In my program about half are married, no divorces. It is NOT neccesarily true that surgery residency leads to divorce!!! Ask residents about divorce rate on interviews. It varies a lot from program to program - usually varying along with the happiness level of the residents. Duke is often cited as having a high divorce rate, and is also known as one of the still very malignant programs around - unhappy residents are unhappy at work AND at home. Ones who enjoy their job more probably tend to come home in a better mood and hence have more fun quality time in their precious free time.
I think kids would be a bit harder - I can see a spouse being more understanding than a child that you have a late case and don't come home till 8pm or later on a night you thought you'd make it home for dinner. Certainly there are people that manage having a family - usually men, of course, and it should be getting more managable with the 80 hour workweek.
It's all about having an a spouse or girlfriend/boyfriend who understands your unpredictable schedule and is okay with it. I agree that living in a place your wife has family or friends would help a lot in giving her a support system and something to do while you are not home. I'd see how it goes when you are on busy rotations in med school - if your wife or kids seem annoyed and upset when you work long hours, it's a sign maybe you can't make it work. Of course, residency is much tougher than med school, but I think it's a good general indicator about your family's tolerance level.
There are tons of posts about the hours, but here's a summary again for Herpeto, who asked: 80 hours total/week, one day per week avg over 4 weeks (so sometimes you won't have a day off, but the next week you may get both Sat and Sun off), you must go home by noon post-call (=24 hour call+6 hours max of post-call followup/transition care), call cannot average more than Q3 I think, so you are on call usually less than twice a week avg (call being the 24-30 hour shift). So there's much more time off than was before, but sometimes it seems like you just work harder when you are at work, so you're still tired. We often go home post call and sleep the whole afternoon away anyway, or we are expected to read and study when we're off, so I'm not sure if that translates to tons more family time. The days off are really enjoyable though, and seem to make a busy week seem much more humane.
