Person 20: Dad

Growing up my dad was mean. He wasn't just mean. He was cruel. He told me that I was fat and ugly. He tried to convince me on several occasions to have gastric bypass surgery. He didn't think that I was of any great value.

My mom left him and since then he's tried to make it up to me. I hated him until he backed off. I hated his weekly phone calls. It wasn't until they had stopped for sometime that I became okay with the situation. Now we talk on the phone about once a week, and most of the time it's me that calls. He learned that for me to recover he needed to back off and let me come to him.

My dad taught me about perseverance. If he hadn't persevered we wouldn't be on good terms now. He encourages me to go on in my education. He wants me to visit. He really cares about what's going on in my life, and to him and answer such as "the same as every other week" is not good enough, because he knows that somewhere inside of that is a story that happened to me.

He also taught me about repentance. My dad is not an active member of the church, but he repented of what happened in my youth by apologizing and trying to move forward. He taught me that people can change.

So although my dad made me extremely self conscious, although he told me at one time that no man would ever want me, he is currently the person who encourages me the most about going to medical school. And that is what matters.