My Struggle with Weight and Body Image
Although I have always been considered small, my weight has always fluctuated beyond what is considered to be in the normal range of 1 to 2 pounds. The heaviest I have ever been is 123 pounds and I hit that as a freshman in college, unlike most individuals, I was my second heaviest as a freshman in high school. As a three sport athlete I ate whatever I wanted thinking that I could burn it off on the field and being bigger, muscle-wise was better. At the time food was more important that what I looked like and I felt stronger weighing on the higher end of the 110s than the lower end, and accepted the extra body fat that came with my diet and muscle. At some point as a sophomore I started to care more …show more content…
I ate whatever I wanted to the point of stomach explosion and tried to compensate for it at the gym. Between meal plan, stress, lack of self-control and unhealthy eating habits I hit my heaviest weight at the end of the semester despite running track and working out twice a day. Looking back, that was probably the least healthy I had been in my life despite my efforts. Following that semester I returned home for the spring. I was able to get my stress, eating and exercising habits in check and returned to a healthier state both physically and mentally. I took the time to think about where I wanted to be physically, as well as what had worked and what hadn’t worked for me during the fall. I knew I wanted to be like the strong and muscular girls that could lift their body weight. I had grown to love lifting during track, even more so than running and based of what information out there on strength training, I decided to start incorporating weight training into my workouts. I was able to stay on track for the whole semester and by the time summer rolled around I felt much better about how I looked and felt compared to the previous …show more content…
At home I had no gym, access to a full kitchen, and a schedule that made for unpredictable meal times. I felt amazing at the end of the school year and wanted to keep up with lifting. My local Y had a summer membership for college students and a reciprocity program that allowed me to use any of the three YMCAs in my area which was great because I had one close to home and one close to work. I made a workout program that focused just on lifting, with my job being my “cardio” or going for a run on my days off. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to lift 5-6 days a week like I did during school but I did make it a goal to do something physically active every day, whether that was work, lifting, running or some other activity. I also tried really hard to not go back to the same old diet at home that always got the best of me. I stuck with everything and managed to loose 10 pounds in just under five
Although I have always been considered small, my weight has always fluctuated beyond what is considered to be in the normal range of 1 to 2 pounds. The heaviest I have ever been is 123 pounds and I hit that as a freshman in college, unlike most individuals, I was my second heaviest as a freshman in high school. As a three sport athlete I ate whatever I wanted thinking that I could burn it off on the field and being bigger, muscle-wise was better. At the time food was more important that what I looked like and I felt stronger weighing on the higher end of the 110s than the lower end, and accepted the extra body fat that came with my diet and muscle. At some point as a sophomore I started to care more …show more content…
I ate whatever I wanted to the point of stomach explosion and tried to compensate for it at the gym. Between meal plan, stress, lack of self-control and unhealthy eating habits I hit my heaviest weight at the end of the semester despite running track and working out twice a day. Looking back, that was probably the least healthy I had been in my life despite my efforts. Following that semester I returned home for the spring. I was able to get my stress, eating and exercising habits in check and returned to a healthier state both physically and mentally. I took the time to think about where I wanted to be physically, as well as what had worked and what hadn’t worked for me during the fall. I knew I wanted to be like the strong and muscular girls that could lift their body weight. I had grown to love lifting during track, even more so than running and based of what information out there on strength training, I decided to start incorporating weight training into my workouts. I was able to stay on track for the whole semester and by the time summer rolled around I felt much better about how I looked and felt compared to the previous …show more content…
At home I had no gym, access to a full kitchen, and a schedule that made for unpredictable meal times. I felt amazing at the end of the school year and wanted to keep up with lifting. My local Y had a summer membership for college students and a reciprocity program that allowed me to use any of the three YMCAs in my area which was great because I had one close to home and one close to work. I made a workout program that focused just on lifting, with my job being my “cardio” or going for a run on my days off. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to lift 5-6 days a week like I did during school but I did make it a goal to do something physically active every day, whether that was work, lifting, running or some other activity. I also tried really hard to not go back to the same old diet at home that always got the best of me. I stuck with everything and managed to loose 10 pounds in just under five