What can I do (I'm 25) to get him to take this thing seriously. I struggled with this with both my parents (one a smoker, one obese). I talked to both until it

What can I do (I'm 25) to get him to take this thing seriously. I struggled with this with both my parents (one a smoker, one obese). I talked to both until it became a strain on our relationship (both were younger than yours is now though - they were maybe 48ish when I was 25). In the end, my mom just flat out told me that she knew it would kill her but that her parents died young and that's just okay with her. How do you respond to that? This is an intelligent woman - a professional DBA for 10+ years and an IT manager for another 15) - yet she is superstitious without cause ("My parents died early so that must mean I will too no matter what I do"). In the end I opted to just live and let live - no more preaching, no more "Are you kidding? You can't eat that! You're already 280 pounds!". I don't know what else I could do - I can't make them do the right thing and they know the "right thing" but willfully ignore it. It's frustrating, sure, but I enjoy the time I have with them. I ultimately chalked it up to "personal weakness" - my dad would sabotage his diets and avoid actual health knowledge in favor of fad diets, and my mom just didn't want to work that hard to quit smoking. Bottom line: he made the life choices of the past 20+ years with full knowledge of what might/will happen.