About you & me
Who I am and what we can do together
I believe that putting ourselves first is the way we get back to the roots of medicine.
Is this you?
You're a physician struggling to make life work, buried under an endless mountain of lab results, inbox messages, charts, billing workshops with some meager patient contact scattered in between...
You thought it would be different when you "got here." But forget living the dream; you feel like you're barely treading water.
You've tried everything from retail therapy to yoga & meditation to exercising more.(Because that’s the magic that admin tells us will make our lives better!) But, you’ve found that it doesn’t.
You wonder if it's possible to change your life when you’ve been on this path for 10, maybe 20, maybe 30 years and it feels like there is nothing else you know how to do.
You love medicine. (Or you want to love medicine.) You wish there were a way that your love affair with medicine could continue, but you feel your relationship is dangerously close to calling it quits.
Here's the question:
While you're taking care of everyone and everything else, who's taking care of you?
What if I told you...
You can become a doctor in control of your own life and destiny...
...who luxuriates in self-care, fiercely advocates for yourself and your patients (not from a place of burnout!), provides a refuge in the crazy world of medicine for all the patients who have no idea how to navigate the system? What if I told you this is all within your reach?
Hi, I'm Ruchi Kaul MD.
Physician. coach.
been there. done that.
I can teach you to become the person you want to be. She’s not a unicorn with rainbow poop (credit: Everybody Poops, our daily reading on the potty). She’s a real-life amazing, kick-ass human being who goes for what she wants and is all in. Only you know what she wants, what her life looks like.
It's in reclaiming our own power...
That we can first heal our minds, then our lives, then the system — to make it better for everyone.
How it started...
I trained in Family Medicine at Beth Israel’s residency in NYC. After that, I worked as a full spectrum faculty at a residency program, doing my own clinics, precepting residency clinics, covering the ICU, the hospital floors and labor and delivery with the residents. I did everything from pediatrics to women’s health (including OB) to adult health to geriatrics to hospice. I loved teaching and training the residents.
When that program told me I’d have to choose between breastfeeding my baby or taking overnight calls several times a month from 1.5 hours away from my baby, I started looking into other options. I worked as a hospitalist, for an urgent care, doing locums, for a private practice, for a corporate company doing employee health.
At each subsequent turn, I was subject to the whims of the (non-clinical) administration, running into yet another group of people who either didn’t have my back, or didn’t have the back of our patients, or both.
In the meantime, in supporting patients, residents, staff — I had no time for myself. And precious little time to spend with my kids.
I tried all of it, and with each attempt, I felt unsatisfied. Like, this is not what things were supposed to be like. This was not the dream I had.
So I decided to open a DPC. I rented a one-room space and I haven’t looked back.
And I have to say that the one single factor that has determined whether my practice is a success or not is me.
I have never given up, and decided that I was going to do whatever it took to make this succeed. I made a lot of mistakes and spent a lot of time spinning in the “how the heck do I do this” or “I didn’t go to school for this” or “I wasn’t made to market” spirals. But I was determined to make it work and I dreamed my dream every day.
I lived it, if only in my imagination, until I breathed life into it and made it true.
How it's going...
Today, my practice truly is an oasis — for me, my staff, and my family, too. My staff comes early just to get a quiet moment and space. Our office is our home. Our dream come to life. It is a living, breathing manifestation of my life’s purpose.
But it didn't happen overnight. I was open for almost 3 years before my life really started changing. Before I let my life change. The change started with me. And it’s still ongoing. But my life is a heck of a lot better. When I describe it to people now, I see all the envy in their eyes that I once had….for a promise of something better.
It is available to you. All of it is available to you. The joy, the freedom, the flexible hours.
I drop my kids off at school and pick them up. We take walks, ride bikes, and I get kisses and snuggles all day. I leave the house for a few patients, then come back. I hit up the grocery store if I need to in the middle of the day (because I have time for things like that). I have lunch with my husband or my MA.
I get to decide when I take on more patients. I get to decide my hours. I get to decide who I take on and who I keep. No one tells me how long I have to work and no one tells me how fast I need to get done.
Part of this is a function of DPC and how I’ve made it mine. But a bigger part of it is managing my mind and understanding that I have control over my life and if I have any complaints, I have the power to change it. And if I choose (yes, choose) not to fix it, then I can expect the same patterns on repeat.
We have all changed in this process. Life is less hectic. I’m never telling my kids to hurry up and rush because we’re late ANYMORE. NEVER. I always hated that. When there are tears, I have the space and time to stop. To kneel down. To give kisses. To have talks. To show my shining jewels of children how special and important they are. And how they can learn to put themselves first. Like...how I finally decided to buy myself a Peloton!
I want this for you. Do you?
Yes, you can love your life and your work.
The world needs more doctors. More good doctors. People who have studied and perfected their craft. Patients need us. But WE need us. And we need to heal in order to serve.
The current model of medicine is not interested in serving us or our patients. It’s interested in the cashflow, and that is painfully apparent. Let’s reinvent medicine. Let’s make it something we love again. So our patients can thrive and we can, too.