The "Transformation " of a lay person into a physician

Dr. Lawrence G.Smith, writing in the April 3, 2005 issue of the American Journal of Medicine speaks of this transformation. Professionalism has been written about extensively as it relates to doctors. Smith maintains the core of professionalism is the "personal transformation of self that takes place in stages during the early years of medical training and practice" When transformed the person now interacts with society in a new and different manner.
I have no doubt that happened to me. I can still remember comments made by teachers now over thirty years ago which were part of that process. I remember the attitude of respect and seriousness that was passed to me from the professors of gross anatomy as it related to behavior to the cadavers and behavior in the lab. I remember the pathology professor who told us that when we saw patients at night in the hospital how important it was for us to look and behave like physicians.I remember the chief of surgery who insisted that his residents wear shirts and ties in the hospital and clean coats and that his definition of a surgeon was a physician who knew how to operate.I remember how the clinical faculty typically treated the patients in the county hospital always with courtesy and respect, even though at time residents might have not.
In the first few months after I completed training I was doing a locum tenens and had the occasional to call the chief of medicine, with whom I had trained, to see a private patient at 3 am. She had end stage lupus and he had seen her several years before. He arrived soon after I called him at home. He was well shaven and well dressed in a suit. He spent over a hour with the patient and family, completed a page and half note and spent another 10 minutes with me.The family was greatly relieved that all that could be done was done. I was greatly relieved and felt that the chief had taught me another lesson;how a physician can do things the way that should be done in the real world.
These are just a few snap shots of the events and attitudes that lead to my transition from a college kid who really had no idea what to expect in med school or beyond to a person who felt he was trained to do serious, important work and that it all was a privilege and a great obligation and that doing the right thing for the patient was what it was all about. Much of what my high school friends had done while I was in training, I had missed and in the years of training much of transpired in the world I had also missed. And much of the everyday concerns of relatives seemed to be so much less important.I believe part of that transformation process is the isolation from the daily events of the world that seems required by the intense study and training lasting for years past the usual time an adult joins the work force. Part of that transformation occurs because most of your waking hours are spent with other physicians and professionals doing what doctors do and talking about things doctors talk about.Role models are everywhere.
As Dr. Smith said, once the transformation occurs you cannot think of being a physician as just a job.And it is difficult to think of yourself as any thing but a physician.
And because of that transformation it becomes very hard for a physician to retire or to be forced to leave practice because of illness. Are you transformed back into a lay person or are you still a physician who ...?