My experience at CrossFit Central has helped me find 3 things that I was missing in my life: Coaches, Cheerfulness, and Courage. (CC helped me find 3 C’s, haha, yes, I did that on purpose)

Coaches
I’d been attempting to make use of my home gym before joining CrossFit Central. I had an excellent foundation in CrossFit movements along with previously awesome coaching so I felt confident I could workout safely on my own. It was nice that I could workout whenever I wanted and there was no specific class time I had to attend. It just wasn’t the same as being in a class. Having a coach tell you what you’re doing wrong/right and being encouraged/inspired by the people working out with you just doesn’t happen when you’re by yourself in a garage at 3am.

When I used to live in LA, I was a member at Strength Rx CrossFit. One of the co-owners, Ethan, was the reason I joined because I liked his coaching when I did a trial class, and he turned out to be one of the best coaches I’ve ever had. One of the reasons I like CrossFit Central was because Jeremy’s passion and coaching reminded me of Ethan. Jeremy’s the kind of guy you want at the core of the gym. I felt like there were only good things to come from Jeremy (and subsequently his gym).

My first experience with a CrossFit gym in Austin wasn’t all that different from my experience at CrossFit Central. I settled on regularly attending a late morning class which basically had people who popped in while on break from work, stay at home moms, retired folks, people with alternative schedules, etc. I saw the same people at these classes but at CrossFit Central, I felt more connection to the people. I think the difference was in the coach. While both coaches were passionate about health and fitness and CrossFit and whatnot, Lisa would go out of her way to make sure she and everyone else knew more about you outside of what you did in the gym, and not just as an ice breaker question at the beginning of class. She makes class an experience and not just a workout.

Cheerfulness
To understand me a little better, know that my love language is Quality Time, know that I am an introvert, and know that I experience a lot of anxiety when it comes to people and interacting with them. When I invest my mental energies into someone, it’s no small matter. When something disrupts an investment that I’ve made, I get very upset. Having only a few close friends is more manageable for me, but moving to Austin where I knew zero people was a whole different experience. I’d been on a general decline in mental and physical health since shortly before I moved to Austin, and it didn’t get any better, maybe even got a little worse, once I moved here.

Of the approximately 3 people I actually talked to and hung out with in Austin, 2 of them moved away and one of them passed away. When the one friend passed away earlier this year, it was sudden and unexpected. I took it hard and went into a sort of slump. I called off work a lot and spent most of my days just doing the bare minimum, basically staying in bed and watching TV, and getting some assignments for class done when needed. I always enjoyed cooking for myself but I couldn't bring myself to make much of anything and resorted to a lot of eating out to keep me fed.

On the outside, everything was fine, I still smiled. You wouldn't have known if you saw me and I wouldn't have told you if you asked. I was always a homebody so my landlord didn't question it. I still went to class and managed to get A's so there was no reason to suspect anything. When I called off work, I told coworkers it was because I had assignments I needed to work on for class (only partly true) and there was no decline in my work performance. I also don't talk to people that much so it wasn't unusual for me to not talk to anybody, even my family.

I didn't keep track of my weight or anything so I can't say for sure if the time after my friend's death saw a spiked increase, but I knew that over the 4 years since I'd moved to Austin, I was constantly gaining weight. The switch to a night shift schedule and being generally sad about life were always working against me since I had neither the time nor motivation to keep myself active. I had the home gym, but when you don’t have any motivation to begin with, it’s hard to get in there.

The whole situation was getting out of hand and I had a trip to Iceland coming up with my family in a few months. I didn't want to see my family and feel like the fat one. So I looked for the nearest CrossFit gym to me and CrossFit Central was the only one around with both locations being nearly equidistant from my house. Wrote up a long email asking for help, had a chat with Lisa, tried one class, and decided to join. While I did not in fact slim down like I wanted to in time for Iceland, I found that being out of the house, interacting with people, and exercising were lifting me out of the slump a little. I was, dare I say, cheerful.

Courage
2015 was a very exciting and devastating year for me emotionally. It is where a distinct line is drawn in my mind. Anyone I knew before then, I didn't have the courage to talk to anymore because I felt like I was less than I was when they knew me and didn't want to have them see how things have gone downhill. My social media postings, as meager as they were to begin with, eventually ceased at the end of 2016. I was tired of feeling like I had to share every experience and part of me wanted to just crawl under a rock and not do anything.

I’ve come to believe that everything happens the way it’s supposed to. My turn of events in 2015 led me to Austin in 2016. Looking for a community led me back to CrossFit after my break in 2015. A busy schedule led me to switch to doing workouts in a home gym, and a pathetic attempt at keeping regular workouts along with no improvement in physical/mental health led me to CrossFit Central. CrossFit Central led me to Lisa, and Lisa led me to nutrition.

I’d slowly made some progress physically and started to workout regularly a few months into my membership. Around the same time, my old gym in LA sent an email out about a nutrition program they were starting and were taking remote clients. The significant thing about this for me was the fact that my nutrition coach was going to be Ethan from Strength Rx CrossFit, from before 2015. It has been 4+ years since I’ve talked to him or anyone from then. I was terrified of having to talk to him. Even replying to the email to say I wanted to learn more about their program was difficult. Since having that small breakthrough with Ethan, I got a little more courage to reach out to someone else from before 2015 and that wasn’t so bad either. I’m still scared most days, but at least I made some progress.

Even though Lisa wasn’t aware of my inner struggles, she’s been a great cheerleader in my corner. She was happy for me to join any nutrition program and supported my decision to go the route I chose. She is excited for me when I’m not that excited myself. She wants to share my achievements on social media and celebrate how great I’m doing when I still don’t care to share anything myself. I am glad that everything that has happened has led me to her.