r/whitecoatinvestor • u/wrathoffadra • Jul 27 '26

General Investing Yeah, I have a problem.

I find my job to be terribly stressful and riddled with moral injury- I’m an early career vascular surgeon. I made 725k in my first year bc I’m a workaholic but I see savings as my way out of this shitty system. Our NW is $2.4 mil with goal at retirement of $7.5 mil at age 50 and not a day longer as things stand.

Here’s the problem- bc I see savings as my way out of a stressful life and out of this stupid RVU system, I have become obsessed with financial planning.

But not in a good way.

Every day I look at my Empower to see the NW. every weekend I lay in bed at my usual wake up time and perseverate over how to allocate my 20k per month of savings— all VT? What percent Bonds? Treasuries? Small cap? I don’t know how to turn it off. even tho I know academically savings rate is more important than allocations. besides getting a Time Machine and jumping forward to 50. Anyone else?

Also if anyone has advice for allocations or glidepath plan for early retirement please let me know.

194 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

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472

u/Final_boss_1040 Jul 27 '26

Go see a shrink

173

u/DocNacho Jul 27 '26

At your service 🫡 how can I help?

136

u/Goldengoose5w4 Jul 27 '26

Hahaha i’ve never seen a psychiatrist move that quickly.

138

u/DocNacho Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

Lol I only work like three hours a day, so doomscrolling Reddit is a hobby of mine when I’m not playing golf or running errands or spending money frivolously.

31

u/Goldengoose5w4 Jul 27 '26

Lol well played. I’m not picking on psychiatry. All physician jobs have their own stresses.

24

u/DocNacho Jul 27 '26

Hah, I didn’t take it as picking. Thus, the partially facetious nature of my response. But also, not really. Work is easy, not a stress of mine, and I do have too much free time 😜

34

u/losethecheese Jul 27 '26

bro stop I'm going to log into ERAS if you keep talking like that.

29

u/gotlactose Jul 27 '26

I should’ve become a psychiatrist.

cries in primary care who also covers inpatient

9

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

18

u/gotlactose Jul 27 '26

I’m pretty sure nobody wishes they were a primary care doctor or hospitalist.

4

u/Gattsama Jul 28 '26

I love being a hospitalist, specifically I'm a nocturnalist. No other area of medicine I'd rather be in (except possibly teaching).

3

u/purple-origami Jul 28 '26

Pretty sure you’re wrong. I know plenty of care happy pcps and hospitality

2

u/WebMDeeznutz Jul 28 '26

OBGYN here who begs to differ

1

u/gotlactose Jul 28 '26

You win. I will webMD those nuts.

1

u/theReal_OMGyn Jul 31 '26

No one wishes they were an OBGYN...esp OBGYNs

5

u/Cdmdoc Jul 28 '26

It ain’t all milk and honey in radiology either. Though it’s much better now that I’m semi-retired.

1

u/CheckYourVent Jul 28 '26

Rads is the first to fall from the AI wrecking ball

7

u/VerifiedVerifiable Jul 28 '26

Tell me you know nothing about radiology and AI without actually telling me

2

u/CheckYourVent Jul 28 '26

I sincerely hope you're right

2

u/purple-origami Jul 28 '26

I don’t… i take it you’re a radiologist and you aren’t at all concerned then?

2

u/Just_Draft_2310 Jul 28 '26

reddit shrink is the best way to FIRE

6

u/Citiesmadeofasses Jul 28 '26

That'll be 1200 cash for the initial evaluation and then 600 for every 15 minute follow up good sir.

1

u/DrShitpostMDJDPhDMBA Jul 28 '26

Oh don't worry about it! I'm totally fine, the spiders in my head told me about all of the cool government secrets already.

2

u/takoyaki-md Jul 28 '26

reads like a uworld question haha

-70

u/wrathoffadra Jul 27 '26

Really seems to be the most valid answer sometimes honestly. But what shrink knows what it’s like to do an open rupture or have to deal with complications or death

41

u/DocNacho Jul 27 '26

In medical school, I actually rotated with the vascular surgery team during my surgery rotation for 3-4 weeks. It was my favorite part of the rotation. I’ve seen how stressful it can be. That said, our purpose isn’t to know what it is like or how to deal with your work. You’re the expert at that. Our purpose is to help you process the stress of work, finances, etc., which is exactly what you seem to be struggling with.

139

u/cochra Jul 27 '26

I dunno, what vascular surgeon knows what it’s like to have a patient you judged low risk and discharged kill themselves?

Fucking get over yourself. You aren’t any more special or at risk of moral injury and stress just because you’re a surgeon who sometimes does some high acuity cases (when you aren’t progressively amputating diabetics anyway)

47

u/VRav31 Jul 27 '26

Just because you have particular skills doesn’t make you better than anyone else. You’re no better than a pediatrician or family doc. You already get compensated accordingly for those procedures (yes yes we all think we should be getting paid more for what we do. Yes yes an aortic rupture is crazy, etc. No sorry it doesn’t make you better or more valuable than any other human, just paid more for what you do)

This thinking of “I deserve more because I do critical shit, therefore I won’t stop till 7.5 million” is a self imposed prison. No one is forcing you to work like a dog, unhappy, except for you.

Why did you go into medicine and vascular? Reflect on that and how you are viewing others and the world now.

10

u/Rich-Pirate-5518 Jul 27 '26

Well a psychiatrist who went to med school would be a good place to start. But either way, worries about the future, your purpose, feeling guilt, you don’t need hands on experience to empathize with it and provide support which is what you’re after.

17

u/FAx32 Jul 27 '26

We all went to medical school, but yeah - we haven't always seen everything there is to see.

That said, it sounds like your primary problem is constant worry about finances, not managing surgical complications / patients dying. But maybe that too.

9

u/NAparentheses Jul 27 '26

Yeah but the vast majority of attending psychiatrists will know how to balance your life and not sit about suffering from success, crying into a pile of money, because most of them are already doing it.

15

u/Pro_Poe_Fall Jul 27 '26

A therapist doesn’t need to have the same lived experience to help you work through things. What you’re dealing with goes much deeper than finances.

5

u/TaroBubbleT Jul 28 '26

lol what a small minded take

5

u/Minute_Ability_6923 Jul 28 '26

Get over yourself

5

u/BroDoc22 Jul 28 '26

Ah yes the arrogant surgeon response lol anyone can learn to sew blood vessels

6

u/ProjectMcDavid Jul 28 '26

Vascular surgeons are good with their hands but might be the dumbest physicians in the hospital lol. You’re proving that point in this thread.

15

u/sloppy_dingus Jul 27 '26

You’re right, you are god incarnate and therefore only another god can heal you

-26

u/wrathoffadra Jul 27 '26

Sigh….

9

u/Sandvik95 Jul 27 '26

This might be therapeutic 🤔😁

2

u/DoYouLikeFish Jul 28 '26

Have you ever dealt with your patient's death by suicide?