What are these you may ask? These are the names of the three Oasis teams participating in our partner BJC HealthCare's "Help for Your Health: Fruits and Vegetables Challenge." This competition happens each year to encourage BJC employees to remember the importance of eating 7-10 or more fruits and vegetables each day. Fruit and Vegetable Challenge
         
This is my second year participating in this friendly competition. The competition sparks a dialogue and gets everyone thinking about their diet. Last year I was surprised that such a simple competition could teach us so much about fruits and vegetables, while encouraging our co-workers too. It was also surprising to learn how much we didn't know. 
 
One co-worker was struggling to eat five servings per day. I was confused because I saw her eating fruit for breakfast and snacks, plus large salads and baked potatoes for lunch. I asked her and it turns out she was counting a large banana as one serving, when it was really two servings. And her large salads? She was also counting those as one or two servings when they were really four or maybe even five servings. Here's the MyPlate guide on fruits and veggies and what constitutes a serving size. Others on my team only had 1-3 servings per day. And many people just don’t eat fruits and vegetables regularly.
         
This year has been different. Oasis has three active – and competitive – teams. The annual contest has created lots of discussion and energy around the topic of fruits and vegetables in our daily diets. We are more educated this year, teams are exchanging recipes and bringing snacks of fruits and vegetables into the office to share with their teammates – and even their competitors! There is even a bracket going each week to show each team’s progress in the competition. As captain of the Freggies (inspired by the "Framily" plan), I’m proud to say we are in 2nd place! And my teammates are consistently eating 7-11 servings per day. It’s exciting to see everyone’s excitement around this healthy competition. 
Even though my team may not win – we are all winners in improving our health!