Going into my freshman year of college with a ripe load of body image issues and an extensive eating disorder history, my biggest fear outside of academic pressure was gaining the infamous “Freshman 15”. Already, I had issues with food and eating and calories, and now this? A supposedly real threat to the “control” my anorexia gave me? All summer I listened to parents and alumni talk about the well-known weight gain that plagues almost all first years as they learn to navigate eating on their own, and all I could think about was No. That will not be me. Never in a million years.
News flash! I did gain the Freshman 15. And guess what? I can confidently say that it was the best thing that could have happened to me. Here’s why.
IT HELPED ME SEE MYSELF DIFFERENTLY (LITERALLY)
Leading up to my departure to UC Berkeley, I had been recovering from anorexia nervosa for almost the entirety of high school. Coming to college, I convinced myself that how I looked then was how I had to leave it, and if I changed even the slightest bit, I would be a total and utter failure (if you can’t tell, I obviously hadn’t yet recovered). My self-worth was intrinsically tied to my appearance and, because of that, I had a shallow perception of myself and a low expectation for what I could achieve as a student, friend and individual.
Gaining the Freshman 15, however, helped me change that perspective.
As my body began to change, so too did my mindset. At first, I was uncomfortable with the weight gain. I felt exactly like how I thought I would feel — a failure. But as I began making friends, joining clubs I was passionate about and taking thought-provoking classes, I realized how little of my value came from my body. The size of my waist line didn’t change what my roommates thought about me! The number on the scale didn’t change the impact I could make on campus! The way my shirts hugged my arms didn’t diminish my work ethic!
In fact, all those silly numbers that I had come into college obsessing over had no say on the experience I was able to create during my first year. Without the Freshman 15, I might have always been stuck with the shallow perspective I came into college with.
IT HELPED ME SEE FOOD DIFFERENTLY
Growing up with an eating disorder trained me to see food for its nutritional value only. I didn’t care how good “bad” foods tasted or how bad “good” foods tasted. I saw everything as a series of calories and convinced myself that I had to avoid high calorie meals for health reasons.
Negative talk surrounding the Freshman 15 only fueled that mentality. Food was not fun. Food was not enjoyable.
But then I came to college and I made friends. I made friends who liked to go out and get midnight snacks. Friends who wanted ice cream at 2 am. Friends who wanted to plan extravagant dinners and brunches and meals not for the food, but for the memories. And the more I found myself participating in these fun outings, the more I began to eat purely for memories and less for its nutritional value. Nothing felt better than driving to In-N-Out in a gig car on random Thursday nights, or buying post-midterm burgers to eat while crying over questions we surely failed.
Food became far, far more than calories. Food became fun! My Freshman 15 is a tattoo of all those moments. Why then, I asked myself, am I being told to look at this weight gain as something bad? The Freshman 15 I carry with me now is just a testimony for the moments in my life where I challenged myself to truly believe that food is more than calories.
IT HELPED ME GAINED CONTROL
While I cannot speak for others, my experience with anorexia left me depressed, anxious and constantly trying to bring myself down. I felt like a stranger in my own body that was forced to listen to negative self-talk all the damn time. I was spiraling without knowing which way was down. Gaining the Freshman 15 — gaining any weight — was in direct violation of what my eating disorder wanted me to do.
But by gaining weight, by doing something that I had for so many years thought was wrong, I also gained back a sense of myself I had lost. I gained confidence and courage. I slapped my demon across the face and told it to never to come back.
The Freshman 15 helped me gain control over my thoughts and a love for myself. The moment I stopped obsessing over every inch of my body, I began to value other parts of myself that I had neglected for so long. My creativity, my passions, my interests… Gaining weight allowed me to gain happiness. It allowed me to feel more like myself than I ever had in years.
THE JOURNEY
Of course, my journey with the Freshman 15 won’t be the same as anyone else’s, and understanding my journey to this point is far easier to examine in retrospect. Along the way, I constantly felt like I wasn’t enough. I felt that by gaining the Freshman 15, I was losing a part of who I had carefully structured myself to be. After all, it had always been the Freshman 15 this, the Freshman 15 that. Thus, I came into college seeing the weight gain as a negative thing, and it took a great deal of reflection to change that perspective.
For the reasons I listed above (and many more!) I realize that the Freshman 15 was never a “bad” thing. In fact, facing it allowed me to truly realize that the only “bad” part of it is the way we discuss and perpetuate this negative atmosphere around weight gain on college campuses. I’ve emerged with important insights into the way we improve that discussion, and it all starts by looking at the Freshman 15 through a new lens.
WHY WE SHOULD LOOK AT THE Freshman 15 DIFFERENTLY
The National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA) estimates that up to 20% of college women and 10% of college men suffer from an eating disorder. That’s a lot.
The constant pressure to do well both academically and socially, combined with being away from home for the first time, can lead to destructive behaviors in an attempt to feel a false sense of control. I know from firsthand experience that by letting my eating disorder control my weight, I felt that I was doing something good. That even if I happened to do bad in classes or not make friends, at least I would be succeeding at something. That, at least if all else failed, I wouldn’t fall victim to the Freshman 15 curse that I had been warned of for so many years.
Now, could we imagine how different things might be if we told high school seniors it’s okay to go into college and see changes in their bodies? If we looked at the Freshman 15 as a neutral entity and not as something to avoid or analyze with disgust? Weight gain is not inherently bad — but looking at it from a negative perspective is. Especially given the prevalence of disordered eating on college campuses, we should aim to destigmatize weight gain, and promote self-love and acceptance no matter one’s size.
Creating a college culture that chooses to not associate negativity with the Freshman 15 might help remove part of the fuel eating disorders flames feed on. It would take courage from all of us, but together, step by step, conversation by conversation, we can slowly start to change the narrative around Freshman 15.