Maybe I resilient... Maybe I determined... OR maybe I just crazy???

Growing up, I wanted to be involved in sports. I wanted to play t ball like my cousins. I wanted to be a cheerleader or gymnast. I wanted to run track and be fast. I had a tiny stint with volleyball in my elementary years as a part of rec league. Every time I wanted to pursue something that would grow my competitive flame, I was met with all the reasons why it wasn't a good idea. I was reminded that I was too small, too slow, too weak, not powerful enough, strong enough, flexible enough... so it wasn't worth my parents investing their time or their money so I could try. I was always the last one picked in Phys ed, and after I was picked, I was always pushed to the back of line by the better kids or put on the bench to "sub in" but never got my turn. When my school had a track and field showcase in 5th grade my PE teacher told the class that every student would be assigned 2 track and or field events, plus we would all participate in the tug of war event as we went against the five other elementary schools in my hometown. She rattled thru the list of who was doing each event, and I didn't hear my name called. She asked if anyone had questions about their events, and I raised my hand. She looked around pretending not to see me, and said "okay, everybody break into your groups and go start practicing". As everyone separated, I went up and told her I didn't have any events, and she said she knew but there wasn't really space for me and I had missed the "try outs" when I had a seminar at another school the week before for an advanced class, I had been placed in. She told me she though that participating in the tug of war this year would be best for me. I was devastated and I just wandered around watching my friends and classmates learn about starting blocks, passing the baton, pacing longer distances, throwing the shotput and discus, and proper technique for long jump. I did this for the rest of year as everyone prepped for track and field. The day finally came, and I sat in the stands for the entire day doing nothing. It came time for tug of war, and I finally got to go down onto the field. When I got there, they made sure the teams were even. The same number of boys and girls on each side. The other school had less girls than we did, so they removed me from the line to sit it out so we could "be even". I didn't make a sound. I just shrunk back into the group and tried to keep a smile on my face. 

The following year track season came around again, this time I was again not assigned any events, but I didn't speak up. I learned last year that they knew I was excluded, and it was part of the plan because I had nothing to offer to my class. A major difference this year was that my younger sister was now in 5th grade, and she was given 3 events to run, even though she missed the "tryouts" due to being at the same seminar for her advanced class that I had attended the year before. Everybody talked about how great she was and made a point to tell my parents. Maybe they thought I didn't notice, but I did. I shrunk smaller. I was able to do one round of tug of war this year because we went up against a school that had more girls, so all of the girls in my class got to participate. We won. For a second I felt like I helped us win and I was so powerful. The next round I was asked to sit out, and the final round when we ended up winning, I watched on from the sidelines with a sad heart. 

In 5th and 6th grade I was able to do a couple sessions at our Rec Center of volleyball, because my friend's mom took us most of the time. I loved it, and the coaches often complimented how great I was at diving for the ball, passing it and how I had very impressive control for my age. It gave me a little boost, so I was extremely excited to try out for the 7th grade team. My parents agreed, and again my friend's mom took me with my friend to try outs. When it came time for cuts, I was called into a little room and told that the coach was impressed with my passing skills, but he couldn't ignore the fact that I was too small, and not powerful enough to overhand serve the ball. He didn't have time to work with me on this when he already had a group of girls who had that skill mastered and were "good enough" at passing the ball. Another blow, and another broken heart. Now, hindsight 20/20 I should have doubled down to improve my serve, but I didn't have the resources, support or guidance to make that my reality. I was just a brokenhearted 13-year-old who never had that thought cross my mind until years later. I was so deep into the lie that I was too small, too short, too weak, too slow, etc. that I had blinders on, and I was stuck. 

As 7th grade continued, I wanted to try out for cheerleading during the basketball season. I went to the info meeting one day during homeroom, got the packet of info, filled it all out and started making up my own cheer with movements, which was one of the requirements for try outs. I brought all the stuff home to my parents, and it just sat. When it came time to sign up for my tryout spot it was the first time my mom said how she really felt. She told me that there were girls better than me, so it was not worth the expense or them taking their time for me to do it. I was so upset. Tryouts passed, and I excitedly checked the list of names with friends the morning it was posted. As we were looking over the list, the coach, who was also a math teacher at our school asked me if we could talk. She took me into her classroom and told me that she saw me at the info meeting, and she saw I took a packet home. She asked why I didn't try out. I told her that I knew there girls better than me and that I am not very flexible. She told me that they needed another flyer, and she thought I would be perfect for the squad. She wanted to offer me a spot, no need to try out and she would work with me extra on my flexibility and tumbling. I excitedly went home that night and told my parents and my mom told me that she didn't think it was a good idea because it would require a lot of sacrifice from her when it came to "carting me around". I went back to school the next day and sadly told the coach that I didn't think it would work out. *Flash forwards a year, and my sister got diagnosed with scoliosis. The doctor recommended a tumbling/stretching class and somehow my mom found the time to get my sister to and from the tumbling session with the cheerleaders from her class, and she wasn't even on the squad. They just kindly let her join their class. Another piece broken from my heart, and new belief that if I wasn't "good enough" and pursuing my dreams wasn't worth others sacrifice. 

Seventh grade spring sports came up and even with my track experiences the previous two years, the majority of my friends were joining track, and I was excited because there were no try outs. There was space for everyone, and they didn't care if you were good, or not, they would let you do your best. I went home and told my parents I wanted to join the team and again was reminded of all of the people better than me that my mom saw from the two previous years of track and field, and she "reminded" me that it wouldn't be worth the sacrifice for her. The following year, I didn't even ask and was shocked on the day the season started that my sister never got on the bus to go home, because my parents agreed that she could join the track team. My heart broke a little more. Season after season, watching my friends do things I wanted to do. I tried to be happy for them, but I was so broken. Those words that were spoken over me time and time again as reminders about why I shouldn't even try became my whole identity. Once upon a time my soul was set on fire to become an athlete and to be competitive. I wanted to push myself to limits mentally and physical and just see what I could do, and over the time of a few short years that flame got put out. 

Or so I thought. 

I continued through high school and college struggling with anorexia, hating my body and believing that working out was only for athletes, and I was not capable of being one of those. Immediately after college, I got married to my high school sweetheart and over the next five years, I had my four beautiful baby girls. Pregnancies back-to-back, had any types of workouts far from my mind, although I realize now it shouldn't have been. After all my girls started sleeping through the night and becoming more independent, it took me a few years to "get my pink back" as Lindsey Gurk says. I tried to start working out at home doing Beachbody workouts when my youngest was 2, but it was coming from a place of self-hate. I never made it more than two weeks into a program before I would fall off the wagon and go months without thinking about moving my body, until one day I would look in the mirror and hate myself so much that I would start all over with another day 1. 

This went on, over and over again, until my 32nd birthday was approaching. The thought of wasting away my 30s left me stressed out that I had been trying for two years and here came another birthday with zero results. 24 months of guilting, shaming and hating myself and nothing good to show for it. I decided I wanted to start training for something, but the only "competitive" thing I knew about at the time was Spartan Races. My husband had completed a couple Trifectas, and I was envious of him every time because I wanted to do something like that, but all those voices came back reminding me that I wasn't fast enough, strong enough, big enough, powerful enough, etc. But I decided that I was going to do it anyway. I started out on my birthday and was devastated to see that I was only able to run for a few seconds before I needed to walk for a few minutes and catch my breath. But I kept showing up. Three times a week I would run and slowly I was improving. Nothing spectacular, but I was happy with each and every tiny bit of improvement. After few weeks I was BORED. I was tired of just running and I complained to my husband. He told me he thought that CrossFit might be a good fit for me. 

I hadn't heard of it before so one day during lunch he pulled up an old CrossFit games clip on YouTube and I watched all these amazingly fit women do the most amazing things I had ever seen. It was a few weeks into everything being shut down in 2020, so I started doing a little research about CrossFit gyms near me. I made a spreadsheet and filled in all the info about each one that I could find on their website, and I let it sit open on my computer while I tried to work up the nerve to start calling each one to see when I could go through the list and check them out. A few days after I made my list, I was wandering around my new neighborhood that we had just moved into the month before and I saw a new neighbor I hadn't met. I went up and introduced myself to her and noticed she had a shirt on that had the name of one of the CrossFit gyms on my list. In our conversation I asked her about it, and she told me she was a coach there. I told her I wanted to try it out sometime and she informed me that they were just getting ready to reopen. She passed my info along to the owner, who called me the next day and invited me to their intro class which was starting back up that night. 

I freaked out on the inside, but told her yes, I would be there. As the class time approached, I got in my car and started to drive down the street. I freaked out and drove back and sat in my driveway trying to talk myself out of doing this. I finally pulled it together and headed out again but got halfway there and freaked out and started to turn back. I told myself to chill out and suck it up and do it scared. Once I got in the door and got my hands on a barbell, the rest is history. That flame inside that wanted to compete was bigger than ever before, but I absolutely knew that it was going to be a whole journey because I recognized pretty quickly that I lacked athletic experience, body awareness, muscle, coordination and a lot more. Everything felt hard, but I was excited, eager, and ready to learn. 

Nine months into signing up for CrossFit, the Open was coming around. I was hesitant to participate because I was definitely the "worst" athlete at the gym so I was worried I would be last in the world. After a little pep talk from my coach, who reminded me that it was just a data point and it was an opportunity to try new, challenging things I wouldn't normally get to try, and he thought I would see that things were going better than I thought. I signed up, but my goal was to not be last in the world. I ended up placing 75,565 out of 108,000+ women. My flame grew bigger. My soul was set on fire. I felt so proud of myself and if I could do this in just nine months, I couldn't wait to see what I could do in another year. Unfortunately, the weekend before the last week of the 2021 Open I injured my knee while helping my husband carry a couch. This injury required 12 weeks of PT, a knee surgery and 12 more weeks of surgery. When I came back, I lost a lot of muscle in my lower body, and my knee was bothered in a lot of the movements for almost a year post op. But I fought and tried to get back into the swing of things. I unfortunately chose to not participate in the 2022 Open because I didn't feel comfortable pushing my knee because it wasn't ready. 

I wish that was all to the story, but it's not! When my knee finally started to feel better, I picked up intensity and got back into the swing of things. After a few months, I noticed my body started having a hard time recovering. I started having more frequent endometriosis flare ups. I was having cramping frequently. As time went on, I gained 15 lbs. in a 6-month period of time, which was not something I had experienced before. As time went on, I started having trouble regulating my body temperature. I was always cold and after workouts when I came home, I had to bundle up with a heating pad, I wore a cozy robe and was layered in blankets. My energy went completely out the window, and I couldn't function. I was able to do the 2023 CrossFit Open and even though I was not recovering well I pushed myself in the workouts and surprised myself getting toes to bar, PR on my thruster and getting 5 RX wall walks. I placed 88,644 out of 124,000+ women. PROGRESS. 

I searched for 6 months for an endometriosis specialist to help me figure out what was going on, and in April 2023 I finally got some answers. I went into surgery the following week where my doctor did a "clean up". Post surgery, I had 16 weeks of pelvic floor therapy where I learned that a bunch of scar tissue was connected to my lower abdominal muscles, and they had become "frozen". Over the next year, I had to learn how to brace correctly, activate my lower abdominal muscles, stop using the incorrect muscles that had taken oven, and develop my core strength/endurance. I was able to do the 2024 CrossFit Open, at 11 months post op, and surprised myself by being able to use the 35 lb. dumbbell, and my first double unders in a workout. I placed 79,222 out of 136,000+. AGAIN PROGRESS! 

As my core felt stronger, I started to notice I had some back issues. All the years of undereating and inactivity had taken their toll on my body. I found in out in September 2024 that I had two bulging discs. I have been in physical therapy for the past 6 months. During this time my post workout fatigue, worsening cycle symptoms, digestive issues, weight gain (another 10 lbs and now at my heaviest weight ever), muscle loss, hair loss, difficulty regulating my temperature, all started coming back. I discussed my issues with my doctor at my annual appointment. She spent all of 7 minutes with me and told me that we will never know what is going on. I had been doing research, and I was curious if it could be due to my previous birth control use? Or is this perimenopause? Or do I have PCOS... or ovarian cysts? She again told me that we will probably never know because women's health is so understudied. She offered me more birth control, which I thought was crazy since I had a hysterectomy 10 years ago. She told me it was probably anxiety, and we could change/up my anxiety medication and see if that would help and she could give me a referral to the weight loss clinic so I could look into Ozempic. She didn't order bloodwork, an ultrasound, nothing. I left more frustrated than when I came in. 

I continued to push forward, but my fitness seemed to at a standstill. Despite showing up 5 days a week, and following the strength progressions, I was having no progress, and my workouts felt worse and worse. I once again signed up for the CrossFit Open and although it wasn't my best year because of my back and how my body felt, I was surprised that I had not lost my ability to use a the 35 lb. dumbbell or do RX wall walks. I ended up placing 66,295 out of over 90,000 women. Not my best year, but I did my best, felt good while doing and was proud of what I was able to do. 

I decided it was time to pursue functional medicine back in October. I will share more about it someday, but the general gist after going through testing and treatment the past 6 months is that I had pretty significant vitamin D deficiency and zinc deficiency. I also had SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth) which was causing all of my digestive issues. I also have low testosterone, progesterone, estrogen, cortisol, DHEA and dopamine. This combination points to stage 2 adrenal insufficiency, and an HPA-axis dysfunction. It looks like I have another year of recovering ahead of me, but this time I don't have to completely stop working out, just reduce the intensity and focus on building muscle. I am also prioritizing reducing stress, providing my body with all the nutrition it needs to heal, and following all of my doctors' orders. 

All of this has been a lot, and it looks on paper like the odds are stack against me. But I have known since day one that all of this is for a reason. I know that nobody can feel this fire and passion inside of me, or this pure belief that competing and sharing my story with as many women who will hear me, is my purpose, but that gut feeling that this is what I was made for has never wavered for even one second. This is what keeps me waking up day after day, to do the best I can with what I have! Maybe I will get to the end of my life and it turns out this was just a delusion I created in my head, that I would be capable of something as big as this, but I think it would be way worse to come to the end of my life and know I left bits and pieces of me on the table and didn't what I was put on this Earth to do. So, I will leave you with that! And hopefully I will be back soon to share some exciting news!