Without struggle there is no progress.
That’s a saying I started practicing saying when everything started to fall apart and it stays with me today.
My name is Alexa Cress and I’d like to say I’m your average 24 year old just trying to get life in order but to be quite honest, I’m really not. I may be young, but my life has taken me around the world and back; literally.
If we go back to high school you would have found me playing sports, and when I say playing sports I mean multiple a day. I went from soccer in the summer to basketball in the winter followed by track and softball, and so forth. When graduation came around, the anxiety set in. Sports were my life and were what I identified with. They were what kept me healthy and active and without them, I really wasn’t sure who Alexa really was.
That summer was rough, but the years following were even worse. I found myself growing bored of in my mind “doing nothing” when really I was working every day and still keeping active by taking up running with my father. Running led to weight loss which led to people starting to show attention which ultimately led me to change my nutrition habits because in my eyes I was good at this whole “healthy living” phenomenon. Going from having no free time while in high school to having complete days off gave me the time to start meal prepping and learning how to properly workout.
At first it was completely healthy which is why no one raised concern. I was just finally shedding the baby weight or so some might say. I started eating less junk and incorporating healthier options. This was when Instagram was just becoming a popular platform for health and fitness enthusiasts to share their lives. I figured what the heck and created my own and soon was sucked in to what I thought was something that was only going to benefit my health.
20 lbs lost, led to 30 and then 40 and at that point, I didn’t look “fit” anymore and I sure didn’t feel healthy. At this point I’d tried pretty much every diet out there and was sometimes even doing more than one at a time which really just ended up with me eating vegetables, fruit and low calorie yogurt.
The next 3 years were a constant battle of trying to eat more but wanting to eat less; attempting to exercise less but really moving more. I’d come home for the summers and eat normally with my family or at least try to but as soon as I went back to college I was alone again. Being alone gave me the opportunity to eat what I wanted when I wanted and if I didn’t want to, I surely didn’t have anyone pressuring me.
I keep saying I was alone, but really I shouldn’t have been as I was in the final years of my 6 year relationship. Mind you, we didn’t spend a lot of time together as he was gone a lot and I was preoccupied with my healthy lifestyle. I often wonder if our distance had something to do my fixation on myself because I needed something to do with my time and quite frankly I was just plain sad. In the beginning it was tough; being alone all the time but I soon grew to love it. I craved being by myself because it meant I had full control on my daily life. If I wanted to eat carrots for dinner I sure could and if I wanted to exercise for 3 hours there was no one there to stop me.
So as you can probably tell, my little diet turned into an obsession; an addiction some might say. My parents tried to get me help; I went from doctor to nutritionist to try and get my eating back on track but even though I said I wanted it, I really didn’t. I would gain weight just as fast as I could lose it again because I didn’t want to get better; I didn’t want to let go.
Some of you reading might be thinking that I had an eating disorder but I didn’t, or at least not a formally recognizable one. I was never diagnosed with having a problem except the fact that I was underweight but that’s where it ended. I believe that I was suffering from something called Orthorexia which like I mentioned above is an obsession with eating foods that one considers healthy. As it’s not recognized by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual it’s something that gets thrown under the radar with more and more people falling victim without even being aware that anything is wrong. Who really thinks that by eating healthy they are going to become obsessed with it? I mean one can only eat so healthy right?
I beg to differ.
I loved eating healthy and I loved that my “disorder” gave me something to finally self-identify with again, as sports one had. As the years followed, I grew more obsessed with my health and less interested in the outside world even though I knew real life was about to hit me hard. As my college graduation grew closer I realized that I was not mentally or physically healthy enough to start “life” and knew it was either push through or finally go get professional help. At the time, both sounded absolutely appalling so I looked for other options. One day I was scrolling through my Instagram and I saw the Eiffel Tower. Being the curious person I am, I clicked on the picture, then the profile and soon enough I was hooked. This girl was Canadian, living in Paris and working as an Au Pair. Heck, I grew up babysitting I didn’t see why I wouldn’t be a fit for that job and I got to travel!
So that was that. 3 months later I booked a one way ticket to Paris, France and moved in with my host family. I was there to work but I knew that I needed this experience more than anything. I fell in love with the French food, the people and the way of life. I traded in my hours of exercise for long walks through the gardens of Paris. My low fat yogurt was replaced with rich cheese and my sweet protein bars with macarons. I’m not going to say it was all butterflies and rainbows but as much as it pained me to change I needed it. I came back that year 20 pounds heavier and with a whole new perspective on life. That 20 pounds turned to 30 and then 40.
I had done a complete 360.
I continued traveling for another year after that, to Costa Rica and to Australia but those trips didn’t feel the same. They didn’t give me the life that Paris had and that is why Paris will always have my heart. It was a long 6 years of battling against what my body wanted but I’m glad I went through what I had to go through because I truly don’t think I’d be the person I am today if I hadn’t of. If I hadn’t of gone through the struggles, I would never have connected with my fiancé for one and I wouldn’t have had such a positive outlook on living.
And for that, I am grateful for this journey of a life I’ve had.
Alexa Cress, Fitness Enthusiast.
Any individuals in sports and fitness who would like to share their voice, please submit to hank@hankfittraining.com