Column: Food for thought

There are two words that I absolutely dread during the academic year: midterms and
finals.

This past week has been fairly hellish for me, as three of my classes had midterm essays and projects due nonstop.  

I’m really worn down after all of it and just want a rest, but, alas, I still have
another midterm this week, as well as another writing project due.

One of my projects due this past week was for my class in prehistoric diet and nutrition. It involved observing my diet for two days and analyzing the nutritional data that I obtained. This really isn’t anything new for me; a lot of my food-related courses end up requiring me to keep track of what I eat for part of the semester.  

As a result, I am more aware of what I’m eating during the week.

This is definitely a good thing when I’m trying to keep healthier habits, as I don’t count calories. I merely keep track of what categories certain foods fall into.

As it has been midterms week, however, my diet has changed negatively. I have been trying to stay healthy since my first column, when I wrote about trying to lose weight as a New Year’s resolution. I have not been doing my best to keep up with my efforts.
For example, since I had essays due nonstop until Wednesday afternoon last week, I was not able to get to the gym until Wednesday evening.

I really wanted to work out after finishing my essays each night, but it was so late and I was so tired that it didn’t make sense.

I seemed to care less about my health in general. I ate more junk foods, although I did put forth effort to eat some vegetables — I know myself well enough to know that I’m always more stressed when I don’t eat enough leafy greens.

But worse than that, when I was busy juggling four essays at once, I felt myself playing an internal game of tug-of-war. I didn’t know if I should eat or not.
I think this is the case for everyone during stressful testing weeks.

How sad is it that midterms stress us out so much that we end up not eating?

I know I’m not the only one. I see friends end up forgetting to eat all the time because they feel that academics are more important than personal health. And lately, I’ve been feeling the same way.

What are we supposed to do? There’s no easy way to convince ourselves to stop and eat for a moment, if only to fuel ourselves through our academic pain.

I wish I could just magically feed everyone, like I do with my good friends. Obviously that’s impossible, but you get the idea.

The important thing to remember is not just eating when you know you need nourishment.

In my opinion, it’s more important to not let academia keep you from your meals. After all, what’s more important — academics or your personal health?
It’s just some food for thought while cramming for midterms.