Jan Weidemeier

The gym was almost empty when I finished my second set. Outside, Frankfurt, Germany, stirred slowly—cars humming in the distance, cafés dragging open their shutters. I pulled my hoodie tight, avoided eye contact, and walked home along side streets where no one would greet me.

Two years ago, I was still deep in it—cocaine, pills, late-night clubs, days lost in a fog of noise and light. I’m twenty-three now, and those days feel like another lifetime. I swapped the chaos for routines so strict they barely leave space to breathe. Meal plans, supplements, macros, cold showers, eight hours of sleep. No sugar, no alcohol, no slip-ups.

My fridge looks like a nutrition manual. Everything labeled, weighed, controlled. I tell people it’s about health, and maybe at first it was. But somewhere along the way, it became something else. I haven’t eaten at a restaurant in nearly a year. Not because I can’t—but because I don’t trust what I can’t track.

Friends still ask me out. I always say I’m busy. The truth is, I’m scared. Scared to break the pattern. Scared to eat a slice of pizza and not know the exact calorie count. Scared I might like it. Most nights I cook, clean, stretch, and scroll through fitness articles until my eyes burn.

Last week, my cousin had a birthday dinner. I said I couldn’t come—“work stuff,” I lied. My mother sent me a photo: them smiling, arms around each other, cake half-eaten. I stared at it longer than I meant to.

This lifestyle saved me from self-destruction, but I can feel it hardening into another kind of prison. Control turned into isolation. Health into obsession. I miss noise. I miss spontaneity. I miss not thinking about food all the time.

Tomorrow, maybe I’ll skip the gym. Maybe I’ll call Cem and say yes. Maybe I’ll eat something I didn’t plan. Not to fall back—but to find a place somewhere in between.