[Editor’s Note: This is a republished post from Physician on FIRE, a member of The White Coat Investor Network. There seems to be some confusion sometimes on these Saturday posts. In case it isn't clear, this isn't written by me or about me. It's written by Physician on FIRE and it is about HIM. The original post ran here, but if you missed it the first time, it’s new to you! Enjoy! ]
Personal finance is personal, and personal posts tend to be more interesting than the typical clickbait lists that penetrate our Facebook and Twitter feeds.
I’ve written a couple not-so-personal Top 5 lists, including the Reasons to Retire Early, and the Reasons Not to. The writing comes easier when I’ve got something more personal to say, as I did when I wrote the Top 5 Things I’ll Miss When I Retire Early.
Today, I’m going to give you my own reasons for wanting to retire early. These aren’t the best reasons to retire early, or reasons you should retire early; these are just mine.
Editor’s note: This was written before I switched to a part-time schedule. Life has gotten better since then, particularly in the case of number 1, but the following reasons still apply.
The Top 5 Reasons I Want to Retire Early:
1. More Family Time
My boys are growing up right in front of my eyes. Well, sometimes they are. On weekday calls, I have about a 20% chance of seeing them. I always leave for work before they’re awake for the day, and on hospital days, usually return after they’re in bed.
In the summertime, my wife and boys spend a good deal of time at our modest second home a couple states away. They’re out there having a grand time with friends and family, and I’m missing out because I have a job.
It’s a choice we’ve made as a family. And before too long, I’ll make a different choice. The choice to retire early.
If you’ve attended high school graduation parties and chatted with parents, they’ll tell you they cannot believe how the time flew by. I don’t want to wonder where the years went. I want to be a full-time Dad. Most of the physicians I know do their best to find a balance between work, family, and play, but I’m going to take work right off the scale. I expect to find the perfect imbalance when I retire early.
2. Because it is There
I haven’t always planned on retiring early — in fact, it seems as though early retirement chose me. Two years ago, the concept wasn’t a blip on my radar. It wasn’t until my nose was buried in anesthesia books to study for a silly $2,100 computer exam that I started to wonder if I would have to do this all over again in ten years.*
A google search opened my eyes to a brave new world of early retirement blogs, forums, and a community of good people who are in various stages of contemplating, planning, or living the life of an early retiree.
I want to show you and others that it can be done, and show you how I plan to do it. The truth is, mathematically, I could have retired by now, but I’m not ready to leave my career behind just yet. I still like many aspects of my job, but as I’m explaining here, there are other things I do enjoy more.
I know many physicians who feel differently about their jobs than I do mine. Burnout, long days, endless paperwork and computer work are taking their toll on this generation of physicians. Trying to spend your way out of a frustrating situation only prolongs your misery. I want to help those doctors that need it find their escape hatch.
Sir Edmund Hilary climbed Mount Everest because it was there. I’m retiring early because it’s there for the taking for those who want it and take steps to achieve it.
3. Turn the Happiness Knob to Eleven
Ask me most days how happy I am on a scale of 1 to 10, I’d usually give you an 8 or a 9. I have many reasons to be happy and thankful.
If a professional athlete can routinely give 110%, I’d like to be able to give an answer of 11.
I recently wrote about 10 ways to be happier backed by science, and nearly all of them would be easier to do more effectively without the timesuck that is a full-time job.
Not long ago, my lovely wife asked me to name the three things that caused me the most stress in life. The answers came quick and they were all work-related. I believe I handle stress reasonably well, but that doesn’t mean I don’t deal with it on a daily basis.
A substantial reduction in stress, combined with ample free time, is a recipe for Eleven when I’m early retired.
4. I’m a Sleep Enthusiast.
One of the 10 happiness boosting ideas was to get better sleep. I have very little control over my sleep cycle these days, taking an overnight call about 73 times every 52 weeks, but who’s counting? I live close to the hospital to minimize my commute, and I usually bike in the warmer months, but even with a 4-minute commute, I am up by 0515 to be working at 0600.
Post-call days, I’m frequently sleeping in. Alternating between 0515 and 0815 wakeups is not the healthiest sleep pattern, and being up at all hours several times a month makes it even more difficult to establish a healthy sleep schedule.
I signed up for the job, and I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining. I’m compensated quite well for the sacrifices I make for my patients and my family. But I’d be a liar if I didn’t admit that I’m looking forward to sleeping like a baby in early retirement.
my sleeping baby
5. To Pursue Other Interests
I can give you a list of 50 other things I can think to do with my time. There are things that I do now, but nearly as much as I’d like. Photography is one. I’ve taken just about every photo published on this site, including the one above of my second boy nearly six years ago.
You may have noticed that I like to write, and I spend a fair amount of my free time writing. I’d like to learn to write mo’ better, but it’s all I can do to keep up with the blog. I’d love to read more, too. Reading takes time. I need time. Can I buy some time?
There are other things I’d like to do that I don’t do at all right now. I’d love to play piano half as well as my boys have learned to do. I’d like to learn to speak Spanish. My two years in high school taught me enough to ask where the bathroom is, but not enough to understand the response. We may try to learn as a family, and in early retirement, we could do that in a Spanish speaking country. How cool would that be?
Honorable Mention
Now that I can talk freely about it, there was an ugly lawsuit that came about as a result of my brief volunteer stint as a non-voting member of the Board of Trustees at a hospital that eventually went belly up. Having lived for three and a half years under the threat of potentially losing a substantial portion of my net worth, and forking over thousands upon thousands in legal fees, I may have become a bit jaded.
Job dissatisfaction is nowhere on this list.
I think it’s important to understand that I don’t hate my job. Among jobs I’ve had, it’s easily the best one. I will admit that I like my days off more than my workdays, and the best workday is a short workday, but I’m not desperate to leave, and I don’t believe I’m burned out.
If I absolutely loved my job, I doubt I’d be planning on an early retirement. Of course, you don’t have to retire early just because you can. Financial Independence comes with a host of other benefits.
Is an early retirement on your horizon? What’s your motivation? Look for the comment box below to say hello.
*The answer is no, I wouldn’t have to take the exam even if I worked another 30 years. In fact, I didn’t need to take the test I took but the ABA waited until after I had taken it to announce changes that were obviously in the works before I even registered for the exam.
My reasons are (no particular order)
1) Growing dissatisfaction with the way medicine is heading (reimbursements getting constantly cut forcing to work more to maintain salary)
2) Wanting to enjoy life more while I am still relatively young (more vacations etc)
3) Reduce exposure from a litigious profession
4) More quality time with family and be there while my daughter is young
5) Pursue things that express my creativity even if not compensated as much
6) No longer have my sleep wake cycle dictated to me
7) No longer subject to MOC or any government hoops to continue practicing
I like that list.
great list!
I too love sleep and I love my bed. I guess I am a sleep enthusiast as well. I prefer to do all work, exercise, meditate, etc from the hours of 5am to 10am. Then the rest of the time will be me time. And I too would also like to spend more time with family. I guess that is why I aspire to FIRE. Nice post.
Thanks,
Miriam
1) Life is short and fully functional life is shorter. As a 54 y.o. triathlete, I am lucky to be able to do anything I want to do. This becomes increasingly unlikely in the late 60’s and 70’s despite maintenance efforts.
2) I have two modes of being: at work, in which case I’m at work and in heaven (any time I am not at work). I’d like a lot more time “not at work”.
3) To pursue leisure with the same focus and intensity as I have pursued my career. Like many others, I have “fifty things” I’d like to get to and more full time work with moonlighting…aren’t on the list.
4) To live abroad for a few weeks a year: New Zealand, Italy, Costa Rica, Panama, Thailand… who knows, the world is large and some parts are still fairly inexpensive.
5) I would like to kiss EMR, MOC, narcotic seeking patients, and a few other things like this…goodbye. Also, the assembly line type of psychiatry with fifteen minute Med checks is really no fun.
Good luck to all on their plan for freedom.
Nicely summarized! I’m similar: triathlete and love the places you have mentioned. I need to write a post about my year practicing medicine in New Zealand. So many docs talk about it. I DID it! It was a breath of fresh air (sorry for the cliche). My wife and I want to go back when the kids are a few years older.
we should form a WCI triathlon club- with Strava/Garmin etc. Maybe have a yearly race- that would be cool!
To the list of the “push” factors I would definitely add tremendous turnover of the ED nurses, with even moderately competent and helpful ones are cycling out so quickly nowadays, leaving you with young, eager but alas, much less than competent, so you’re doing more and more things by yourself
Plus with the EMRs I keep getting told “I can’t do that, you have to” as more nursing, tech, and clerk tasks get put onto the docs. I remember seeing 6 not very sick patients an hour when I was in the military doing paper charting. No way I could do that in our current system. It feels like I’m working really hard to see 2.
I am scheduled to see up to 20 chronically ill mental health patients per day. Luckily, there is about a 25% no show/cancel rate.
The EMR creates a 10 page note for a 15” appointment and conveys less useful information than a 1-2” dictation. It takes 10” per patient to do, sometimes more than the face to face patient time (for stable patients).
It’s simply no fun. I go on vacation…the post vacation relaxation lasts less than a week from when I get back.
Also governmental and local politics/ bureaucracy/regulations/craziness…
Well state, PoF! Thanks for sharing. This is right on the money! I’m sorry to hear about the lawsuit. That is a very ugly part of being in America. I have been wanting to write a post for you as I often hear you speak of New Zealand. I worked there as an anesthesiologist for a year and I loved it. People do not really sue each other. They have the ACC (Accident Compensation Corporation). You can read a bit here: https://www.acc.co.nz/ It’s a no fault system. So when your patient has a complication, you as the doctor remain the advocate for the patient. you fill out their ACC paperwork and help them get paid. It was incredible. Do they have a perfect system? Of course not. But it’s worth learning about and trying to borrow the good aspects.
One of the best reasons to become FI is so you can live life according to your deepest values and spend time doing the things that matter most and WITH the people that matter most to you. Yes, we all have our list of 50 things we want to do and it is important to try to do them.
American medicine has a funny way of making doctors forget their purpose. If you wake up each day because you HAVE to pay the mortgage, pay the bills, and fulfill obligations rather than because you love to impact people’s lives, then of course we will burnout.
That’s fascinating. I’ve not heard about the ACC, other than in the context of collegiate athletics. Sounds like a better system than the mess we have here.
I’d love to read about your experience there. A friend and coworker of mine at a VA hospital (when I was a locum) had done several lengthy stints in Dunedin and he loved it there. For a while, I was convinced that would be my next stop in my anesthesia career, but I’ve realized if I were working full time and blogging, there’d be little time to truly enjoy New Zealand! (although I realize full time work there is not as taxing as full time work here)
So we still plan to go, but most likely for 90 days or so without the need to work.
Cheers!
-PoF
It’s not quite like that. My full time gig in NZ was generally around 3.5 days per week with one full home call weekend every 6 weeks, something like 10 weeks of vacation and meeting time. With that type of a schedule we had time for many 3 day weekends and day trips to the Coromandel, Rotorua, Auckland, Wellignton, Raglan and then some 4 day trips down to the south: Wanaka, Queenstown, Dunedin, and Milford Sound. I had time to learn to play guitar, surf, kitesurf compose music, and read books. Surgery start time was 830 every weekday so I could surf before morning cases. Most importantly though, by being on staff at a local hospital, I was integrated into the community. THAT is what makes travel truly special, when you are integrated into the community. I made life long friends who live differently. I love to travel and I’ve taken many huge trips and lived abroad in a few different countries. Traveling as a tourist is cool, but doing something for a community and becoming friends with local people is where the magic is.
90 days would be wonderful! Dunedin is amazing. You would dig the Speights Brewery and the penguins.
I’m not sure how many hours you work now but my guess is that you most likely could write, work, and sight-see. You might even be able to take a pay cut for extra time off if you felt over-stretched. And if not, hey, at least you get to pronounce tourniquet without the “T” and be in the operating theatre without a mask!
That does sound pretty awesome. Guess I haven’t ruled it out entirely — taking things one year at a time at this point.
Cheers!
-PoF
Filling out endless FMLA forms. A more recent one was for a patient that had TMJ and missed not a single day of work, employer requested it “just in case”.
Another FMLA form?!?
FML.
😉 As an anesthesiologist, I’m actually shielded from a lot of that type of nonsense. No pre-authorizations, disability, workers comp, FMLA, etc… Sounds like a nightmare.
Best,
-PoF
All the prior auth, drug formulary, controlled substance issues from patient side and government side, denial after the fact so care provided for free, Meaningless use that takes longer to comply with than the actual medically useful documentation, MOC 8 page FMLA forms, 20(No kidding 20 page) hoverround chair forms, 3-4 page diabetic shoe forms, dear doctor letter telling me I’m not providing quality care when overwhelmingly the rec has either already been done or is not relevant in the particular patient’s case, home health supervision somehow never rising to level of actually getting paid for it, chronic care management costing more to document and get paid for than it pays, patients expecting free care, and more similar issues than I care to list drove me out of clinic.
It’s a shame because I really enjoyed longitudinal patient care in the hospital and clinic but the above drove me to the hospital side where large swaths of the above is avoided. Add in the fact that I know work fewer days and make significantly more money, and I am annoyed I didn[‘t do it sooner. I will be able to retire years earlier if I want now.
That sucks. What a slap in the face to get a letter like that. Then a good doc like you leaves and probably will retire early. Bad for the clinic patients and but good for you.
I actually called an insurance company a few months ago when the 6th fax in a day came telling me I wasn’t checking a1cs. I personally looked at the 6 charts and realized every single one had proper labs drawn in the last 6 months. The nurse on the other end was pleasant but couldn’t explain the limitations of their data mining and said I could ignore these “care consideration” faxes since they don’t do anything with them. Are you kidding me? What a total waste of life energy.
My husband and I are healthcare providers , I own a dental practice and my husband is an MD in private practice . When our children were 5 and 7 years old and a baby on the way , we decided not to wait until we were 55y.o to decide on our retirement location build our retirement home . We went overseas to a Spanish speaking country and built our home and took a gigantic risk that we would be happy with our decision to retire overseas in the chosen country . Over the last 15 years we took the kids during school vacations , about 4-5 Times a year ,to our Overseas Home . It has been such a wonderful experience for all of us in many ways I never would have predicted .
Besides the obvious of training the kids to be good travelers , being stared at and adjusting to a different culture and language , learning to use the metric system and forced to learn to speak Spanish out of desperation to make friends , my husband and I found going there an emotional and physical haven . It helped us get through long stretches of dark dreary winters and unbearable work weeks knowing that we can escape and re-charge in beautiful
weather and reset our body clock to the natural circadian rhythm . We home cooked all our meals and ate as a family. We engaged in quality time talking eye to eye with our kids or just lay around and read books together . My husband and I switched gears from health care and welcomed being busy with projects involving Home maintenance and ex-pat living .
We are now in our mid 50’s and we thank God for having our home waiting for us to retire . Our children don’t see it as a location any further emotionally than going to Florida after going back and forth from the US for 15 years . We are integrated in our neighborhood and have friends .
We both speak near fluent Spanish and the years of dealing with the complexities of banking, phone and internet service, water and garbage disposal have assuaged any hesitations from being a senior citizen ex-pat .
It was a bold and brave decision and definitely not for everyone but it worked out wonderfully for me and my family . Our happiest and funniest family memories have all been from our home overseas .The early start with this project have truly made it a “home” for our new chapter In retirement and with happy childhood memories that will make it easy for our kids to accept this as our future permanent home as well .
Wonderful! What country if you don’t mind specifying?
I do wish you could figure out a way to recharge without having to leave your work and your country behind though. Imagine if you could get that same sense weekly instead of just a few times a year.
Sounds amazing, DrMAC.
We’ve been experimenting with some longer trips like you describe, and our three weeks in Guanajuato were similar to what you describe, albeit on a much smaller scale. https://www.physicianonfire.com/three-weeks-guanajuato/
Thank you for sharing!
-PoF
Great post PoF. We’re a slightly older 2 MD couple (both in our mid 50s). The main aspect of my work that I am looking to get rid of is the night time and weekend operations. I can’t complain too much, since I’m only on weekend duty 1 of 7 weekends. I’ve been able to be home for dinner most nights, and we take great vacations. The kids are older (college grad, in college, and one in high school), so their desire to spend a lot of time with the parents is limited.
The uncertainty of call is quite unsettling. I was on call over the weekend as this was published. Worked 16 hours on Friday, came in three separate times on Saturday for appendectomies (morning, afternoon, and night), and had another three cases on Sunday. Made it to church just in time to see my younger son take his first communion.
Sunday evening, we sit down to dinner, I pick up my fork and the pager goes off. Several hours later, the case is done, I’m texting my wife that I’m coming home and the pager goes off. Labor epidural.
I would be happy without the call, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be even happier without the daytime stuff, too. We’re taking it one year at a time, though.
Cheers!
-PoF
I’m not dead set on retiring early but what I DO want is to have options. If at some point I get sick of OB call I want the option to take a pay cut and do gyn only. Or just go part time. Or negotiate more (unpaid) vacation time. Or maybe retire early. So I want to be prepared. 2018 is the first full calendar year without student loans and we’re on track to be putting away 30% of gross income into savings. We’ll see how I feel in 5 or 10 or 20 years, but it’s nice knowing the money will be there.