Pressing My Luck

In 2001, Dr. Shirley Press was your typical, hard-working pediatric emergency room doctor…until she won 56 million dollars (17.5 million take home) in the Florida Lottery with a ticket bought in the hospital’s gift shop. This stroke of luck brought with it numerous challenges as well as self-discovery. In her memoir, Pressing My Luck, Dr. Press takes readers on a tour of her life and candidly looks back on how the lottery windfall affected it. She recalls her childhood in Camden, New Jersey growing up with parents who were Holocaust survivors, her determination to become successful, the wild 1970 summer adventure at Paul McCartney’s house and the years dedicated to practicing medicine. And despite her lottery fortune, she reveals how money didn’t shield her family from life’s adversities, such as her husband’s near fatal illness and her son’s drug addiction. With insight and candor, Dr. Press recounts her decisions, daily struggles as well as post-lottery observations on family, friends and life in general. In the end, Dr. Press can hardly believe that most of her confidence and personal growth that she thought was due to winning the Lotto could have been achieved without all the money.