You don't even feel it when you're the operating surgeon. At the end of even the longest case you suddenly realize that your bladder is bursting and your muscles ache!
I don't know a surgeon who hasn't felt the same way. I'm sure that part of it is self selection.
Lots of people stand up all day for their work. Soldiers wear heavy packs while marching. Movers carry heavy boxes and even pianos. Landscapers carry heavy bags of peat and manure on their shoulders and dig with shovels. Construction workers carry sheets of gypsum and drywall. Carpenters carry lumber. Carpet layers carry heavy rolls of carpet. This isn't super human, this is what the human body was designed to do. A better question would be asking what happened to the young generation that sits on their butts playing video games all day and marvels that people can actually maintain a job where they stand on their feet.
The OR is a harsh mistress but her rewards are sweet: a sensation of living in the moment, the beauty of the dance (collaboration of skilled colleagues), the ritual, the good outcome...and of course, compression stockings!
The years of preparation and practice, the pre anesthesia interaction with the patient, anesthesia, the residents and the students; scrubbing, gowning, gloving, the pre op checklist, the post op quiet, dictation, talking to the family... It's lovely.
