I took a lot of time to think about an answer to this.
I don't think I would do medicine again. At all.
If it HAD to be medicine (like; if God came down and said - "Dude; I have been here all along. By the way... new rule - you can go back but you haaave to do medicine. AND the floor is lava.")
I think I would do FM and just do clinic-only stuff.
I'm a bit of a bizarre case study, though.
See; I got into medicine for two reasons.
(1) I was born into a medical family. Dad was a dentist (retired). Mom was an ER nurse. Uncle is a world-class pathologist (no joke; the guy is major-league level brilliant, holds patents, sits on boards of boards, he's 77 and still working). Aunt is/was (retired) an old cath-lab nurse. Ever since I was a kid, I was told that "biology is good; its how life is life". So [this sounds lame as hell, but its the truth], by the time I was in high-school, I really "knew the source material very well". For those who can remember, you used to be able to take SAT-II subject-specific tests. This was back in the day where an "800" was a perfect single-subject score, and a "1600" was a perfect score (math/verbal). I hear that a perfect score is like, 2400 now (or something). Anyways. I took two SAT-II subject-specific tests because I could. I scored a 760 on biology, and a 790 on molecular biology (yeah, that was a thing). I had a few scholarship offers from some big-name schools. Went to a state-school for my own reasons. I really, really, was one-track-minded.
(2) I had this idea of "nobility". Medicine of any variety (dentistry, podiatry, nursing, whatever) was "noble" because at the end of the day you were helping a fellow human being who needs help. This was "sacred" and was a "good thing to do", according to so many people who held so much influence over me.
Now, I don't care about people. Hardly at all.
I really don't.
If it was one thing that burned me out of medicine, its... people.
But hey, here I am. PGY-10.
I'm at a bit of a crossroads in life, too.
I don't have any kids. I'm not saving for the college educations of kids that I don't have.
I don't want kids.
My debts are all paid off. 330K+ for med school was a lot. Yay for me. Lulz. Gamer trophy, somehow.
I looked at my tax returns. I generally made (gross) in the neighborhood of 330K a year (plus/minus 10K or whatever).
I'd be just as happy with a lot less money.
I don't have a luxury car. A big house. A second home. Expensive watches. I don't buy "designer clothes". Sure, I like to travel; but a "good day off" for me is having some breakfast and going to the park to juggle a soccer ball or hit the batting cages, or just "playing like a kid would play". I don't head to the country club for 18 holes with "important executives". I hate those people and their pretentiousness. My wife said to me once: "I used to date this guy; he was in law school. One day, he said something like; 'when I'm a real lawyer, ALL of my clothes will be [designer name here]'." Lame sauce. She followed that with: "Yep. I knew right there and then that this wasn't going to work out." I don't need "status". In fact, I hate it.
We frequently go out to dinner, and not infrequently (because we generally sit at the bartop, we dont like tables), another patron or an employee will recognize me and say "Hey! Dr. Rustedfox! Thanks so much for x-and-y-and here's some follow-up that you didn't ask about!"
I hate that. I would rather just eat my chicken salad and drink my beer in silence.
I figure on making a big change.
I'm probably just going to go straight-part-time EM, and treat it like "radiation exposure". Its not that bad if your exposure isn't too long or or too heavy. This may or may not be tenable in the coming years. Who knows? Maybe EM will be nothing but PLPs. Everywhere. If that's it. I quit.