Can you be fit AND love Junk Food?

Listen up.

I spent a long time hating my body. I still do sometimes, if I’m being honest with you, but it’s become a quiet voice in the back of my head rather than the loud “hey, you’re awful” that it was when I was younger. In short, I used to hate food.

Some people will read that and think “Uh, what? Food is my favorite! #foodie” and some of you are right in the exact spot that I used to be. I see and empathize with both of you.

I’m not going to make any claims of loving good food. I love junk food. I thought for the longest time that junk food and fitness were not able to coexist. The girls online with their awesome looking smoothie bowls and raw fruit diets did not align with my “I really like Taco Bell nachos” lifestyle. What did align, though, was maybe…only eating Taco Bell nachos? Once per day? That makes sense, right?

If we’re looking at the standard weight change formula of “calories in vs calories out”, it made perfect sense to my sad little brain that I could eat a Nachos Bellgrande for dinner (no beef, extra beans, sub sour cream for guacamole, thank you very much!) and I’d still lose weight because that was really only around 800 calories. Maybe I’d eat some fruit for a snack earlier in the day, or a protein shake.

And honestly? I did lose weight (don’t stop here and drive to Taco Bell, this is not the diet advice of the century, y’all). I lost a lot of weight. Working ten-hour days on my feet in a photography studio, spending half of my nights out on the town, and then only eating around one thousand calories MAX per day? I was tiny. But I was also really unhealthy.

And not in a “but I look great” kind of way.

My friends all wondered about my “diet secrets”. I got a lot of positive reinforcement that I probably didn’t need at the time. It took until one friend took me aside after we got lunch together (I ate a soft pretzel and a diet soda, which was insufficient to her and anyone else) and asked if I was abusing cocaine.

Clearly she didn’t understand just how little money I made at work.

After gently convincing her that I did not, in fact, abuse cocaine, we went our separate ways and I felt…different. My thinner body didn’t feel as good. I started to get critical of myself in the mirror again, my thin arms and legs, my lack of definition. My face looking more gaunt than ever.

I decided to learn a bit about nutrition.

Now I’ll be real with you. I don’t track macros, or calories, or micronutrients. As someone who used to deal with disordered eating, that makes me crazy. I do, though, keep a vague running total in my head of “how many calories should I eat and expend for my goals. How much protein should I be aiming for. How many vegetables am I eating (and do the refried beans in nachos count?).

It turns out that if I’m not too crazy with my junkfood habit, I can still keep it around while maintaining a balanced diet. What? 

Now I can’t eat garbage every day. I won’t feel good. But once or twice a week as part of a balanced and healthy (ish) lifestyle? No problem. People make different adjustments for what works for them. I see 90/10 and 80/20 a lot–meaning 90% or 80% of the time, the person aims for healthy and nutrient-dense foods, and 10% or 20% of the time they relax. As someone who doesn’t strictly track, I aim for about 70/30, and probably fall closer to 40/60 during particularly stressful weeks.  It’s way better than it used to be, though, and that’s what matters. I’m not trying to be in the Olympics here.

There are a lot of different calculators out there for getting an idea of your macros, even if you’re not going to track. This one is pretty simple, though I ended up disagreeing with the amount of protein it suggested to me. I’m also not super buff though, so maybe it’s time to revise my plan.

You don’t have to go on an all-out diet to meet your goals, or feel healthier. As a matter of fact, you probably shouldn’t. Diet culture can be really harmful, and the diet industry has a lot to gain from people who try and fail and try again.

I’m a vegetarian junk food queen. If you put it in front of me and cover it in salt, I’ll probably eat it. I’ve become fit and (relatively) healthy despite my habit just by slightly switching up my diet. Was it easy? Eh. Not really. Was it fun? No, not at first. But now I can eat icecream every day and takeout at least once per week and maintain my weight (within about five pounds) , my muscle mass, and my ability to do cardio (which was never great).

Can you do it too? I think so.