Unfortunately, I’ve always been one of those girls that if they even look at a chip, they instantly put on like 5 pounds. Okay, I may be slightly exaggerating but I have a mega slow metabolism and so have always had to watch what I eat from a young age.
I’ve been going to the gym and lifting weights for over 5 years now, battling with a full-time office job, and being mindful of what I put into my body. As it is such a huge part of my life and has such a positive impact on my mental health, I thought I’d share my fitness journey, right from the start.
Where It All Began
I haven’t always had the best relationship with food and fitness. When I was younger and at the time in my life when I was still learning ‘who I am’, I hated the way I looked. Literally everything about it. This led to an unhealthy perception of what I wanted to look like and therefore how much exercise I would do or how little food I wanted to put in my body.
Instead of exercising to stay healthy and to make myself feel good, I would exercise to burn off the little calories I consumed, tracking every last detail to the gram on My Fitness Pal (an amazing calorie tracker that I still use now). I was so wrapped up in what other people thought of me that I completely lost myself.
This obviously wasn’t a sustainable way to live and in the long run just made me miserable. It took me around 2/3 years to come out of this negative phase and into a much more positive mindset which is where I’m at today. Now I train at the gym because it makes me feel good and I do it for me.
And if I want to eat a whole pizza and pig out on crisps and dip because that makes me feel good too, then I will and definitely not feel guilty about it (okay, sometimes I do but I’m working on that! We can’t all be perfect, right?)
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