Death or Early Retirement
Death or Early Retirement
I choose early retirement! All joking aside, my father died at the age of forty unexpectedly from a brain aneurysm. He never had the chance to contemplate such ephemeral dreams like what he would do in retirement. Or when he would take retirement in the first place. Five years past his early demise, I look at the future of my career with trepidation. I, of all people, should understand that life is fleeting. That a life spent overly inundated with work is not a life well lived. Of all the arguments beckoning me towards hanging up my stethoscope, my father’s example is certainly the main one. But sometimes I wonder if there is a mistake assuming that the decision is binary. Death or early retirement? Or something else completely?
The One More Year Phenomenon
Sometimes I give myself a pass on the one more year phenomenon. I tell myself that it is OK to work longer. Build the nest egg up a little more. What’s the harm? Its easy to make this statement as a fairly young (ok middle-aged) guy in adequate health.
But life is not infinite.
There are so many stories out there like my father’s. How many promised themselves that they were going to quit at some distant point just around the bend, and never made it to that point? Their hopes and dreams snuffed out before they truly got the chance to soak in all that life has to offer.
Death or early retirement? Are we asking the wrong question?
Maybe It’s Not That Simple
This fear of death as a driver towards early retirement is not exactly logic. So if you retire and then die six months later anyway, is it really that much better? Maybe your family would actually have benefited from the few extra bucks you could have stashed away in the mean time. If you are going to die early, how much time in retirement is really going to move the needle?
And what if you are wrong. Pull the trigger too early and maybe you die at an old age as a pauper. Get the market wrong and sequence of returns risk could throw you right back into that dreary 9 to 5 after losing significant ground.
The point is that the future is unknowable. Each path down the decision tree entails risk.
Am I ready To Stop Working?
I think the answer is yes. Part of my job, at least. But I think, in the end, fear of death can’t be the argument that wins the day. I have lived a good life. And if I knew I were going to die today, it would not be my time spent at work that would be my regret.
It would be leaving my family. I could quit right now and yet still not really spend that much more time with my loved ones. My wife has work. The kids have school. My parents are busy traveling the world. I have been lucky enough to create a work life balance that allows for much of what I need.
I am ready to consider leaving the nursing home work because it no longer brings me joy.
It is that simple. In the stress versus joy equation, stress is starting to win out.
Final Thoughts
I think we do ourselves a disservice if we boil the question down to death or early retirement. If I felt like there was a big emptiness in my life that work was getting in the way of, I would have left my job a long time ago.
If I were to sit on my death-bed tomorrow, my sadness would be at leaving my family. It wouldn’t enter my mind a lick whether I should have stopped work earlier.
My evolution towards early retirement mainly focuses not on what I’m missing but more on what I am enduring.
The time to let go of the stress has come.
You’ve got it with that last line!
My father in law postponed truly living til retirement. He passed 6 months later. My brother passed suddenly recently at 59. Sad. My mother passed at an even younger age. Retirement or not to retire, doesn’t really matter. It’s your choice. The real answer is enjoy life.
There are so many stories about untimely deaths. I guess we have to become our best selves now!
I agree. No one unfortunately is able to see the future, and it’s only when you look back that you can connect the dots and decide whether the decisions you made were right.
However, when the hour of reckoning comes, I doubt many people will think “I wish I had worked more”…
Very true.
“Give me liberty, or give me death!” – Patrick Henry
I’m glad you chose early retirement from your nursing home work. It gives you more liberty and freedom to do more of the things that bring you joy.
And this is certainly my plan. We will see how it goes.
My grandfather was dead at 41 and a parapalegic at 33. I’m 37. These things do pop into my head from time to time. That’s why it’s so important to enjoy the entire journey regardless of retired or working. Make a point every day to just be happy to be alive.
This gratitude towards life in either situation is best.
Two good friends from a small fellowship class of six were dead by age 50, both from cancer. We recently looked through our wedding album (1996), and they were seated together. They were healthy, smiling and having fun. They had no idea that they would be dead 20 years later.
Rather than quit entirely, scaling back has significantly reduced the burnout. As long as I have enjoyable work, can spend quality time with family and dogs, enjoy good health, and travel often with one high quality vacation per year, I seem pretty damn content.
From your guest posts and podcast appearances….you seem pretty content. I think you are one of the great role models for the physician glide path.
One more year syndrome is a nasty concept because it will always push the goalposts further and further away. As you know my dad died early as well (age 50) and that left a lasting impression on me.
Time is not guaranteed and you never know when your # comes up. I don’t want to work doing something that I am enjoying less and less of and die right after I stop. I think early retirement will give me the chance to enjoy some quality years when I am still healthy enough to enjoy them.
You and me both. It’s nice to still be healthy and look forward to this.
Congratulations! I think it is honorable that you consider your Father in this important step. It is all unknowable. It may take you a bit to withdraw from your beeper!
My father was the big impetus to become a physician. Maybe he will be the same to retire.
The future is unknowable. You just have to live your best life. Plan for tomorrow but live today. I’m a proponent of building work around your life. You will always work- I think that is just your personality. I think you are fortunate to be in a good position now where you have a lot of options. Ditch the stress. If you want to work with patients again, I’m sure you can find other options with the parameters that fit your lifestyle best. Good luck DocG. See you at Fincon?
You have a point. Almost nothing is undoable.
Stress is the silent killer, as you obviously know being a doctor. Make the move!
Very true. This can be a stressful job.
The reason I retired was I looked into the future and saw if I worked 4 more years, it would make maybe 1.5 mil difference is my life’s total accumulated income. It would make zero difference in my nest egg’s ability to sustain my life post retirement. At the 50% centile on the Monte Carlo bell curve I would have twice the money at age 92 than when I retired I retired. At the 10% centile I would have 3/4 at age 92 of what I retired with. That extra 4 years would have been a complete waste of time. All I would have done was incur 4 more years of liability and then 4 more years for possible suits to be filed after I was into retirement. and 4 more years of deteriorating medical practice as we are marginalized and normalized in our decision making, not to mention the paperwork. A t some point you have to put aside risk aversion, believe in the projection and behave rationally.
Running a hospice is good and necessary work. I have a couple friends who run hospice and I have a lot of respect for them. I know a lot of nurses and social work types who are involved and they are quite proud of the work they do, and my wife used to be on the board of one of our hospices so I’m familiar. Being a retired physician is totally legit but you won’t even be a retired physician, you will be a hospice director. You loose no status to your community or family, continue to be a model to your children, and do valuable work, you have plenty of dough. I don’t quite get the angst involved.
The angst comes from letting go of the dream of practicing clinical medicine. As a hospice medical director, I never have to see a patient face to face again. There is also the worry about leaving the accumulation phase. I am an earner. Always been.
Glad you made that choice, Doc G! It sounds like something you certainly won’t regret. Looking forward to following your journey after this point to see how things change for you and where your energy is spent now that you have freed up some time.
Good for you for putting you and your family first.
TPP
Whatever comes, I will write about it here.
So this is it? You are going to retire?? I sold my dental practice this year at 53 yo and had no reservations whatsoever. I was thinking or hoping to be somewhat melancholy about it but…nothing. Though I do still go in a couple days per week. I did this not only because of my financial independence but mostly to spend more time with my aging parents. Little did I know my father would pass before the papers were signed and my mother is recently facing a possible ominous health diagnosis. One can always make money but as we all know you cannot buy more time!
Good luck with your parents. Although leaving the nursing home, I will still do hospice work. i can’t let go of that.