The motivation to change the course of one’s life can come from anything. Sometimes it can
be a life jarring incident or something really trivial. This can mean upending
your life completely. It can also mean the people around you misunderstanding
your decision. But the motivation and the desire to change is so great that
these things really don’t matter.
Karishma Parkar, an orthodontist for eight
years, lived a very conventional life. Married with a child, she was living the
life many women in India are living. However, she upended it all when she
decided to go ahead with her divorce. She decided to live life on her terms.
The decision was taken but it also took a heavy toll on her psychologically.
She slipped into depression and began to binge eat. She gained weight and was
ten kilos over her regular weight. She realised this was a path down a road
where there was only even more depression and frustration. She decided a change
was required. Karishma joined a gym. Her motivation then was to lose weight. This
was around the start of 2016. She was then introduced to weights by the
trainers, who were bodybuilders there.
Karishma says, “I liked it; along with my
fat loss, I was also developing good structure. Slowly this became my passion
and I wouldn’t miss even a day. I started doing research on female body
building and that is how I met my first coach on social media. Based in
Australia, I was trained by him, online. That’s how my journey began.”
Balancing being a mother, body builder and
orthodontist means her day is planned very well. Her mornings are devoted to
bodybuilding and then after 2 pm, she devotes her time to dentistry. She has
two clinics in Margao and is a consultant in seven other practices around Goa.
But life is not all hunky dory. Karishma says, “Some days, it is very
difficult. I am a single parent. I have to take care of my daughter, who is
six. During competitions, I train twice a day – morning and in the night, with
the day devoted to my daughter and dentistry.”
The help during competitions is welcome
because during that time she is low on carbs because bodybuilders stop
consumption of rice. She admits it is very difficult when she has to travel out
of Goa because there are no competitions for women in the state. There are
several competitions held in Mumbai for women. She now intends to compete
internationally next and Thailand could be the place she could be competing
next.
It is important to note that Karishma is doing something that
was usually done by men and the first amateur bodybuilding competition for
women was conducted as late as 1985, in Detroit, USA. In India too, it was
years later before the first competition for women was held.
And wearing a bikini, a garment frowned upon by conservatives,
was a bit of a hurdle for some. For Karishma, it was a garment one wore during
competition and even though it was not appreciated by some people, Karishma
decided to go ahead without fear. The reaction of her family and friends was
generally mixed. She says, “Initially, they were reluctant and my father felt
that since I was a professional, there was no need to do all this. I learned
that in life, everyone had their problems and sometimes they would find it
difficult to understand the things that others do. Here I am talking
specifically about people in society who like to generally talk about other
people. Quite a few of my friends are dentists and they were with me during my
divorce but when it comes to bodybuilding, I don’t expect them to understand
how and why I am doing what I am doing.” She feels that society in general has
a herd mentality and wants people to follow rules set down by it. She believes
that sometimes it is important to defy it. She received encouragement from
younger people in her life, like cousins and friends, though around 10 to 20
percent were critical of her wearing a bikini. Her daughter however has been
very encouraging and appreciative and would inform her friends in school
whenever her mother won a medal in any competition.
Speaking of the future, she hopes to compete on the biggest
stage of them all. She hopes to win a pro card and qualify for the Olympia, a
professional female bodybuilding competition. She intends to continue
exercising and bodybuilding well into her 60s and 70s and laughs and says “I
shall die when I die, in good shape and style.”
The
state and the country will hope she achieves her goals and becomes another
heroine to many young girls in the country.
