At the beginning of 2009, I was a multi-sport athlete. I was playing a few team sports at the same time that I was receiving my black belt in Taekwondo, and this meant that whenever I wasn't at school I was either training or on the field. Looking back on this, I can genuinely say that the best part of being an athlete is being able to eat anything you want. Nutrition was the furthest thing from my mind because I knew that any food I put into my body would immediately be broken down by the combination of my high activity level and my prepubescent metabolism.
However, it was that same year when I discovered that I had torn the meniscus in both of my knees. Following a series of three surgeries to remove this torn tissue and a long recovery process (both psychological and physical), I was told I would never be able to play any impact sports again for the safety of my knees. It was the most sudden goodbye to everything I had loved doing, and it was definitely difficult to process.
One of the biggest mistakes I made following those surgeries was not adjusting my diet. I was still eating like a maniac as I had when I was nearly five times as active prior to the surgeries, and this took its toll. I quickly gained weight, lost confidence, and saw no hope in adjusting my lifestyle. I tried to become active again by trying out other sports that didn't involve impact (ie. golf, swimming, etc.), but I was either terrible at them or found now joy in doing them. It seemed like I had hit a complete dead end as I continued to watch the number on the scale rise each week.
One day in my sophomore year of high school, I came home from school and looked in the mirror and decided that enough was enough. I knew that not only did my diet cause me to lose confidence, but my body wasn't receiving the fuel that it needed. As I did my own research into ways that I could revamp my nutrition, I truly began to realize that some of the foods that I considered healthy weren't healthy at all. I learned how to close-read nutrition labels, identify how artificial products were, control and space out my portions, and many other strategies that would ultimately allow me to become the healthy version of myself that I dreamed of.
The biggest blessing in disguise that came my way was my discovery of my sensitivity to MSG, or Monosodium Glutamate. For those who don't know what MSG is, its essentially a preservative that can be found in a lot of processed foods (potato chips, things with flavored powders) and sauces (mostly Asian sauces). This condition kept me from falling back into my bad eating habits and helped me make the shift towards consuming more natural products.
When I made that final decision to truly shift the way I dealt with my diet, I expected the shift to come all at once. I felt like I had the willpower to truly change everything in a day, but this was not the case at all. The changes that I made took baby steps to achieve-- not just because it's hard to switch your entire lifestyle immediately, but also because I continued to learn new things about how to keep myself healthy. I began to become more active again, slowly increasing the number of times a week I found myself in the gym. I pushed my body more and more each time I went, and it felt incredible. The weight that I had gained after my surgeries slowly began to wane off, and I knew that with dedication I could become who I wanted to be physically.
20 pounds of fat loss and a few pounds of muscle gain later and I'm more surprised at how my mindset has shifted compared to my body. I expected to reach this point and then decide, "Okay, that's enough, I can let myself indulge again." But no, I have never felt better about myself or the health of my body, and I continue to develop the good habits that I have learned along the way. My transition into this new lifestyle took years to achieve, but it is one of the aspects of my life that I am most proud of and confident in.
Becoming healthy, in my opinion, is almost entirely a psychological process. Pushing yourself as far as you can go in both the gym and the kitchen requires true dedication, but in the end, you not only feel healthier and more confident, but you are constantly reminded of how perseverant you can be every time you look in the mirror. Health, although so much more than just nutrition, is something people often put at the back of their minds nowadays despite it being the driving force for most of what we do. You can always become healthier, it's just a matter of taking the steps to get there.
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