WHITE COAT, WORN OUT: A Surgeon’s Memoir of Burnout and Resilience
About this ebook
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For any healthcare professional feeling emotionally exhausted, this surgeon memoir pulls back the hospital curtains on a reality rarely discussed: the silent collapse of a healer. White Coat, Worn Out is a raw doctor burnout story that follows a female general surgeon through surgical residency, twelve-hour operations, trauma surgery, and the devastating toll of compassion fatigue. Unlike clinical textbooks on physician wellness, this real-life narrative explores medical training trauma, sleep deprivation, panic attacks in the parking garage, hiding in a hospital supply closet, and the grey zone of empathy loss where patients stop feeling real. This gripping memoir also dives into healthcare PTSD from code blues, gunshot wounds, and pediatric deaths, along with the toxic medical culture of one-hundred-hour workweeks, bullying in surgical residencies, and the unspoken rule that feelings are weakness. But this book is also a story of burnout recovery – from shaking hands in the operating room and hiding whiskey bottles to seeking therapy for doctors, taking medical leave, and learning to say no. It addresses physician mental health, anxiety in doctors, depression in physicians, secondary traumatic stress, moral injury in medicine, and how to treat trauma in healthcare workers. Written by a practicing surgeon who rediscovered resilience, this inspirational memoir offers a path back from emotional numbness to presence and joy. Whether you are a nurse, resident, attending physician, medical student, doctor spouse, or anyone suffering from occupational burnout, this book proves that the white coat is just fabric – and even a worn-out thing can be worth keeping. Stitch by stitch, one thread at a time, healing is possible.
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About the author
Hollis Parr Enderby is a general surgeon who has spent nearly two decades in operating rooms, emergency departments, and intensive care units. She writes from the intersection of medicine and humanity, where the white coat meets the worn-out soul beneath it.
Born and raised in the Midwest, Enderby knew she wanted to be a doctor by the time she was twelve years old. She pursued that dream through medical school, a surgical residency that nearly broke her, and a career that taught her that healing is not just for patients. It is also for the people who care for them.
Her writing has appeared in medical journals and general publications, though she prefers to keep those names off the page. She believes that the best stories come from the quiet moments. The supply closet at three in the morning. The hand squeeze from a scared family member. The first bite of a tomato you grew yourself.
Enderby lives in a house with a garden, a demanding tomato plant named Franklin the Third, and a wife who never let go of her hand. She still practices surgery, though now she takes lunch breaks and leaves on time whenever she can. Her white coat is stained and mended and still hanging on the back of her door.
She hopes this book finds the doctors, nurses, and caregivers who need it most. You are not alone. You are not broken. You are just tired. And there is a way back. Stitch by stitch. One thread at a time.
