Father Figure

I could write a BOOK, much less a blog entry, about the intersection between my family and my healthy living. Perhaps I will someday, but for now I'd thought I'd start with one aspect: my dad.

I had a pretty awesome father and it's not until this whole process that I've realized that he, probably more so than anyone else in my family (surprisingly since I have a mother and a sister who are big on dieting), had a big influence on my eating and physical activity habits. For better or worse.

It was 1998, the end of my sophomore year of college, and I had vowed to be a vegetarian. It was going great - up until school ended and I went back home. My mom was pretty supportive of it - even experimented in non-meat dinners. My dad regularly grumbled like the Wendy's lady, "Where's the beef?" Around late June/early July, I was helping my dad out in his office. It was lunchtime. He said, "Hey, Mi, you want to go get us some KFC for lunch?" I told him, "Dad, I'm not eating meat, remember?" He looked at me for a minute, a bemused expression on his face. Then he proceeded to pass me a $20, "Really? No meat?" I, paused, took the $20 and promptly went and got us both 2 piece meals and strawberry sodas. I think he let me keep the change. (Note: to anyone else who is considering leaving vegetarianism, do not make KFC your first meat-filled meal. Bad move.)

My dad was also the first person to introduce me to the gym. He regularly went to swim or sauna, sometimes lift weights. I would tag along, try the machines out. My dad was also usually the first person to say, "Hey, you're getting chubby." Man, did that make me go on a diet. He didn't harp on it, he just would mention it and once was enough for it to be effective. At the same time, he was supportive when he saw I was trying. I once lost 10 lbs and excitedly told my parents. My mom was not impressed. "Only ten pounds? That's nothing!" My dad rolled his eyes at her and said, "Good job, Mila."

When I was preparing for my organ donation, the surgeon told me I needed to drop 10 pounds in about a month. It was incredibly stressful - when you're preparing for major surgery the last thing you want to think about it your diet - but it was for my dad, so I did it (I totally lost more than that too).

Motivation is a helluva thing.