Cutting Out

James K. Weber M.D. F.A.C.S.

Description

Giving up a successful career in surgery to become a yoga teacher? Unheard of—yet that is exactly what this author has done. That, and reuniting with the love of his life after two previous failures.
It takes a lot of courage to walk away from a successful surgical career to become a yoga teacher. Especially after all the years of highly competitive schooling, followed by the mental, emotional, and physical stresses of surgical training.
James K. Weber, however, took that huge leap—and along the way, he scored a third chance to make it right with the love of his life.
It wasn’t until after several heart attacks that a plan to leave the profession took hold.
He came to think of his heart attacks as the key to improved health—something that would propel him to strike off on a new path.
In this memoir, he recalls how he made such a huge decision. As you read his story, you won’t be able to help but reflect on the critical decisions that you’ve made or deferred at the crossroads of your own life.
Eminently readable and filled with anecdotes, reflections, pathos, and humor, this is an autobiography unlike any other—a testimony to the hardiness of the human spirit.

Sujets

• Biography
• Autobiography

Informations

• Publié par: Archway Publishing
• Date de parution: 17 janvier 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781665728560
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

CUTTING OUT
The Making and Unmaking of a Surgeon
JAMES K. WEBER, M.D., F.A.C.S.


Copyright © 2023 James K. Weber, M.D., F.A.C.S.
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
 
This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.
 
 
Archway Publishing
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Bloomington, IN 47403
www.archwaypublishing.com
844-669-3957
 
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2857-7 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2855-3 (hc)
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2856-0 (e)
 
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022921229
 
 
 
Archway Publishing rev. date: 1/16/2023
CONTENTS
FOREGROUND
Meanings
PLAYGROUND
1. Musings
In Medias Res
Mind You
Mortality
2. Misspent Youth
Early Memories
Mischief
Mind Blowing
3. Maturation
4. May Day
5. Monikers
Medicine in My Blood
Mischances
6. Mysterioso
7. My Son, the M.D.
8. Music Matters
A major Modulation
Melodies at the Alma Mater
Maestro in the Making
Semper pro Musica
BATTLEGROUND
9. Moping
10. Les Misérables
11. Maelstrom
12. Manumission
Myself
Mentoring
Maladies
13. Memberships
Making Waves
Monumental
14. Motivation
Morbid Obesity
Misbegotten Manuscript
Metamorphosis
RE-GROUNDING
15. Merka
Missteps
Mirabile Dictu
HIGH GROUND
16. Moving On
Memento Mori
Misadventures
Mantra
Merci
Manners
17. Miracles, minette, and The Monarch
18. More to Come
BACKGROUND
Mélange
Mentioning
Moniti, Meliora Sequamur
Minutiae
ADVANCE PRAISE
Jim Weber launched his surgical career from a position of privilege. But nothing would insulate him from life’s great equalizers. In his case, these would include an emotionally distant alcoholic mother, the rugged physical demands and personal humiliations of surgical training, cutthroat hospital politics, and heartbreaking patient stories.
Weber shares the victories also: pioneering work in weight loss surgeries and teaching University of Washington family doctors.
While he tried to find life balance through his music and teaching, Dr. Weber’s health paid a steep price. After several heart attacks rearranged his priorities, Dr. Weber developed a new career teaching yoga. Re-uniting with the love of his life, he essentially started over.
Gritty and candid, this is the story of an accomplished physician healing himself.
Linda Gromko, R.N.,M.D.
Dr. Jim Weber describes how he fulfilled his dream to become a surgeon, only to find that despite his expertise, commitment, and passion, he was not truly satisfied. Enter a difficult transition period that led to his second calling: Yoga Doc.
Jim writes artfully and compassionately about his experiences in ways that make us all reflect on what is important to us, what is worth working for, and what brings us joy.
Jennifer Wisdom, PhD, Wisdom Consulting
When one’s best friend in college writes a tell-all memoir that brings back long-buried memories, one gets worried. But Jim Weber’s surprisingly entertaining description of his journey from privileged Gramercy Park upbringing, with education at Buckley School, Hotchkiss, Yale, and Columbia, to preeminent surgeon, to yoga doc is fascinating.
Surprisingly honest about his four marriages, his description of the road from high-flying surgeon and Seattle Symphony Board member, to being served with two lawsuits on the same day, to discovering that he loves teaching yoga makes this read hard to put down. His self-insight and hilarious anecdotes make for a great saga, even if I did not know some of the story already.
Who knew in addition to being a singer and surgeon and yoga instructor, he was also a gifted writer? A new career beckons!
Richard Peiser, M.B., PhD.,
Michael D. Spear Professor of Real Estate Development,
Harvard Graduate School of Design
ALSO BY THE AUTHOR
Overcoming Obesity Through Weight Loss Surgery
The Complete Idiots Guide to Modern Manners Fast-Track
Joie de Vivre, As I See It: Reflections on Youth and Maturity
Scribbling In My Spare Time (in progress)

This book is dedicated to Mary Monica Mitchell, My wife, soulmate, and inspiration
FOREGROUND

What a wee little part of a person’s life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head and is known to none but himself. All day long, the mill of his brain is grinding, and his thoughts, not those of other things, are his history. These are his life, and they are not written. Every day would make a whole book of 80,000 words—365 books a year. Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of the man — the biography of the man himself cannot be written.
Mark Twain, The Autobiography of Mark Twain
MEANINGS
We do not receive wisdom. We must discover it for ourselves, after a journey through the wilderness which no one else can make for us, which no one can spare us...
Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past
I
Writing this book has been on my mind for quite a few years. I kept pages of notes, mostly one-liners, to jog my memory of unusual or otherwise noteworthy experiences, the majority relating to my medical career. I kept adding more notes, for more than thirty years.
As I ultimately assembled them into a coherent narrative, a unifying story emerged, a story of one man’s journey to move beyond a successful surgical career into the privilege of assisting more people in a different way. Reuniting with his true love provided the necessary affirmation that this was the right choice.
James K. Weber, M.D., F.A.C.S.
August, 2022
II
Like Dr. James Weber, I made significant changes in my professional trajectory. I gave up a career as a bench scientist for an administrative position in medical school, facilitating others with their research. Admittedly, the changes I made were not as radical as Jim’s. Even so, I certainly can relate to the journey he details in Cutting Out: The Making and Unmaking of a Surgeon.
I had the opportunity of meeting Dr. Weber because of professional contact with his wife, Mary Mitchell. I found them to be two of the kindest and most interesting people one could ever hope to cross paths with. I have spent a great deal of time working with Mary, an expert on etiquette—also a deep introvert like myself.
Jim, on the other hand, is as extraverted as they come, and I admit that early on I was drained by his non-stop expressiveness and direct line of inquiries into my life. It’s my recollection, probably flawed, that I met Jim in a hotel lobby as we waited to check out at the end of a National Postdoctoral Association conference. He started a conversation that was quite one-sided until Mary showed up and expressed joy that we had met. So began a friendship that has lasted many years despite our differences in upbringing, location, and careers.
I don’t think I have any friends more different from me than Jim Weber. He is a generation older, grew up in what I’d consider a rich family, had an Ivy League education, and built a career as a surgeon. But what really matters is that he is a man who really cares about what he does and how it impacts others. He is serious about making the most of his life and helping others do the same.
I knew that Jim had retired from a successful career as a bariatric surgeon. I knew he’d gone to the finest schools in the land along the way, and that he had a wonderful wife with whom he lived in a fairy-tale house that floated on the water in Seattle.
In short, I knew Jim was a good guy who had a good life and for whom everything kind of went the way it was supposed to go. Then I read this book, and realized that so many of the things I’d assumed about him were wrong. Also, that many things I’d assumed were right, but I learned much more about why that was so.
This book takes you on a journey through time, as a young boy who seems destined to be a doctor like his parents does exactly that, but never feels he quite fits in. Even though most of us can’t relate to the experience of being a surgeon in a family of physicians, we all can understand how it feels when we aren’t quite where we should be.
Many of us spend a lifetime quieting the inner voice that urges us to try something else, even when the outcome is neither safe nor certain.
Some of us hear the voice for the first time later in life and dismiss it, either as midlife crisis or a childish cry to give up our soft but successful life.
Very few indeed, hear the voice late in life for what it is: the truth. It’s our heart’s true desire. It’s the path to happiness despite pain. It’s what we always wanted to do, rather th