On the first day of my nutrition class, our professor was surprised to see the size of the class. She asked, “Why are all of you here?” She probably meant it as “Why so many this semester?” but I decided to use my first assignment to answer that question.
We had to write about a “food story”–anything, just to get us introduced to the class. I haven’t even turned it in yet, but this is mine.
Katie’s Food Story
On the first day of class, you asked us why we were there, and, to be honest, I had the same question for myself. I recently quit a very good job in a city I love to go back to school in a field completely unrelated to my undergraduate education. As you can imagine, my parents probably think I’m crazy. It’s been an interesting few months of transition, and I can’t say I’m without my own doubts, too.
You see, I have a B.A. in Spanish Literature (that my parents paid for) and have never used it. After graduating from Furman in 2007, I went straight to work as a recruiter at a local tech college and later as a writer and editor at 10Best and finally as the Brand Strategist in 10Best’s corporate office. Along the way and when money got tight, I also waitressed. Being in the kitchen was the only time I’ve really used my language skills. It was also the only time I can say I really enjoyed my work.
Waitressing is certainly not a glamorous job—quite the opposite, in fact. A shift spent waitressing is characterized by sore feet, an aching back, occasional burns and a whole lot of apologies. And yet, I found that being around food, promoting food and talking about food is what I enjoy most.
I’ve always had this interest in and excitement about food. When I was little, I would race home from the bus stop in time to catch the last 10 minutes of a PBS cooking show, which was the best part because that’s when they always made elegant desserts with elaborate plating techniques and designs. (This, of course, was in the days before Food Network so I’m sure you can imagine my obsession with that now that it’s here.) I also loved going to the grocery store with my mom. I marveled at the endless rows of food, especially the “ethnic” aisles filled with exotic dried peppers.
Due to this young love of food, it probably isn’t a surprise that I describe myself as a fat child (but my mom always says I was not). Perhaps I was a bit delusional, but weight became an unhealthy obsession for me at a young age. I can remember doing crunches on my floor as young as age 9 but then turning to a hidden box of Girl Scout cookies in my closet. That kind of unhealthy cycle of exercise and disordered eating carried on through high school and college.
I exhibited patterns of severe restriction and excessive exercise throughout my university years. I started to hate food. I filled myself with joyless foods devoid of fat, calories and, in turn, nutrients. I lived on Diet Cokes and saltine crackers, protein bars and fat-free Cool Whip. The chemically processed, preservative-laden diet products I consumed were hardly even recognizable as real food. Though those “light,” “fat-free” and “diet” products are marketed as “healthy” options, I know better now (and I think I knew then, too).
Throughout this time (and still today), I was also following a vegetarian diet that I had started in high school. Actually, my first attempt at vegetarianism was in 4th grade when a friend of mine and I decided we didn’t want to hurt animals. It lasted only until I got home that night and my mom had Campbell’s chicken soup waiting for me. Later on in middle school I was still eating meat but felt that my family could stand to cut back a bit. I remember vividly (and my family wouldn’t let me forget if I tried) stomping up the stairs at dinnertime screaming, “This family has got to stop eating cows.”
Vegetarianism finally became a reality for me in high school. At first, I just did it on a whim, but I quickly got accustomed to the lifestyle and haven’t had meat in nine years. Over time, I have become more interested in the environmental impacts, economic issues and animal rights associated with vegetarianism, but those were not factors in my initial decision to start the diet.
Anyway, it wasn’t until after college when I had a kitchen and groceries of my own that I really started to put my interest in food to good use. It took a few years, but I started to transition away from processed packaged products toward clean, whole foods. I read books and watched documentaries that greatly impacted my approach to food. Skinny Bitch, Naturally Thin and the documentary Food, Inc. showed me that focusing on food in its cleanest, purest forms is more important than fretting over calories and fat. By eating a natural diet, weight loss will follow. And it did for me.
After adopting a whole foods approach to eating, I quickly shed the 25 extra pounds I’d been carrying since graduating from college. I never once counted calories, obsessed over my weight or even stepped on a scale. In fact, it took a routine check up at the doctor for me to even notice I’d lost the weight. I had finally found a healthy way to live with food rather than continue a life in fear of it.
As my interest in and enthusiasm for my day job began to wane, I started a food and fitness blog back in August 2009 as a creative outlet for my interest in food and my passion for writing. In maintaining the blog, I realized that I was working in the wrong field and that I could turn this passion of mine into a career. After all, we spend at least 1/3 of our day at work. Shouldn’t we all be doing something we love?
Well, I love food. And I love to encourage other people to love food, too. So it seemed logical to me that I should work in a field that involves food and involves teaching other people about food. Becoming a Registered Dietitian fit the bill, and that’s why I’m sitting in this class today.
Right now, my interests lie primarily in dietetics for specialty diets, including vegetarianism/veganism, Celiac/gluten sensitivity and food allergies. My vegetarian diet is a choice, but food allergies and other diseases are not. I want to help people with those issues find foods that make them happy, and make restaurants and food manufacturers aware of their special needs so that appropriate foods are more readily available.
I have a lot of science classes to get caught up on and a lot of tuition to pay. And while I’m nervous and sometimes doubt that I’ve made the right move, I know that I am headed in the right direction. I’m not sure now where exactly I’ll be by the end of this adventure, but I hope that to some degree I am helping other people release themselves from the torment of food and learn to appreciate it as the sustenance of life.
