The Moth - Mermaid Veterinarian: The Moth Podcast

Episode Date: August 28, 2026

On this episode, a story about a veterinarian and a story about a mermaid, both from our incredible StorySlams in Birmingham, Alabama. This episode was hosted by Suzanne Rust.Storytellers:Veronika Kiklevich treats a dog that’s swallowed something a bit unexpected.Bob Byrd accidentally breaks his mother’s mermaid.

Welcome to The Moth. I'm Suzanne Rust. On this episode, we're featuring two stories that involve a pair of underwear and a glass mermaid, respectively. Because you never know what type of tale you'll be hearing at the moth. They can be funny, sad, life-affirming, or just involve underwear and mermaids. First up is Veronica Kiklevich, who told this at a Birmingham story slam where the theme was busted. Here's Veronica, live with them all. Well, I'm a veterinarian, and I'd like to talk about things animals eat. Cats tend to be fairly eclectic in what they eat.

They're finicky. And mostly they limit themselves to long, stringy things. Like a classic thing is tinsel, Christmas tinsel. Dogs, on the other hand, will eat anything. I mean, they will eat toys, they will eat your money, they will eat your shrew. they will eat your shoes, they will eat your neighbor's kids, toys. Basically, if you can think of it, a dog has probably ingested it somewhere. I'll eat things that aren't good for them.

I had a little schnauzer in one time, and oh, she had a really, really painful abdomen. And her mom had brought her in, the four little kids were all standing there. And I said, did she eat anything? Is there anything she could have eaten? No, no, no, no, no. We're very strict with her diet. She never eats anything off diet. that swore and up and down.

And then all of a sudden, this dog started heaving. It started, mm, mm, mm, and you just know something's coming back. So we all took a step back, and sure enough, an entire order of French fries came up on the table. And the lady looked at me in astonishment, and I kind of, and then she looked over at the kids, and they were busted.

They were very busted. And I kind of knew it, they looked at it. And then shortly thereafter, I had a couple, couple weeks after, I had a little 35-ish-pound dog come in. the guy called up and said, my dog gained 18 pounds overnight. So we took an x-ray, and its abdomen was kind of pendants. It was full of rocks.

I mean, stem to stern. It was just full of rocks. And I went in, took all the rocks out, and couldn't quite free that out. When I was talking to the guy, he said, well, I threw some baking grease out next to the house. And there's a bunch of rocks over there. So the dog had just gone out and filled himself up with rocks. So these are the kind of things that we get to see. but my favorite one is a standard poodle mix,

and his name was Benzie. Benzie, as a puppy, was kind of all over the place. He would eat gloves. He ate nuts. He ate pretty much whatever he felt like. But most of the time, the small stuff. As he developed, as he got older, he would find his tastes a little bit.

And he sort of narrowed things down to pretty much undergarments, is what he liked. Socks, T-shirts, bras, panties, you know, night shirts, nice night shirts, and things like that. And so the first time I actually had to take something out of him was a pair of panty hose that he'd eaten. And the panty hose, the body of them had balled up in the stomach and the legs were kind of going down the intestines. So he couldn't really get it up because the legs were, and he couldn't really. So he was stuck.

I had to cut him open. And I took out the panty hose and sewed him up and he was good. And a couple months later, he came back in with the clinical times. not feeling out. That time it was a couple of athletic socks that he'd managed to get a hold of and swallowed those down. So we took those out. And it wasn't very long after that. A couple more months later, I ended up taking a camisole out of a nice little camisole. And but by that time, what had gone from being kind of funny was getting a little serious. And so I talked to the bidders. I said, look, guys, first of all, this costing you an arm and leg. I know that. Well, that's fine with me. My concern is it's not really good for Ben Z. We can't just keep an anestheti, I can't put a zipper in him, and we can't just keep doing this. You know, you guys have to become really a lot more vigilant about what you leave out and about the house. So they did. They did.

They really took it to heart. I think I scared them. And they became very, very good about that. But inevitably, somebody leaves something out, and Benzie snaps it up. So they came back in, classic clinical science. He's not feeling well. Did our diagnostics. took him to surgery and got his intestines out and just like a little ball.

He had this ball in there and I cut over it and I took out these things. When we held them up, they were panties. And so I put them on the surgery table and we finished Benzie up. And the next day when I came in, my technician had taken them home and washed them and pressed them. And she said, give these to the bidders when they come. And I said, sure. So I walked into the bidders room and they were in there and I held up the panties.

I said, look, we brought these to you this time from that. And Mrs. Bitters took them, and she looked at the front, and she looked at the back, and she said, these aren't my panties. And she looked over at Mr. Bitters, who was looking at a little scared, and said, Sam, do you know who these panties are? And I just kind of left the room at that point. That was Veronica Kiklevich. Dr. J. Veronica Kiklevich has practiced and taught

veterinary medicine for more than four decades. Although mainly treating companion animals, she has also worked from time to time with exotic species such as cheetahs, ward hogs, and the occasional elephant seal. Since she told that story, she's continued to remove novel objects from pets' stomachs, including an entire twin-sized bed sheet, 23 hair ties in a single cat, and more plastic Santas and toy squeakies than she can count. I've been very fortunate that I've never had a pet that's eaten about pair of underwear, from a mistress or otherwise. However, when left on his own for too long, my childhood poodle Tuffy did have a pension for my dad's Italian leather shoes and for artfully draping

banners of toilet paper throughout the house. Luckily, that was the extent of his rebellion. Tuffy was loyal, fierce, and very patient with five-year-old me as I played dress up with him and made him my captive guest at many a tea party. After the break, another story about trying to hide a secret, but in a different context, back in a moment. Welcome back. Our next story is from Bob Bird, who told this at a Birmingham Grand Slam, where the theme was Fish Out of Water. Here's Bob, live at the mall. There's a statue of the little mermaid off the coast of Copenhagen. She sits on a rock in the sea, because that's where she's confined, that's where she's trapped, pining for the love that she will never have. My mother had a replica of that little mermaid statue. It was about as big as my hand,

maybe six inches tall, made of white porcelain. Her grandfather, my great-grandfather, gave this to her when she was a little girl, and she said on more than one occasion that it was the most important thing in the world. In fact, when we moved from Washington to Fort Lauderdale, Mom would not risk having the most important thing in the world packed up in a box in a moving van. So for that 20-hour drive, the little mermaid sat in her lap in the front seat of the car. The statue took on even more importance for mom when her grandfather died. Once or twice a month, she took it down from the shelf and stroked it. And it seemed to bring her some kind of comfort or peace or peace.

something. All I know is when she did it, she felt better than she did before she started. When I was in third grade, eight years old, I had a crush on a classmate. His name was John. And I was young enough and innocent enough and naive enough to think that wasn't a problem. That wasn't a big deal. But I very quickly learned just how big a deal it was. I had been fairly popular in school, and in an instant, I was ostracized by everyone, including the teacher, because something's wrong with Bob. And when I got home, I felt an affinity with the mermaid on the rock, because I knew what it was like to be trapped where you are, stuck there,

and never being able to get that which you pine for. And I remembered how mom felt better when she stroked that little statue. And I needed to feel better. So I reached up for the shelf and tried to get it. You know what happened. It landed on the floor and it broke into many pieces. Mom heard the crash and came running into the living room. And when she saw the broken mermaid on the floor,

she made a noise that I have never heard before or since. It was part howl, part scream, more animal than human. And it was followed by gut-wrenching sobs that doubled her over. And I knew there was no coming back from this. I had to leave because I had not only broken the statue, I had broken my mother, which is a terrible wait for an eight-year-old to carry. I fled the house. I didn't know where I was going. I only knew I couldn't stay there. I couldn't live there anymore after what I had done. So I just, with no destination in mind, I just ran up the street and ended up in the backyard of a neighbor's house where I hid behind their shed. Still raining. They must have seen me and called mom because a few moments later, here she came. Now in these days

my mother never wore pants, never were jeans, it was either a dress or a skirt. And she showed up in this neighbor's backyard with her little umbrella and she put it down and got on her hands and knees in her dress and crawled through the muck to get to me behind the shed.

Or I was crying, the gut-wrenching sobs. And she said, you know, when I saw that broken statue, I was confused for just a second because I thought that the statue being broken meant that the bond between me and Granddaddy was broken, that our love

was broken, and that's not true. That's not the case at all. I still know he loves me and he knows that I loved him. That's just a broken statue. You can't break love by breaking that and you did not break my love for you.

Nothing can break my love for you. I would rather have a hundred mermaids broken into a thousand pieces than have you think for one second that I don't love you. She reached for my hand and she said, let's go home. Now, I still would have the crap at school to deal with for a long time. But what had been the worst day of my life was now one of the best days of my life. was now one of the best days of my life because it was the day I learned

that I was more important than the most important thing in the world. That was Bob Bird. Bob grew up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, but is called Alabama home for the last 30 years, which is the last place he thought he'd end up. He regularly posts his stories on his substack page. That reminds me of a story.

You might have noticed that both of these stories, were told at story slams in Alabama. The Moth added Birmingham as a new story slam city in 2019, which makes it one of our youngest Moth communities. Each month Slam is hosted by Chris Davis, and we're always looking for new people to share stories, to listen. And bonus, each show needs three teams of judges, so you can volunteer for that too.

We're always hoping to hear more stories from the South. So calling all Southerners to make it to a slam near you. You can go to the moth.org, for times and locations in Birmingham and beyond. And we've got a whole host of other great story slams all across the world. Go to the moth.org slash events to check them out. That brings us to the end of our episode. From everyone at the moth, have a story-filled week.

Suzanne Rust is the Moss Senior Curatorial producer and one of the hosts of the Moth Radio Hour. In addition to finding new voices and fresh stories for the Moth stage, Suzanne creates playlists and helps curate special storytelling events. Bob Bird's story was coached by Jennifer Hickson. This episode of The Moth Podcast was produced by Sarah Austin-Joness, Sarah Jane Johnson, and me, Mark Salinger. The rest of the Mawals' leadership team includes Gina Duncan, Marina Clucay, Jennifer Hickson, Jordanale, Caledonia Cairns, Kate Tellers, Suzanne Rust, and Patricia Urrena. The Moth podcast is presented by Odyssey.

Special thanks to their executive producer, Leah Reese Dennis. All moth stories are true, as remembered by their storytellers. For more about our podcast, information on pitching your own story, and everything else, go to our website, the moth.org.