Early on, she remembers, her parents  Peping and Tingting Cojuangco  taught her what discipline was all about: Things don’t come easy unless she works for them.
"I learned from my parents that the only way you’ll get to appreciate things is when you work hard for them. If everything is given to you, there’s a tendency for you to take things for granted," she says.
Liaa says she, being the eldest, had to be a good girl so her sisters would know what was expected of them. She adds that she and her sisters Pin Guingona, Mikee Jaworski, Maimai Zini and China experienced a "very normal childhood," devoid of "privileges." Take for instance the case when they wanted to have another doll in addition to their one big and one small dolls each, their parents would caution them: "You don’t need a third one."
Lavishness  considering that at any given time they can afford it  does not reside at the Cojuangco’s abode. Liaa’s simplicity can attest to that. She goes to her clinic in her colorful shirt ("so my patients, especially the babies, can see me") and hardly dolled up. After putting on sunblock, concealer, blush-on, lipstick and off she goes to see her patients at the Medical Plaza Building in Makati City at 8:30 a.m. When her clinic ends at 1:30 p.m., she’ll attend to other things. If her schedule permits it, Liaa, a former 10-pin bowling aficionado, will see herself smashing at the badminton court in Polo Club. Then she sees to it that she guides her son Alec, 13 and daughter Martina, seven with their studies before they call it a night.
Life for her is that simple because, to begin with, she is indeed an uncomplicated person. Yet it is in her simplicity that she unconsciously awakens her effortless elegance. Class and propriety are not imperatives of her life but they come like second skin to her. Au naturelle.
Liaa is quick to point out that the discipline she learned from her mother and father is the same discipline she used when she took up Medicine at the University of Sto. Tomas in 1985 after her pre-med course of Physical Therapy from the same school. It is the same badge of honor she wore when she donned her doctor’s jacket while taking her internship and residency from 1989 to 1990 at the Makati Medical Center where she remains a consultant. When she started doing her own clinic in 1995, Liaa’s ideals guided her in having good clinical eye to discern problems of her little patients.
"When we were growing up, there was so much love for everybody," she recalls. To this day, she says, love overflows in their house. And it is the same love that she and her husband, Noel Bautista, an investment banker, pass on to their children.
"My husband is a very good father; he’s also very supportive of my career," she says with pride. They have been sharing a blissful wedded life for the last 18 years.
With their own children, Liaa and Noel use the same formula of love and discipline to prepare the groundwork for them. The formula is not only about teaching their kids to have good study habits and to have good grades. It’s also about teaching their children how to be respectful of people around them, how to feel for others.
"My family is my biggest accomplishment," she ends.