“Up the Down

By Forrest Preece

The moment she’ll never forget came for Dr. Lisa Doggett, a family practice physician and clinic director, in November 2009. Her husband, a pediatrician, said three words, after her neuroradiologist pointed out white spots on the MRI film of her brain. “So, it’s MS.” If fighting the American medical system to provide care for members of the most challenged, uninsured segment of the Austin population along with raising two active daughters wasn’t enough, now multiple sclerosis had landed on her back.

Lisa Doggett’s autobiographical book “Up the Down Escalator” is perfectly named. It takes the reader on a harrowing ride of pushing back up against a career/household/disease walkway that is constantly churning downhill -- and does it in no-nonsense language.

A West Austin native, Lisa is the daughter of Congressman Lloyd Doggett and Dr. Libby Doggett, who was named Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy and Early Learning at the U.S. Department of Education during the Obama administration. She obviously inherited an ample amount of her parents’ brainpower, compassion, and ability to relate to others, and her writing abilities are remarkable.

One thing about this book

– she doesn’t use up a lot of pages on her childhood. A short chapter is devoted to how she met “The Tall Guy at MIT” who became her husband and a fellow physician, and then she gets down to the hard-core reality of her profession, her home life, and dealing