Welcoming myself back to writing again

it was fun last time, but I have a few more years (and a couple of extra pounds) under my belt.

The last time I was submitting essays online was when my good friend Lisa Maki asked me to write a few stories from the standpoint of a physician, for her company PokitDok. She didn’t give me much guidance other than to write on what I cared about, which seemed sensible advice. So I did. I wrote about the crazy world of “American Healthcare”, about things that most non-physicians don’t experience in the education, training and day-to-day life of a physician, about some of the harder and emotionally draining aspects of being an overworked and under-rested resident, then academic attending, then private practice physician - and then it got more personal…I found myself writing about my Dad, a young anesthesiologist, at the very beginning of his career who tragically died at age 34 out of the blue, from a ruptured cerebral aneurysm. I wrote about my decision to become a physician after already having graduated from Stanford with a degree in International Relations, but not much of an idea of what I wanted to do with it, and the process of re-imagining myself and my goals, and the hard road back to Stanford Medical School. And then I wrote about my experience raising children and my, often more than not, clumsy attempts at being a good father, husband and friend while juggling a career that takes as much as it gives and sometimes leaves you both physically and emotionally exhausted. After a ten year hiatus, I am ready to revisit, and re-write some of these stories. I will re-post a few I have done before, and I may even revise them. So enjoy the stories, and feel free to ask me questions and provide topics about which you would like me to address.

Thanks!

Jeffrey Swisher, M.D. a.k.a Jeff