to health until he could be adopted by a local Cohasset family.  “Sylvester is alive and well, and was in for a check-up last week,” Diana reports.

 

Diana has seen it all in her time as a vet. She has worked with falcons and hawks, snakes and turtles. During her training, she tended to a polar bear with a skin mite problem, and a neglected baby giraffe.

 

Closer to home, she runs a far more tame Cohasset household made up of her husband Matt and their three sons, 6th grader Miles, 4th grader John, and first-grader Charlie, along with their many pets: Snowgrace the Bunny, Shadow the poodle, Smitty the cat, and recently two adopted twin kittens, Kiki and Chicken. 

 

But that’s not all. The family is about to welcome Molly, a pet horse to their menagerie, making the full circle of Diana’s childhood dreams complete. 

 

“The support of our town has been amazing,” Diana smiles. “It’s incredibly heartwarming to be the town vet.”