What a difference diet can make
Hello there college of Health Science students, faculty, friends and family! My name is Makayla Crowley and I am a student worker here at CBU’s college of Health Science. Today I want to share with you a personal experience I had that has made one the biggest impacts to my body, my health and my wellbeing.
In my life I have always been a sweets person, as many people are. Anything sweet of any kind and I want it! Cakes, brownies, candies, pies, whatever you offer me, I will eat it! Now obviously I knew that eating too much sugar was not good for my body, but I didn’t care. I was an active person my whole life playing basketball and volleyball since I was young, so I figured they balanced each other out. As long as I stay active, I can eat whatever I want. Right? Well it wasn’t until I got a little older, around Jr. High and High School, that I began to see the negative effects all these sweets were having on my body internally and externally. Not only was I gaining a bit too much weight for my height and age, but I was losing energy way too quickly and I was falling out of shape. I began to try to work out more. First I tried running and that worked for about a summer to help keep me in better shape, but not the best shape I could be in. Then after running I tried crossfit and that really did help a lot! The people at my gym motivated me to not only keep coming to work out but to eat better as well. However I slowly began to fall out of the routine I had created for myself. More times than I should have I would turn away the fruits and veggies and go eat some candy or a brownie. And from then on I was always back and forth with my daily eating and exercising. Some weeks I would get on this health kick and do my best to work out and eat well, and then most weeks I just didn’t care.
Then I began at CBU. And that made things even harder. An ice cream or a cookie with my meal at Chick-fil-a!? The option to pick a brownie or a cookie at Brisco’s or El Monte? And the Caf… it was an endless buffet of all I could eat ice cream, cakes, puddings and waffles! Beginning of my freshman year I was having some sort of dessert at least once a day, maybe even twice. Yes, I was trying to go to the gym when I could but I knew going to the gym did not mean I could not eat whatever I wanted.
It wasn’t until about half way through the first semester of my freshman year that I decided to make one of the best decisions for my body that I could have ever made. My boyfriend, who attends CBU with me, decided to try out not having any sugar 6 days out of the week, other than natural sugars from things like fruit. When I saw him doing this it challenged me to try this as well. And let me tell you it was hard! Especially because I lived at CBU so most of my meals came from the food on campus and there are so many opportunities to grab ice cream or a cookie with your meal. But week by week it grew easier to not eat sugar. I began to not even miss it. So as I was working out and only eating things with processed sugars once a week, I began to see the biggest transformation in my body. Yes my exterior was changing but what changed internally was the biggest difference! I had so much energy! I didn’t get tired every day by 2:00pm and it became so much easier to wake up for class in the morning. It was actually possible for me to have classes during the day and then go to work afterwards without feeling like I might die of exhaustion. I enjoyed my days and didn’t feel like I was dragging my feet. I could focus a lot longer while in class or doing my homework. And then after a few months into this new “life style” whenever I would/do eat more than one dessert on my day off from no sweets I would feel sick. And now I prefer to not eat sweets over eating them because my body has grown so sensitive to eating too much sugar. Yes I still enjoy the occasional cookie or bag of candy every week but my body created a limit for myself. And when I push past it, it is not fun and I immediately regret it.
I know, for most people the thought of not eating any processed sugar for 6 out of 7 days sounds ridiculous or maybe even impossible for some. That’s what I had thought for myself too. But maybe start by not eating sugar once a week and build your way up. I can promise you that not only will cutting most sugars out of your diet (along with exercise) make a huge difference with how you look, but it will also give you so much energy for your day and make your body feel and actually be healthy. It is worth it. Hard… but worth it.
Makayla Crowley
Student Worker
College of Health Science