I was standing at a food court of my college ordering a spinach wrap with ham, cheese, and a few vegetables at the Boar's Head Deli stand.

As I was watching a woman I've become to know there make the sandwich, my vision started to blur. My head felt like it does when I get really light-headed and I thought that it would go away. My vision kept getting clouded and getting darker. I stumbled a little but caught myself on the counter.

Nobody saw.

As my vision started to completely close off, I knew something was wrong. I looked in the direction to where my phone was in my hand but I couldn't see. I used my memory of my keyboard to try to send a text to my boyfriend whom I had just been walking with. I lost my hearing and heard a ringing sound. Then I went blank.

I remember hearing the lady who was making my sandwich yelling. I didn't see her, but I woke up on the floor with her standing over me. I winced and held my head and grabbed the back of it because I had fallen straight back and hit both elbows and the crown of my head. "Someone call EMS!" I heard someone say. I quickly tried to get up but wasn't able to without assistance. I told them not to call EMS because that was pricey and I was sure we could solve this some other way.

The lady helped me to a seat while the rest of the food court crew ran around grabbing phones and water for me. The text I had been trying to send to Luke looked a little like,"Luke, my head really hhhhhttttttt."

I didn't even have the chance to lock my phone before I fell. An EMT came to check on me and my roommate met me over there to walk me to Student Health afterward. They hooked me up to IV and told me to come back the following day for a follow-up. For the next two days, they ran tests and got results to try more treatment. My hemoglobin, blood sugar and blood pressure were all very low and it was all because of some of my choices.

First, I wasn't eating breakfast, which caused me to go more than twelve hours each night and morning without food until about one or two in the afternoon. I had gotten a cold about a month before as well and only ate saltines, which could've also been something that affected me. I wasn't eating full meals and was just grabbing quick things from the dining hall to speed to practice or run to class.

Mostly, I didn't have a good balance of proteins, carbs, and fats to keep me healthy. The day I passed out, I had accidentally slept in until two in the afternoon, which I never do. I usually always wake up before nine. My stomach had felt completely empty and I had a gnawing pain between my breastbone and navel that felt like intense hunger, which caused me to go to get the sandwich in the first place.

I'm still feeling the effects of what happened and I still get very weak if I don't get what I need. I have to take iron supplements each day, because my iron is usually pretty low. I had known that it was pretty normal for it to get a little low before but did not take the vitamins like I was supposed to. Instead of sodas and sugary drinks like Vitamin Water, I've begun to just drink water to stay hydrated and not so weak.

When I get hungry now, I have the same intense gnawing pain and it won't go away until about twenty minutes after I eat. It's so bad that I can't even stand up all the way straight if I don't eat all the way. Going to regattas with my team is hard because the suggestion of eating six small meals a day instead of three big meals like my doctor said is just a little hard with so much going on.

When you get into a routine whether it's college, a new location or a new living arrangement, make sure you're taking care of yourself. The only time I had ever passed out was once in seventh grade when i was sleep deprived.

Don't skip meals to study for a test and especially don't skip breakfast. My dad can tell you firsthand that he has to eat breakfast each day even if he doesn't want it because it not only keeps you from focusing on the day's tasks but it also keeps you from having a bad attitude. Make sure you're getting each nutritional component into your daily diet for each meal and make you don't just "grab-and-go."

Also, if you know your body doesn't produce enough of something important like iron, make sure you're keeping up with that. And ALWAYS drink enough water!

Your body already becomes stressed in new situations, don't deprive it of what you truly need to keep yourself healthy, because you may have a crash like I did and end up having to make up for months of unhealthy habits.