Things I Learned From Vet: History Taking

Once, while I was talking to a writer friend about how she was stuck at a point in her plot, I found myself asking questions uncannily similar to those I ask at work. Now, I wasn't asking if there had been any sneezing or coughing, but the process was the same: try to narrow in on the problem, but also cast a broad net to pick up on any other potential red flags.

In essence, I was trying to diagnose why she was stuck.

This got me thinking. Could I apply the skills I learned in history taking to my own writing?

In vet school, they taught us a series of bullet points to hit when gathering history. I'm probably missing some, but I still run them through my mind during every appointment. What happens if we apply it to a writing problem? I may have to be a bit loose with terminology, but let's see what kind of questions we can come up with.

Onset: Did the problem come on acutely or gradually?
Is it something that happens suddenly and all at once, like a transition that isn't working? Things are fine, fine, fine, and then yuck, this scene is rocky, and everything after it feels off. Maybe it seems like the problem is everything, and we fiddle endlessly with that rocky scene, when in reality all the issues started because of a poor transition.

A more gradual problem might be building up to a reveal, and then feeling let down with what we have. Maybe all that build-up was pointing in the wrong direction? Or gave away too much or too little? Another example could be realizing we don't like the direction a character's personality has taken--many small steps have added up to an unsatisfactory end result. 

Duration: How long has the problem been going on?
In medicine, it makes a big difference whether your dog started vomiting yesterday after eating his dog bed, or has been doing it on and off for three weeks. In writing, this feels like questions in the same vein as the one above. Perhaps if we look at the "onset" as how the problem came about, and the "duration" as consequences of the problem.

So for example, a problem with a short duration might be "this one argument scene isn't heated enough," or "there's not enough setting in that chapter"--but as soon as we move to the next scene/chapter, it's a different place and time and that dialogue or setting is just fine. On the other hand, a long-duration issue might be two characters who chronically have poor chemistry every time they interact, or a structural issue that messes things up every time there's a POV switch.

Progression: Has it been getting worse, staying the same, or up and down?
Let's think of this one as how bad is the problem, really? It might be something that's not an issue early on (we have two characters whose names both start with J), and gets more and more problematic deeper into the novel (eventually we have ten characters whose names start with J). Or for a more realistic example, a neglected worldbuilding element is easy to excuse at first, but as we examine the characters' lives more closely, it's harder to avoid.

An example of a problem that stays the same could be a side character that no one likes; every time they're on screen, same issue. A problem that comes and goes might be a setting that works really well for some of our scenes but not others.

Frequency: How often does the problem happen?
This one might not be so applicable to writing, but I'll be damned if I don't try. In the example of a poor transition, it's one instance--one thing to fix. A problem with recurring frequency might be a worldbuilding issue surrounding a particular aspect of culture--say every time we see a certain profession that has been poorly researched or inadequately explained.

Environment: Can we find any clues in the context?
For pets, this means things like where they sleep, whether they get flea and tick prevention, if there are other animals in the house, or what their diet and feeding schedule is like. For our literary problem, this is the world and backstory. What kind of person is the character? How does their background influence how they perceive the world? How does the history play into the culture? Where are the weak points, and is there room to develop an explanation that helps our current problem?

Put it all together:
Hopefully through the process of answering questions like this, we've sparked some ideas. The root cause of the issue may have become apparent. It might seem like the problem is a scene not working, when reality it's an incorrect portrayal of something several chapters earlier. By explaining to ourselves where exactly the issue is and how it impacts everything down the line, fixes can become easier.

I admit I don't do this so explicitly in practice. However, history taking has taught me to focus in on an issue. So often, clients will describe everything they can possibly think of--every little unusual behavior, any object the dog might have gotten near or gotten on them, no matter how much it doesn't matter. My job is to know which clues are important, and direct the conversation there. The fact that he avoided a certain part of your yard this morning doesn't tell me much, but the fact that you had a friend visiting with their dog yesterday does. I won't ask more about the former, but I will pursue the latter.

It's the same idea with writing--I have to turn off the "client" in me that wants to babble about every possibility and/or fret unproductively about how this problem is going to cause the whole story to collapse and be stupid. I need to put on my thinking cap and ask targeted questions that will lead me to a tangible answer. By identifying underlying causes and exploring how everything relates in context, it's easier to reach a practical solution.