It's usually talked about in a cautionary tone. We’re taught to avoid it like it’s some kind of plague. It sneaks into many conversations, especially those involving food. Before I left for college, I couldn’t tell you the number of people who told me to “watch out” for it or to “make sure it doesn’t happen to you.” Well, it f***ing did. The "Freshman 15" did happen to me, and I couldn’t be happier. It didn’t happen because of beer or midnight snacks, either. It happened because health finally became one of my main priorities. Rather than become more concerned with the exact amount of food and exercise in my daily routine, I did the opposite. I tried this cool new thing where I just listen to myself. Some days I feel like working out, so I do. Other days, I’m just not feeling it, so I’ll watch a movie instead. It's similar when food is involved, too. I see no reason not to grab the extra cookie if I want it. I finally confirmed something that I had heard several times but never paid much attention to. If you become intuitive to yourself, your body will find a set point. It can fluctuate a little bit, but it figures itself out eventually without you having to do a thing. Exercise, food and weight gain don’t fit together in a perfect equation and one extra snack won’t make a difference. Those are several things that you shouldn’t have to worry about. Your body does the work for you. That's pretty awesome if you ask me.

I think the "Freshman 15" is a dramatized concept. It's this universal idea that dramatic weight gain will attack as soon as you move into college. When I say that the "Freshman 15" happened to me, I don't mean it in the sense that I gained weight overnight from ordering pizza at 3 a.m. In fact, it has very little to do with the amount of weight that I actually gained. For me personally, it was something that came naturally once I let it, and was something that needed to happen for me to get healthy. The idea of the "Freshman 15" given such a negative connotation, and I think we should give it way less power than it has. I'm not here to promote it in any sort of way, or to encourage you to dramatically change your lifestyle, unless, of course, what you're doing is not good for you physically or mentally. I'm here to suggest that we push concerns of "The Freshman 15" aside in order to find what's really important throughout our four, short years of college. If there's one thing that you take away from my article, I hope it's the same thing that I learned this year; there are so many other things to be concerned about than how your body can change, and this one isn't worth your time. It's not. I promise. Just let things happen. Sometimes, the less attention you pay to something that's stuck in your mind, the easier it is to get rid of it for good. I learned that from beating my eating disorder and I'm continuing to learn it now.

So hey "Freshman 15," the real freshman 15, the one that happened to me-- thanks for the back muscles. I can finally do pull-ups now. Thanks for getting me to a healthy weight, even though I don’t worry about the number anymore. Thanks for the fun workouts, everything I can enjoy again, and for much more than weight that I gained from you. Let's kick ass.