My Fitness Journey

Fitness is something that has always been really important to me because I’ve been an athlete for most of my life.

I started with ballet and gymnastics— similar to every toddler, right? Though my height and petite size benefitted me in gymnastics, my fear of heights and landing on my head while attempting to do a flip in the air killed my chances of training for the Olympics. Just kidding— gymnastics ended before I hit second grade. I was always too impatient with ballet so that got left behind as well.

I moved onto soccer (like a lot of youngsters) and swimming. I enjoyed both a lot and honestly wish I had stuck to both, but there’s only so many seasons that allow you to play dedicated sports. My fame in soccer was when I had to miraculously be the goalie in one of my little league games and I blocked two shots with my forehead and my nose. (True story I have only had 1 bloody nose in my entire life and it wasn’t from this). I swam competitively in middle school all year round. I loved the sport and being the water. Every summer when my family went to the beach I could always be found swimming through the waves. I really do miss swimming because I was actually very good at it and I dedicated so many years to it. I don’t want to say I was burnt out from it, but when the time to came to take it to the next level in High School it was unfortunately the first sport I decided to move on from. Especially when lacrosse became the main focus.

Soccer was traded in for Field Hockey and then once I picked up Lacrosse in middle school, there was no turning back. Specifically on the East Coast, lacrosse is a no-joke, give it your all or not all, one hundred percent dedication. My winters couldn’t even involve swimming because I was required to do “strength and conditioning” with my team. We spent all winter preparing for our run tests and practicing for the spring season ahead. All of my summers were consumed by competitive tournaments that involved traveling up and down the East Coast to try and get recruited for college. Thank you mom and dad for taking me on however many lacrosse tournaments we went on. You’re the real MVPs, truly.

This might be why I loved field hockey a little more, which was my fall sport. Our team was surprisingly insanely good (all of the same lacrosse players) because we were athletic literally all year round. It’s funny when people say that high school is your prime time because in the fitness department it was definitely my peak. This was really because there was rarely ever a time that I wasn’t training for something that required me to remain in top shape.

I also went through a 2 year eating disorder that was a mix of over-exercising, restricting calories, and some anorexia and bulimia. Thankfully, I was able to recover on my own and it wasn’t for a very long time. More on that another time though. There will be a blog post about that coming soon.

So field hockey and lacrosse were my two main sports in college and I loved them both with all of my heart. I’m actually not a competitive person at all, but what I loved so much was the team aspect of playing a sport. In my opinion there’s nothing more motivating, inspiring, or fun than being on a really close team that’s damn good at what they do. However, once the time came to apply for colleges the pressure really began to intensify. My junior year of high school is actually when my eating disorder was at it’s peak worst, which is when most high schoolers start to look at applying for colleges. A ton of my friends had already been recruited to play lacrosse at DI colleges like UVA, UNC, Duke, JMU, Denver, and the list goes on. But yes, we were that good. However I wasn’t. I could’ve been for sure with the amount of pressure put on our high school because of how high level we were able to play. I didn’t want to play DI though because I didn’t want lacrosse to rule my life. I wasn’t ready for that in fact I was ready to leave the East Coast stereotypes that revolved around lacrosse. It was still one of my passions though, which is why I chose DIII and when Rhodes came into the picture.

I committed to play lacrosse at Rhodes College in Memphis, TN the spring semester of my senior year in High School. Yes, it took that long! Can you imagine the stress when all of your friends have already been recruited sophomore and junior year to play at top universities? But god forbid I remember that this is actually a completely normal time to find out where you’re going to dedicate the next 4 years of your life…

It’s interesting because I had never seen Memphis, TN or even heard of Rhodes College. This was definitely a leap of faith that I can say I’m fully proud of.

So now that I’ve mentioned my entire sports career, my eating disorder, and what led me to where I am now, I can touch on the basis of this post. Fitness has always been dear to my heart because of how it’s impacted my life. It’s brought me friends, teammates, my college career, an outlet from stress, and all those endorphins J. While there was a point in my life when I abused it, which sometimes I still struggle to know if I have a slight obsession with working out (if you’ve ever taken Bikram Hot Pilates though, you’d contemplate this too), it has brought me so many positive things in my life that I will forever be grateful for. I ran a half marathon in college with one of my best friends and it was one of the most amazing experiences. I was allowed that opportunity because of my (recovered) health condition and positive relationship with fitness.

I’ve been involved in sports, running, different fitness platforms, and have taken multiple boutique fitness classes. I’m always changing it up, which is where I’ve found joy in fitness. It doesn’t have to be one size fits all, or the same thing every day. While I do wish that I could play team sports for the rest of my life, I have found joy and appreciation in my solo fitness time. See more posts on the different types of fitness I enjoy and have tried. I’ll always give you my honest opinion on everything.

Thanks for listening!

Xo stay vibrant