I was always skinny. I was the skinny girl in a skinny family of stick people. Skinny dad. Skinny mom. Skinny sister. So when, in summer of 2006 (the summer before my senior year of college), my body went haywire and I gained 30 pounds in a three month period, I knew something was wrong. At that time, I worked at UNCA’s gym, and I looked like a giant blue blob in my standard-issue uniform. The thing is, since I was so skinny before (probably weighing an average 110-120 pounds since highschool), most people didn’t see me the way I saw me. Most didn’t even realize I’d gained so much weight.

After going to several doctors, I was diagnosed with a life-long medical condition that had triggered the weight gain. Over the next year (and a move to Flagstaff, AZ), I moved from doctor to doctor, realizing that this particular medical condition was correlated with a lot of other bad stuff other than the weight gain. High Cholesterol (Yes, I had high cholesterol at 21). Pre-Diabetes. A B-12 deficiency.

In Flagstaff, I thought I paid attention to my diet. I walked 30 minutes a day (going to and from campus), plus my regular exercising. I’d drink a Slim-Fast for breakfast. We bought our organic food from New Frontiers. But I wasn’t really thinking about quality or quantity. We still walked over to Chili’s two or three times a week for football, beer, and a feast. I got a M.A degree. I didn’t care much about the rest. I gained about ten more pounds in my time in Flagstaff.

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