NICOLE CHIN | layout & design editor
When media are the enemy, learning to live healthily is sometimes learning to love.
Growing up in Los Angeles, amid Hollywood heroines and beach bombshells, was hard. Spending this past summer in New York, surrounded by majestic models on 5th Avenue, was even harder.
Slender legs, thin torsos, brazen cheekbones, sultry lips—portraits of beauty, paintings of “perfection.”
I knew I needed to come home when the supermodels, in their skin tight tank tops, covered the city and I caught myself staring at random windows and bathroom mirrors checking to see if I was thin enough.
For months I had been diet-free—eating well-balanced breakfasts, lunches and dinners, including six servings of fruits and vegetables and drinking plenty of milk. I was working out daily, walking around the skyscraper paradise, and sweating so much in the heat I felt the pounds dripping off.
But in August I went on a cruise and, two days into it, I immediately felt like my waist size had increased two inches. I felt shameful and worse—I felt fat.
It got even harder when I returned to New York and watched a friend sip on a 12-ounce cup of soup and say she was full. She had just recently come out of a long battle with anorexia nervosa. It had ended abruptly, she said, once she had showed her best friend a protruding hip bone and saw the look of shock on her dear friend’s face.
By then, I was going crazy inside. I cut out all unhealthy drinks—soda, coffee and alcohol—and went back to the gym. I felt the pounds slip off again, but I still felt bad about myself.
I continued to struggle once school started. College campuses pressure women to be thin, to lose weight and look better than the year before, especially because peers recognize the change and often glorify it. College women are consumed with worry over who looks good and who is more desirable than everyone else. I found myself falling into this trap, trying to look my best so I could hear the compliments and feel better about myself again.
So I forced myself to eat sandwiches and fruits and vegetables, but I remember the sinking feeling every time I took a bite and felt the tightening of my intestines—and the fear.
What if my jeans don’t fit after this?
This happens every once in a while. I feel the loss of control and the stress and the anxiety from it. I realize I can’t control things—I can’t be perfect—and then sometimes I feel like I can still try.
The mirror becomes my enemy. The TV my nemesis. The magazine cover my rival.
There is nowhere to turn because admitting this fear is impossible. It’s inexplicable. No one can ever really understand. I start to think, maybe, if I just stopped eating I’d feel better. I’d be thin and I’d be happy. I’ll feel better about myself because I can look in the mirror and not feel fat. Or I’ll feel better because things are the way I want them to be.
But that is not how it works. The body is designed this way for a reason. If someone were to cut out food, the misery just grows, the fear escalates, and the anxiety deepens.
I find I am happiest when I’m healthy and when I’m taking active steps to take care of my body. It’s more than loving yourself. It’s truly taking care of your body—watching what goes in and how it comes out.
It seems simple, but it is so easy to grow complacent and even easier to disregard.
I used to love the feeling of being hungry. But now I know better.
The college culture wants you to pack your schedule with so much it’s impossible to breathe. Believe me, I’m guilty. We stack things so high we “forget” to eat or we “lose” our appetite because we’re too stressed about life or anxious about the challenges it brings.
Most days, I try to eat healthy. My refrigerator is packed with Trader Joe’s produce, pita bread and whole wheat tortillas. And while I still indulge in Diet Coke, I stay away from fast food, fried foods and things dunked in grease. There’s no way to describe it except that I just feel so alive when I’m eating right.
I sleep enough to feel good, usually seven to eight hours.
I work out daily. Someone once told me, after being an athlete for so long, my body was so used to releasing emotions and endorphins through activities and now that I suddenly wasn’t exercising, there was no way to release them. And once I started exercising again, I found that to be true.
Mental steps need to be taken as well. Now that I’ve learned what my struggles are, I realize how I can actively change my thought process. I change my thoughts from, “If I eat this I’ll get fat” to “If I eat this, I will continue to experience life in a good, healthy way.”
Our body is like anything else—a child, a pet, a car. It responds to the way we treat it. If we run out of gas, our car dies. If we run out of nutrients, our body shuts down. If we’re not doing routine maintenance checks or changing a car’s oil, parts start to malfunction. If we don’t exercise or condition our body, organs weaken and break down.
It seems so obvious, but unfortunately, we’ve been conditioned by this culture to believe having an eating disorder is permissible.
But it kills.
I think about how I treat my best friend—the most amazing person I know. I’d never intentionally do anything to hurt her and I would do anything to make her happy. I never want to see her sad.
We should treat our bodies the same way we treat our best friend.
As a precious being we adore. 
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