The way a person consumes food can reveal a lot about their personality, interests and aversions. I am no exception, and my consumption of food has changed throughout my childhood.
I was born into a low-middle class household, and that meant we didn’t have much money to spend on food. My parents both have to work full-time jobs to make ends meet, so back then I didn’t have much to eat. As I grew older, my family’s financial situation stabilized, and I became more of a picky eater due to having more food security.
However, this also made me overweight as while I don’t eat a lot of unhealthy food, the amount I eat is a lot. My parents had tried to help me lose weight in many different ways, from eating brown rice instead of white rice, to drinking weight loss powder. Regardless of how absurd the methods were, they were all ineffective as whatever weight I lost came back and made me gain weight in the end and was about to give up on losing weight.
Then, COVID-19 hit. As everyone was quarantined, I didn’t have many opportunities to go eat out, so I took the time to reflect on myself and my own habits. I took the quarantine as an opportunity to exercise more and eat less, reducing my portions by half. Slowly but surely, I began to lose weight without regaining it back. As a result, I managed to lose 40lb within a year of quarantine. It was an agonizing year during that time, but now I know that it was all worth it. Nowadays, I regained part of the weight I lost, but my diet habits have changed for the better. I know eat less and at a slower pace, so that I don’t revert back to stuffing my face with food.
During the quarantine, I also took the opportunity to learn to cook from my mother. I first made basic dishes like fried eggs, but I eventually learned more complex recipes curtesy of my mother. In the past, I did not regard food as very valuable and only thought of it as something to be consumed. However, now I know the true value of food and how much work my parents put in to put it on the table, so I savor the food instead of wolfing it down.
All of these experiences have made me into the person I am now.
Featured image sourced from food280.com