Recently, a colleague told me I am old.  I like to think of myself as “comparatively old” and I’m pretty sure that’s how she meant it.  

I’ve taken a circuitous route through surgical training, which means I am much older than my colleagues at the same level.  

After finishing my medical degree and working as a hospital medical officer, I applied to surgical training.  I spent two years as a surgical registrar, in 2003 and 2004.  The surgical training program at that stage would have taken four years, with an exit exam in the fourth year.  That would have made me a consultant surgeon in 2007, when I was 32.  However, I took a detour.

I decided to do a PhD, which I completed and of which I am incredibly proud.  That normally takes 3 years at a minimum, and mine took three and a half. I spent some extra time having three kids, of whom I’m also incredibly proud.  So that means I took a six year pause in total, and returned to full-time training in 2011.

This year, I sit my exit exam, and I will finally be a consultant surgeon in 2014.  I will be turning 39 that year, so a considerable detour.  Perhaps I am an old woman.

I am a better doctor for all that I have had in my life.  In medicine, progression is stepwise, so your job title and level is a marker of your progress.  I feel self-conscious of this, and spend too much time casually  dropping hints that I have done other things.

I’m not sure I would do it again.  I love who I am as a clinician, and the skills I have.  But I’m really, really ready to give up being told what to do.  Just one more year.