Why I decided against surgery

Over the past 8 weeks, I have been giving serious consideration to surgery as a career. I love it. I love the OR environment, the immediate gratification of doing something tangible to fix a physical problem, and I think that I would be good at it. I've watched my surgery residents, imagining myself in their shoes a few years from now, jealous that they actually get to do the surgeries rather than watch from the sidelines. They work hard, really hard. All that hard work would be worth it, though, to do something that I truly love.

But I have other considerations in deciding on a career. A lot of introspection has led me to understand that I need to find a balance between my career as a physician and the rest of my life. I'm speaking mostly about a hypothetical family. This may be just an abstract concept right now, but I know that the importance I place on family now will only magnify when there's an actual flesh-and-blood family to care for.

It's an unfortunate reality that surgeons must sacrifice more in terms of family life than do most other medical specialties. However, most of the surgeons at my community hospital seemed to be able to find a balance between their professional and personal lives. My surgery mentor, for example, has six children! Even the surgery residents at this community program seemed relatively sane and well-adjusted. But the bottom line is that, even if I chose a community versus academic program (usually a more stressful and toxic environment), going into surgery would still require too much sacrifice from other areas of my life that I value.

This reasoning felt like a cop-out when I was first coming to terms with the realization that surgery is not the career for me. My wise older sister picked up on this sentiment, which I hadn't quite consciously expressed, offering me this advice: "Don't feel apologetic for choosing a career that allows you to find balance in your life. There's a difference between wanting to find a career that makes you happy in all areas of your life and being lazy."

At the beginning of this rotation, I laid out three questions to ask myself to help me decide if surgery is right for me:

• Do I absolutely love being in the OR? Yes.
• Can I see myself happy doing surgery when I'm 60 years old? Possibly, but the chances are slim.
• Can I see myself happy in any specialty other than surgery? Yes, I think so. Before this rotation, I felt pretty optimistic that that specialty could be pediatric neurology. It's still high on my list, but this rotation has made me a little less certain. I learned that I like doing things, that I do well with a mix of action and cogitation. I hadn't seriously considered anesthesia as a career until this rotation, but from my one-week exposure to anesthesia, it provides both action and cogitation.