Real talk: When you go to the doctor, are you always open and honest about your health with them?

Sure, you may fib about how you only drink once a week (okay, maybe twice) or how you’ve never smoked a cigarette before (except that one time in high school), but chances are, you’re going to be pretty open about whatever your situation is.

So when you’re taking your dog to the vet, it should be the same way—you should be honest about anything the animal doctor asks you. They’re asking for a reason, and it’s important to be up front about things.

One veterinarian named Lisa Schroder found herself in a pretty dark situation during a shift at work. One of her patients brought in their dog—their very large, 94-pound dog—for treatment, and when she asked his owners if he was friendly, they nodded their heads yes.

It only took one motion for Lisa to realize that “yes” was a big fat lie. While she crouched down to take a look at the dog, whose heart rate was rising, she didn’t get a good feeling. “He does have a temper sometimes,” the owner told her right before the worst happened.

“As I started to back away from the dog, he lunged at me, biting into my forearm,” Lisa posted in a now viral Facebook post. “Not only did he hold on, but he started jerking on my arm, as well, while the owner pulled on his retractable leash to get him off. When he let go, I was able to crawl into the corner of the room, all the while, the dog still barking and lunging at me.”

When the owners finally got the dog out of the room, Lisa was able to get to her boss, who coincidentally was also an EMT, who bandaged up the damage and sent her to the ER.

Lisa had to get an x-ray (to see if any of the dog’s teeth got stuck in her arm) and nine stitches in her arm before she could return to work. She then had to work through a winter storm, so got stuck at the office for two days straight.

“Every time I laid down to rest between shifts, I spent a good 20 minutes thinking about a huge dog with my arm in his mouth, and my boss cleaning pieces of my flesh off my shirt sleeve so I didn’t have see it while I rode to the hospital,” she wrote in her post.

While Lisa still loves every bit of her job, she wants her story to encourage owners who take their pets to the vet to do one thing: Always be honest.

“If your dog has a history of snapping, biting or even being kind of sketchy at the vet’s office, you need to be honest and up front about it,” she said. “You have to give me a chance to keep myself safe.”

Even though Lisa was deployed to combat zones with the army, she said the dog attack was by far the scariest encounter she has ever faced in her life.

You can read her entire post about the incident here.

What do you think of this story? Are you always open and honest with the vet?