an intellectual pursuit

Patty is 32 years old and works as a Neonatologist. She lives in Boston, MA with her husband, Caleb.

What’s your most indulgent pleasure?

When I was little, my dad was the family cook, and we’re super close. He grew up on a farm in Kentucky and loves some very basic American things that I do too -laughs-. While I have been on a mostly pescatarian diet for the last three years - when I go home and I’m with my dad, it’s a different story. If he makes his white wonder bread, American cheese, baloney, and horseradish mustard sandwich with a side of potato chips, I can’t say no to it. It’s all I want and is my favorite indulgence -laughs-.

How did you choose the food at your wedding? I rave about your wedding to so many people.

It’s funny, we actually didn't. We were living in New York while we were planning our wedding, so we couldn’t be in Ohio to taste the food. Caleb’s mom, Lori, who is a huge part of my food journey, tasted all of the food for us and made the final call.

Tell me more about that food journey with Lori.

Growing up, my family ate things like tuna casserole or steamed broccoli with melted Velveeta cheese, frozen vegetables or fruit cocktail. Then I remember meeting Lori and eating a roasted vegetable at her house for the first time, and thought, this is broccoli? I had never had salmon before. I remember she grilled it with these huge slices of lemon and orange and I thought it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.

How have you made sure you’re eating the right food to have enough energy and a positive mind?

Halfway through medical school, I was not happy. I was downward spiraling. I had gained 15 pounds and none of my pants fit. It was a moment of, oh my god what have I been doing? I started to realize, maybe I should think about what I eat. I tapped into this idea that I did not want to go on a diet, but I did want healthy choices, because choices are what makes life fun, right? So, I gave myself 5 choices for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Every day I would pick one of these 5 things for each meal. Yogurt, smoothies, fruit, things like that.

I realized that feeling good about my life, and making healthy choices, were integral to my happiness. I realized that by eating healthy, I can feel in control. Through food, you figure out how to love yourself and take care of yourself. 

I think most women have gained 15 pounds and not been happy about it. How do you think all of this relates to body image?

It’s been a journey. Lori [Caleb’s mom] knew I was struggling because a lot of it had to do with Caleb. He had moved to New York and I wasn’t emotionally ready to be a medical student and in a long-distance relationship. She became my running and weight loss partner. 

Weight loss became a game to me. I was feeling out of control and all of a sudden I had this weight loss game I could play- and I was really good at it.

Then one day, Lori said, “I think we should start talking about weight maintenance.” That was interesting. I was a rule follower and I was following my own rules. It was making me feel really good, and I was getting really skinny. Everything about it felt amazing to me. The next few years were about me trying to figure things out. I had to loosen my own rules. 

I still weigh myself every single morning. I can’t stop doing that. If I see a number on a scale that I don’t like, Caleb will ask me, “but how do you feel? how would you have felt if you hadn’t seen that number?”

I think it’s an ongoing journey, I don’t know if it goes away completely, this relationship with food, your weight and your body. I still have my days, where I get into a downward spiral.

Living in New York, it is so fun to go out for drinks and eat amazing food. Now that we live in Boston, we exercise a ton and cook healthy food. Now I look at myself and I see my muscles are more defined and I know that the scale is going to be different, and I have to be okay with that.

It goes back to self-care: how we feel, how we look, how much we weigh. If you let go too much it ends up hurting you in terms of how you feel, how much energy you have. It’s this crazy balance that we have to find every single day. How to stay feeling our best. 

As I’ve gone through my career, I’ve realized that there's so much more to me than what I look like. The city of Boston is not as focused on aesthetics. It’s so academic. People want to know what you are researching or working on. That has helped me shift to a different level of figuring out who I am. I’m not trying to figure out, who is Patty and how much does she weigh? Instead, I’m trying to figure out who is Patty, the doctor, the researcher, the teacher - and how I can provide the best care to my patients and their families. 

I really like what you say about finding other ways to feel good about yourself beyond your physical appearance. At this stage of our lives, we’re hopefully in a career that we love and excel in, and that becomes more of a cornerstone of our lives. 

It’s such a hard line to walk. As I get older, I still want to be pretty. I want to look good and wear fun clothes and feel like me.

Yet, when I think about who I admire, who is inspiring, it's never because they know about the best eye shadow. I’m tired of reading interviews of successful women where they get asked what their house looks like, or their closet. Those aren’t the questions I want to know about.

It’s something I think about a lot, my own journey with body image, food and weight, and evolving into who and where I am. I think about who I would want as the doctor for my baby. I wouldn't want someone who is so worried about how many carrot sticks she ate for lunch -laughs- I would want someone who is real and there for my family.

I feel like lately I’ve reached this happy place, going back to the first things that both my dad and Lori showed me - just enjoying food and enjoying the connection food gives you with people. That food isn’t only about weight loss. I want people to remember the food at our wedding and having so much fun - or remembering an amazing dinner we cooked and ate together - not how thin I was that day or what size dress I was able to fit into. 

I think on the outside, if you asked people who know me, they would say, “Patty is so healthy and active, she’s a doctor and has her life together.” They don't know that a lot of that actually came from body image problems. It actually comes from a place of struggle. 

I don't think people talk about this enough.

I remember learning about anorexia and bulimia in middle school and thinking, oh my god who could do that? I could never do that. Then when I went through medical school, I realized that I kind of strayed into that world. It’s a struggle that a lot of women go through that’s really hard and even if I think I’m in this great place now - it is always there. But I do think there is a beautiful balance of being in control of what you put into your body and loving it and having fun. Now that we’ve stopped eating meat, Caleb and I both feel really good about our bodies. We’re active and are striking the balance of being healthy, happy, and feeling fit - but still splurging and enjoying things! I don’t know if Caleb feels the same, actually - we don’t talk about his body very much -laughs-. 

Once you get to a really great place in life, you stop self-medicating by controlling your food or overindulging and you start to eat in a way that makes you happy and is really good for your health. 

The food journey is a real one, though. Food is huge. It’s family, love, stress, hate, it’s essential. It's all of these things at once. It’s a crazy journey through life, figuring out how you want to feed yourself and others. It’s really complicated. 

This interview has been edited and condensed.