Li revealed that her heritage really influenced how she felt about food. Her father’s family is from China, and food is extremely important in their culture. She said that Chinese folks take a lot of pride in their food and don’t like to waste food. So, even though Li’s Chinese relatives always innocently commented on her body size, they would also encourage her to clean her plate at every meal.
“It’s like you cannot win with them. Like, be skinny, but eat everything,” Li joked. She added this made it really difficult for her to tune into her body’s hunger and fullness cues. As she got older, Li tarted to pay attention to how she actually felt while she was eating instead of paying attention to how much was left on her plate.
“I’m learning that it’s okay if I don’t finish something if I don’t want to finish it,” she said. She’s also paying more attention to how exercise makes her feel. Li learned that exercise helped with her anxiety, which has encouraged her to get out of the mindset that the only purpose of exercise is to lose weight.