As you begin freshman year, everyone warns you about gaining the Freshman 15. We all tell ourselves that we are going to eat healthy and exercise excessively. However, as life gets in the way, it is inevitable to fall victim to this dreadful epidemic. As I start to look back on freshman year, I realize that gaining the Freshman 15 is part of the typical college experience and actually very acceptable for the following reasons.
1. We all aren’t all-star athletes anymore.
In high school, many of us played competitive sports five to six times a week. We practiced daily and never had to worry about fitting in the time to exercise. In college, most of us don’t continue to play our competitive sports and don’t have the time to work out. We are consumed with work, exams and trying to find an hour to relax. Thus, exercise gets pushed aside.
2. We are getting less sleep.
It has been proven that the less you sleep, the more you eat. On the weekdays we are running around, trying to get all of our work done before the weekend begins. On the weekends, we are up late partying, hanging out with our friends, and participating in all college has to offer. Our change in sleep schedule makes it hard to eat the right way. Because we are not getting eight hours of sleep, it becomes harder to lose the weight we put on.
3. Late Night Food=Memories.
It’s 2 am and all your friends decide to order Mac N Cheese pizza from Ians. Everyone is huddled in a tiny dorm room around the pizza box, fighting to get a slice and savoring every piece of cheese that slides into our mouths. Late-night eating in college creates memories. If we choose to avoid these adventures because we don’t want the extra pounds, we end up missing out on some of the funniest moments of our freshman year.
4. College is stressful.
We all have so much going on that it is hard to learn how to cook dinner or find the time to eat. Stress leads to poor eating choices. The more exams and work we have to accomplish, the more stressed we become, the more slices of pizza and boxes of cookies we devour. It is all about the stress-eating.
5. We are growing up.
Most freshman have never lived away from home before. Our parents were always aware of what we were eating. They made us breakfast and dinner and packed our lunches on the weekdays. Once we got to college, we did not have our parents making sure everything we put in our mouths was low in sugar or fat. As we grow up, we have to make our own choices and deciding what to eat for dinner is just the beginning of them.
Trust me, I am not advocating that college students should eat junk food and never leave their beds, but we need to realize that gaining the freshman 15 is apart of growing up and making our own decisions. It is not the end of the world and could lead to a valuable lesson—learning how to make better choices in order to lose that freshman 15!