Reshaping It All (4 page)

Start strength training by making wise choices that exercise your resistance muscle.

Ways to strengthen your resistance may include:

• Passing on the junk food aisle in the grocery store.

• Making a healthy choice when eating out.

• Passing on the goodies at group meetings.

• Taking one trip to a buffet instead of two or more.

• Eating until you're satisfied rather than stuffed.

• Limiting treats to once or twice a week rather than daily.

Set aside some quiet time to write a letter to yourself. Let God in on this too. It may take one letter; it may take a few. Prayerfully consider the changes you'd like to see in your life and the reasons you'd like to see change. This letter is for your eyes only, so feel free to hide it or tear it up later. The important exercise here is that you decide what is good and why it's important to you before you continue this journey.

Food for Thought

The following list is a recap of the Scriptures we covered in this chapter. You may find it helpful to post them around the house on little notes where you'll see them often. The Bible is great encouragement for every step of the way:

• For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer. (1 Tim. 4:4–5 NIV)

• No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. (Heb. 12:11 NIV)

• So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. (Gal. 5:16 NIV)

The Candy Dish

Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit. —Aristotle

From My Stove to Yours

Easy Chicken Noodle Soup

Ingredients

8 small carrots chopped

4 cups chicken broth

2 cups water

1 clove garlic, pierced with a toothpick

12 ounces boneless, skinless chicken breast

⅓ cup, packed parsley

2 cups dry egg noodles (fine)

2 teaspoons lemon juice

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions

Combine carrots, chicken broth, water, and garlic in a large pot. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium, and simmer until the carrots are tender, about five minutes.

While that is cooking, cut the chicken. I cut it into half-inch chunks. Rinse them, pat dry with a paper towel, and mince the parsley.

Add the chicken and egg noodles to the broth; cover and cook until the chicken is cooked through (about 5 minutes).

Stir in the lemon juice and parsley. Fish out garlic clove and season to taste with salt and pepper.

THREE

Grab Wings and Soar

Reshaping it all has been a lifelong journey, which started the moment I took my first breath. Born on April 6, 1976, in Panorama City, California, to Robert and Barbara Cameron, I entered the world as Candace Helaine Cameron. I was the youngest sister to three siblings, my brother Kirk and two sisters, Bridgette and Melissa. Dad was a public middle-school teacher, while Mom's job was a stay-at-home role that ensured our faces were clean, our tummies were full, and clean underwear was ready when we were.

Being the youngest of four, I enjoyed special times with my mom. After the other kids left for school, we'd pick up some apple fritters and take on the day. I was her traveling companion, and together we had a lot of traveling to do: dropping clothes at the cleaners, picking up groceries, putting gas in the car, and finally picking up my brother and sisters from school again.

When Mom wasn't in the car, she was at the house, doing her best to make it a home. She made the most incredible spaghetti known to mankind, using a blend of tomato sauces, as well as both stewed and diced tomatoes. It was meaty and rich with ground beef and Italian sausage, served with garlic French bread on the side. Stepping through the front door on spaghetti night is one smell I will never forget.

With Mom around we never went hungry. Dinner was always on the table, which was often fish and rice or chicken with mashed potatoes, and veggies on the side. Peas, corn, and carrots were regular visitors to my plate.

It was also our thing to have turkey tacos four or five days a week. We loved them, and since they were easy to make, Mom made them a lot. It became a staple in our house that we all learned to make; in fact they're so simple that I often make them for my kids too. She could have used ground beef but Mom knew turkey was a leaner choice that tasted similar to beef, and was better for us. It does have a lighter taste, but once seasoned there is not a big difference. We loved them then and still do.

I loved watching Mom in the kitchen. Her long blonde ponytail would sway as she moved, and her smile told me she loved being there. I loved being there too, knowing I was Mom's helper when the kids were at school. Being a helper meant I got to taste everything too, which is probably the reason I hung out so much in the kitchen at all.

When I think of my dad, I fondly remember white T-shirts, along with his worn-out jeans that were stained with grease spots and paint blops. Those stains served to remind us that Dad could and would fix everything. He was the ultimate handyman, who put his skills to use on the house. They always lived in the same place, but over the years the house has gone through several major remodeling jobs, including the time our garage was transformed into a family room. Dad would hire out for some jobs, but any job he could do himself, he would. He drove a light-blue Volkswagen Beetle to work every day, and left the Volkswagen van for Mom and us kids. Because of his rugged, handsome looks and wavy brown hair, he was often compared to Michael Landon.

Dad came from a background of healthy eating, while Mom was the opposite. She was brought up in a home that when they ate cold cereal in the morning, they needed to add two tablespoons of sugar to sweeten it up. At times it felt like a battleground when deciding on the type of food and what we could eat. Mom wasn't deliberately unhealthy; she just wasn't as health conscious as Dad, who often tried to implement healthy alternatives.

Our eating habits changed from year to year. For several years we were on the Pritikin Diet, which is based on a book by Nathan Pritikin. The diet is based on vegetables, grains, and fruit. It wasn't strictly vegetarian, but it did have a low percentage of fat. Basically it tasted like cardboard. Dad taught us healthier ways to eat, but they weren't great-tasting options. At the same time Mom would buy chips for our lunch boxes, take us out for fast food, and keep a healthy supply of ice cream in our freezer. Her options weren't so healthy but tasted incredibly good. She tried her best to respect Dad's efforts, but because she loved the naughty but nice food, she'd sneak it into the house.

I started to view food in either one of two ways—it was either delicious but forbidden, or it was acceptable and tasteless. The bottom line is that I was left confused. I really believe that this confusion set the stage for the bad eating habits I had throughout my teen years and into early adulthood. Without clear direction and understanding we're bound to face failure.

A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. (James 1:8 KJV)

Dad wouldn't allow soda, so drinking water was something he encouraged a lot. Depending on the year my mom would have Diet Pepsi in the fridge, but that was the forbidden fruit we dare not touch. Thankfully I acquired a taste for water; in fact I love it, and it's still the first drink I reach for today.

When I was five, things started to get busy for Mom. She was running Kirk, Melissa, and me to auditions in LA. Dad's schedule worked out perfectly. He was home by 3:30, so if Mom was busy driving one kid, he could watch the other three and help out with homework.

I knew the routine. I would come out of the school, and if Mom was parked at the start of the pickup line, then I knew that I had an audition. If that was the case, we'd leave right away and head over the hill to the west side. She would have my clothes clean, pressed, and ready to go so I could change in the car. I didn't wear fancy dresses of any kind, but I did have a few outfits that were my audition clothes. I had three pairs of OshKosh overalls, one purple, one turquoise blue, and the other denim, which I rolled up twice for a cuff. A white T-shirt and pink Converse high tops finished the look. Mom thought that bright colors helped me look cute and hip. I suppose that I did look hip back then, but times have definitely changed. She also packed a butane curling iron so she could throw a few curls in my hair and put it in pigtails or a side ponytail. Unlike pageants, which I've never been in, makeup was a definite no no for auditions. I had to look cute, fresh, and natural.

Most days I was excited, but as the years progressed, or if the day was tiring, I'd be bummed out knowing that we had a long drive ahead. That's where McDonalds came in. It was well worth the drive if I knew a quarter-pounder, fries, and a drink were in it for me. Even when I was just six or seven, a Happy Meal didn't suffice. That little burger was far too small.

I don't know how she ever found the time to teach me how to ride a bike, but she did. I remember climbing up on top of it while she held the back steady. There was an incline on our street that looked like a mountain at the time, but when I look at it now, I see it's barely a hill. After holding on to the back for two or three days, she knew I was ready to take off on my own.

"Don't let go!" I said. But when we got to the top of the hill, she did. I didn't know it at first, but when I found out that I was riding alone, I was thrilled! It was smooth sailing from that moment on; I finally had wings to soar.

Laser tag, hide-and-seek, and bike riding kept us busy on the street. I didn't play any team sports, but we were always active nonetheless.

I was a regular-sized kid until about the age of nine. I wasn't big, and I wasn't small. When I hit nine years old, the chipmunk cheeks set in. It was probably a combination of exercising less, being that I was in school full-time, and eating more junk since I was exposed to more food. I played jump rope at recess but didn't get involved in vigorous games like kick ball or tag, and when lunch came around, it was a tempting new world. We had healthy lunches packed for us, but unfortunately those lunches were dull. While I ate cardboard, my friends feasted on Ding Dongs, Ho Hos, and cake. So like Michael Douglas in
Wall Street,
I became a master trader who managed to get my hands on their stock.

I also started taking trips to the corner store with my friends. Soon enough, Pixie Stix, Fun Dip, and Big League Chewing gum were in a serious relationship with my tongue. I preferred sugar to salt and still do to this day.

I don't think my parents realized just how much access I had to junk. They were doing their best to keep our diet focused on health while I was finding ways to sneak in a snack.

Our family wasn't the only ones with a health-conscious attitude. Our friends Ryan and Andrew lived much the same way, and since our parents were best friends, we were together all the time. In the winter we spent almost every weekend with them, and in the summer it was almost every day. Health wasn't the only thing we had in common: my dad did gymnastics in high school and college, and their dad did too. He was an acrobat in the circus; their mom was too. In fact, after being a trapeze artist, she went on to be Tinkerbelle at Disneyland. Hooked up to a harness and cable, five foot tall Patty would descend from the Matterhorn, flying across the park with her wand.

By the time I was ten, my all-too-famous chubby little cheeks had set in. I wasn't large, but I definitely wasn't thin either, and it was starting to show. That summer my sisters and I hit the park a little more often with Ryan and Andrew, which gave me some exercise. I was also away from the Ding Dongs at school. When I came back for the second season of
Full House,
I had lost five of those pounds, got a curly new perm, and had grown a bit taller. I was aware of my body, but at eleven-years-old I wasn't obsessing.

I remember Gina the costume designer saying, "Wow you grew; you look great!" In a sensitive way she encouraged me.

I felt confident and pretty that year. I got that spiral perm at a salon in the valley where my brother and dad got their hair done as well. Mom had a few perms of her own, which was probably what spurred us on to get mine done too. My hair was almost to my waist by then, and so with the weight of my hair, they were able to give me a tight curl. It was the 1980s—Linda Ronstadt, Whitney Houston, and Madonna had big hair—I wanted it too!

Before the perm Mom spent a lot of time curling my hair before bed. She liked to see my hair curled for auditions and special occasions. We used soft pink spongy rollers, which would hold the curl the entire next day. They were uncomfortable, but I got used to sleeping in them after a while. If we ever lost those rollers (and in a house with six people, we seemed to lose everything), she would use socks that doubled as rag curlers. Wrapping my hair around the sock, she tied each into a bow. They now sell long spongy tubes that do the job, but we didn't have those back then, so I went to bed with a head full of socks.

Our careers were a lot of work on Mom's part, but she did it because she saw both the fun and the potential we had. She didn't intend for any of us to be actors; in fact her friend talked her into letting us take the plunge into acting. But once we started acting and doing it so well, we were excited and knew it was something we wanted to pursue.

Our parents were upfront about giving us the option to leave. At age seven, after just one commercial, Melissa took that option. I think the process scared her to death. Life has a way of doing that to us. It can seem so alluring at times as we embark on new projects, but once we're involved in the process, we discover that reaching the finish line might take some tears and some sweat.