My roommate and I always tried to convince one another that if one of us did something that the other would follow along.
We had this mindset all the time.
A couple of times we succeeded, at least for a little bit, like when we decided to start going to comedy caravan or when we would go see movies shown by the late night film series.
We did everything together and we relied on one another to stop procrastinating, to get out of the room, to do most things.
While we were successful sometimes, others we were not.
One time last year we decided we did not want to feel so bad all of the time. We actually wanted to work to live a better lifestyle.
We went to Commons (the old one in the south campus complex area) for dinner and we got salads and for dessert we got fruit, it was going great. It is not the healthy food that draws me away from eating healthy; it is the unhealthy food that draws me to eat it instead.
The next day we decide to take it a step further, not just a healthier diet, we wanted the full effect. We decided to do a cleanse (you know, cut out all sugar, fat, etc.), but only for a week.
It was going great. We ate healthy for breakfast and for lunch.
Of course, we thought about the food that we could be eating, but we worked to make sure that neither one of us broke when faced with delicious fried foods.
At one point in the day my roommate and I were sitting in our adviser’s office and someone asked if anyone wanted a fry.
Unconsciously, I said yes. Of course I wanted one, I was hungry and lettuce was not going to fix that.
When I went to grab for one (reaching across my roommate), my roommate grabbed my arm and held it. She reminded me about our cleanse and I said that one fry could not hurt.
She refused to let me break that easily, even if it was just one fry. After a few more attempts and a lot of complaints I finally gave in and decided not to eat the fry.
Not long after, we left the face of confrontation and went back to our dorm.
I am not saying that the cleanse was terrible, but it was very difficult and hard to deal with. Eating healthy is neither fun nor fulfilling.
About six hours in we were sitting in our room when we decided that eating healthy and doing a cleanse were just not going to work for us.
It took us a quarter of a day and two healthy meals to realize that we could not do it.
After we cut the cleanse out of our diet we decided to go get some real food.
We tried our best to hold each other up and stray away from temptation, but it is hard when unhealthy food is so delicious.
Today, we still try to help one another make good decisions, but we know our limitations.