How to maintain and increase college students health and wellness

Many college students know that college life is stressful. Between assignments, projects, quizzes, final exams, and not getting enough sleep due to some of these things, college can be a lot to deal with at times. As time goes on, especially if we don't focus on our health and wellness, having more mental breakdowns will become our new reality. According to usnews.com, "In a Gallup poll that surveyed more than 2,400 college students in March 2023, 66% of reported experiencing stress and 51% reported feelings of worry "during a lot of the day." And emotional stress was among the top reasons students considered dropping out of college in the fall 2022 semester, according to findings in the State of Higher Education 2023 report, based on a study conducted in 2022 by Gallup and the Lumina Foundation." Knowing how stressful college can be at times, I asked two SC State students if they consider their health and wellness an important aspect of their life, what do they do to maintain their health and wellness, and which year of college do they think made their health and wellness the most unbalanced.

I asked Jared Toby Kirksey, a senior communications major, if he considers his health and wellness an important aspect of his life. “As an athlete my health and wellness are very important parts of my life, I have to maintain a certain weight and try to limit myself with going overboard regarding bad foods because I know depending on what you eat you can feel like that in your next game or practice.” I also asked him what does he do to maintain his health and wellness. " In order to maintain my health and wellness’s exercise and try to eat and drink in a balanced way." The last question I asked was which year of college does he think made their health and wellness the most unbalanced. "My freshman year of college of the year because of Covid I wasn’t able to work out the way I wanted so I gained weight and was eating very unhealthy and I turned it around my sophomore and junior year."

I asked Emanuel Washington, who is also a senior communications major, the previous questions. These are his responses. “Yes, I consider health and wellness important in my life. I think it’s imperative that one takes there health seriously, especially while still young. The older we get the more we have to maintain our bodies, but if you never did that when you were younger it would be much harder. Overall being healthy promotes longevity, less joint pain, better cardiovascular health, etc. Personally, for the maintenance of my health and wellness I work out 4 times a week. I try also run or do some form of cardio twice a week. Ever since I started lifting and running, I’ve felt better, look better, and I’m more confident as a young man. Being obese/overweight is detrimental to your health, if you can fix it in any way possible, I would encourage anyone to do so. The year of college that made my health and wellness the most unbalanced was junior year. Even though I lift and run consistently, my diet is not the best. Currently I am on a bulking phase, meaning I’m eating everything in sight to gain weight. Honestly eating healthier would be better but at this point I just want the scale to move up.