"I'm definitely not gonna gain the Freshman 15" was a phrase I said a lot my senior year of high school and I believed it wholeheartedly.

At home, I seldom ate out, paid attention to what I ate and how much, and ate almost exclusively fruits and vegetables. So I decided I was different; I was the exception. But during Christmas break after my first semester of college, I discovered I could no longer zip up the jeans that had once been loose on me.

I cried. Hard.

I had gained exactly fifteen pounds since starting college.

I felt confused and embarrassed, but at the same time, I knew exactly how it had happened. Slowly, but surely, I had swapped my healthy habits for unhealthy ones.

When classes got hectic, I began switching out my home cooked meals for frozen dinners and takeout one by one until that's all I ate. I munched on candy and salty snacks when I felt lonely or homesick. I abandoned my workout routine entirely, convinced I had no time.

I felt sick from the way I'd been treating my body in the past few months but my self-esteem had lowered substantially since I'd gained the wait. I didn't want to feel this way anymore. After analyzing where I'd gone wrong, I decided to change it. This semester I was going to pull off a reverse Freshman 15 and lose all the weight I had gained.

I had lost weight before in the past, but it had never been a positive experience. It had always been about hating my body and trying desperately to change it. This is what I instantly turned to after gaining the fifteen pounds, and it would have been so easy to fall back into that, but I stopped myself short. I could make this a positive experience. So instead of making weight loss my only goal, I focused on health.

I wasn't going to eat salad because I hated myself, I was going to eat it because I loved salad. I wasn't going to force myself into workouts I hated, I was going to find something I really loved. Through this process of learning how to actually love healthy living instead of just doing it to "not be fat," I learned a lot.

I found exercises I loved, fostered a newfound love for cooking, and gained a healthier self-esteem. I wasn't losing weight because I hated my body anymore, I was losing weight because I loved it and because I wanted it to be the best it could be. I would have never learned these lessons if it weren't for gaining the Freshman 15.

Does the Freshman 15 suck? Definitely.

But if you're going through it now, fear not because it happens to everyone, health nuts like me included, and in the end, you might come out better than before.

Oh, and I did lose those 15 pounds, more actually. But more importantly, I gained a healthier lifestyle and perspective.