Freshman 15? Try a fourth-year fat suit

Before I started university, I heard about the infamous Freshman 15 constantly. If you haven’t heard this term before, Freshman 15 refers to weight gain of any amount experienced by first-year post-secondary students thanks to the student lifestyle, which mostly involves fast food and take-out, copious amounts of alcohol, and a lot of sleeping, sitting in class and Facebooking.

First, second and even third year passed without any noticeable weight gain, for most of us. We were just too busy to experience it and, especially for those of us in Toronto, we walked everywhere we had to go.

But as we finished up fourth year, we noticed a lot of us gained some weight – whether it was recently or over the four years is impossible to know – and for me personally, it’s feels like I’m wearing a fat suit some days.

I’ve never been thin, but I can feel the weight I’ve put on recently more than at any other time in my life. And it’s not hard to see why:

I just spent months on computers writing, editing, designing. While I was an editor at The Ryersonian and a reporter at the National Post, I ate at least one meal each day from a food court, cafeteria or the ready-made section in a grocery store. There was no minimum-wage part-time job keeping me on my toes. I worked really long days, squeezing in the fastest, most convenient food when there was time.

I don’t even want to think about how many calories, grams of fat, preservatives, etc. I’ve eaten since January.

A few of my peers, like me, finished up university not being able to fit into their clothes. The future is a depressing enough prospect when we’re not only thrown from cushy university life into the real world, but we have to worry about your career, relationships and all the money we spent at university (which we now have to pay back).

Add to that a veritable fat suit, but under our skin, and it’s hard to feel good about life despite all we’ve accomplished.

However, lucky for me, I have a job. I earned my first real, substantial pay cheque on Friday, so on Tuesday I’m going to join Curves. It’s the only gym within walking distance of my dad’s house and, honestly, I hate traditional gyms.

I’m not going to be calorie-counting or obsessively weighing myself, so I hope eating more responsibly and exercising a little every day will give me some more energy and, you know, a bit of weight loss would be a plus too.