The Power Within

The taste of chicken was getting old for me this point. I became so used to eating the

same thing everyday I couldnt even enjoy my favorite type of meat anymore. It was the

same daily routine. I waited impatiently by the door, tapping my foot rapidly,

ready to beat other people to the microwave.

This was my everyday lunch routine during the Winter of 2016, my sophomore year.

This was the year I made the choice to become a two sport athlete. Basketball and

Wrestling. The way my season worked was when I didn't have basketball games I had

wrestling practice, everyday in between I had basketball practices and on the weekends

wrestling tournaments. This meant no free time, no days to sleep in and having to get my

priorities straight.

Month of February.

6:45 am my alarm rings. I wake up to the sound of my annoying iphone alarm that

wakes me every morning, with heavy eyes from lack of sleep from the night before. My

body aches as I roll out of bed. I put on my clothes that I set up from the night before, make

my way to the bathroom dragging my feet with eyes half closed, looking like a zombie.

7:05am I make my way downstairs. Usually, i'm the type of person that does not eat

breakfast, I just was never hungry that early in the morning. But, doing two sports I forced

myself to eat. I knew I was going to need the energy for later. I open up my refrigerator,

squint from the bright light and reach for the chilling mason jar with overnight oats, take a

spoon, slump down onto a chair and eat. This was one out of 3 meals of my day.
 11:30am, advisory time. Every single day I looked forward to advisory. It only meant

20 more minutes till lunch. I checked my phone every 5 minutes, but time felt as if it slowed

down. My knee moved in a constant up and down motion as I watched students pass the

hallways through the window. I don't remember much of advisory. I only remembered the

crave for food. I looked forward to eating. Snacking wasnt a thing for me so the only food

in my stomach at this point were the overnight oats I had for breakfast. This was my 2nd

meal of the day. I knew what I had every day for lunch, my food wasnt even good anymore

but, I just wanted something. Something to slightly fill my stomach. Chicken and broccoli

was the prepared meal that my mom would make me every Sunday night. On lucky days

she would throw in some cauliflower.

2:30pm -6:00pm. Depending on the day I either had practice or a game. As captain

of the girls basketball team I would prioritize basketball whenever it overlapped with

wrestling.[ It was tough on me mentally trying to push myself through a game or practice

when all I was looking forward to was my last meal. Sports used to be outlet for me to

decompose and get away from school and it was, except I couldn't escape the feeling of

temptation every day of breaking my diet, or the wanting of time to pass so that I could

sleep and forget about this feeling. These feelings followed me everywhere. For 3 whole

months. The same feeling that strained my back. The pinching and aching in every joint of

my body ached everywhere from every little movement I did ].

11:00pm. When the sun fell and night came my stomach grumbled asking for food

but,I didn't want to give it any. Some nights my hunger was so bad I genuinely thought my

stomach started eating the surroundings organs. How much longer do I have to this for

was a question I asked every single day. My body was weak. I needed food, but I needed to
win. Every night I feel asleep to the tossing and turning in order to distract myself from my

empty stomach. [The discomfort of lying there knowing that I have the power to just get up

and eat drove me crazy. My self control was being tested. I needed to go far, I wanted to go

far].

The way wrestling works is that we are categorized in weight classes. 101lbs, 106

lbs, 111 lbs, 116 lbs, 121 lbs, lbs so on and so on. For the tournaments before CIFs I had to

maintain the weight class of 111 lbs. Im a small girl, i'm 51, competing in two sports,

maintaining weight should be easy I thought. I started the season at 116 lbs. So why didn't I

compete in that weight class? My childhood growing up I competed in the martial art of

defense and grappling aka Judo. It's the reason why I thought of trying out wrestling in the

first place. One of my best friends, Sarina also did Judo. Growing up every tournament we

were put up against each other. I had to fight my best friend. Every tournament growing up

we would compete for 1st place. It was the most awkwardest and most uncomfortable

thing. We would have no coaches coaching us because they had no baisas, we had no one

cheering because they were all friends. It's just something we absolutely HATED and

wanted to stay away from that as much as possible. [Why would I want to purposely fight

my best friend.] It was something we both didn't want to do. So that meant dropping 5

pounds and going on a strict meal prep diet.

The week of CIF was one of the hardest weeks of my life. In order for Sarina and I to

compete in CIFs I had to drop down to 106lbs. I went from 116 lbs to 111lb to 106lbs. My

diet became so strict I even had to watch my water weight. During my basketball games I

would wear a long blue dri fit shirt so that I could sweat more than I usually did and would

limit my water intake. Keep in mind I was barely eating at this point. I became so afraid of
being of beingOverweight or not qualifying that I switched my meal preps to salad. A

water based food. I practiced 10x as hard to make sure I was burning fat and worked out in

hoodies to sweat more. I did not want the reason I didn't compete was so that I didn't make

weight. Especially because of the hell I put myself through this season.

I needed food. It was after a hard tough basketball game against grossmont (A day

before CIFs). A division 3 school. We are divison 5 basketball team. I had my long drifit

compression under my jersey and I was sweating bullets. [I was infuriated at my shirt I

wanted to rip it off]. I couldn't though, I needed it to sweat. What felt like 2 second breaks

during the game I felt terribly weak. [I felt light. I felt as fragile as a feather]. I reach for my

water bottle and the thought in my head was dont drink much you need to lose weight.

After the loss I am terrible angry because of the lack of food in my system.[ I threw my stuff

in the car and I sat in complete silence]. [Without food it affected me physically yes, but

mentally it was messing me up in the head. The other distracting noise was my mother. The

same chatter she always gives me after my basketball games. You should have done this,

Why didn't you do this, when you are playing defense you need to do this, drive the ball in

more, shoot more, slide your feet and there I was in silence. Its nothing I havent heard

before. Just this time I was thinking of anything else except for food]. The car stops and

they pull into a fruteria. I knew I wasnt going to eat anything. I was angry. [The fact that my

family had the audacity to go get something to eat when they knew I was starving, when

they were the ones who wants me to be on this diet so bad]. My friends were with me. They

each had two big tortas and I walked out of there with a kale juice which acted as my third

and final meal of the day. I was smart though. I took small, small sips. I was smart about my
proportions so that it could satisfy me for the whole night until cifs but, still it wasnt

enough.

Later on that night after taking my friends home I laid there in the back so weak the

only thing that felt slightly better was closing my eyes and pretending I was somewhere

else. We got home and my mother told me to change out of my clothes and put some new

shorts and a shirt.

Hurry up! my mom yells

I dont have the energy to even respond back. I hop back into the car, my eyes slowly

shut and I escape everything for a little while. The car stops, my eyes flutter open up to a

dark night and big bright lights that read Chuze fitness I knew exactly what I was here for.

I walked in and slumped down at the first sight of the couch and fell asleep for maybe 5

minutes. Then I hear my mom and the front desk person arguing. I have no idea what the

issue was. The only thing I only remembered blurbs of my mom's highly irritated voice.

NO YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND, SHE HAS CIFs TOMORROW AND IF SHE DOES NOT

MAKE WEIGHT SHE WONT QUALIFY

My mom is passionate. She's always been passionate. In all my sports. She just wants

me to go far thats all, that's why she yells. They exchanged words again. I was very careless

about what was going on. My mom was just eventually like Follow me

I walked into what led me to the steam room. I took off my white shirt and black

socks and I stayed in the room that had tiles. It was hard to breathe in there. The air was

hot. I tried to breathe through my nose but the humid heat was so heavy it was difficult. I

layed up against the wall and closed my eyes. Sweat was coming out from everywhere of

my body. The walls were dripping with water and the glass door was blurred from the
steam. [Anxiety crept into my mind I had of the thought of the door shutting and my mom

and I being stuck in there]. What would I do in that instance? I thought that we would just

die because I felt to weak to even think about kicking the glass door down. 15 minutes

passed, this was the maximum amount of time you were allowed to stay in there and I

walked out to the cool air going through my open pores. My head was wet with sweat as if I

came out the shower. I dried off and went back home. Only 10 more hours till CIFs, only 10

more hours to weigh in, and only ten more hours till I could eat and drink.

I walk into Claremont High School's gym. The smell of fresh bleach made its way

into my nose and gave me a pound in the head. The bright orange and blue caught my

attention. All of my teammates had bag of healthy foods ready to be stuffed down once we

weighed in. The locker room was full of girls. Full of girls who looked terrible, weak, and

skinny. They separated us depending on which weight class we were trying to qualify for.

While waiting there everyone was, socializing. All potential opponents were speaking to

each other about dieting, about working out. I didn't want to talk about the struggle that it

took to get me to this point, [I didn't want to show any part of weakness in me.]

It was mine turn to weigh in. Down into spandex and my sports bra I didn't realize

how much physical change appeared in my body till then. My stomach was flat and not the

good kind of flat. My arms had no jiggle like how it normally does, I was skinny. I stepped

onto the scale and watch the numbers 105.3 lbs flip back and forth to 105 lb and finally the

scale froze at 105 lbs. I made weight. I could finally eat. I opened my snack bag reached for

my fruits and them. The problem was I was eating so fast I felt like throwing up. I guess I

trained my stomach to eat so little my stomach got full instantly but, it was frustrating

because I was still. SO hungry.

 One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand. The ref swung his arm

into the air and with much force slammed his hand palm down into the matt. The whistle

blew. The opponent with the green ankle band was laying on her back disappointed at the

realization of defeat. The crowd was wild. Yelling and clapping, the audience was live. I

didn't care what was going on there, I couldn't focus. I jumped up and down slapping my

body to get blood circulating. I was composed on the outside. Straight face and a well

composed stance. On the inside fear entered my mind like a thief and stole all my

confidence.

High Tech - Samantha?

I raised my hand

Youll be green

It was officially time. I took the green ankle band, bent down and placed the velcro

onto my right ankle. As I waited for the reff to figure his stuff out I stood there with all eyes

stuck on me. [My heart sank to my empty stomach meeting the million butterflies that

fluttered around, I tried to hide my nervousness with a few jumps to make it seem like I

was warming up]. I saw the ref walking back ready to start us off. Man this is really about

to start I thought.

Shake hands

I reached out to shake my partner's hand and she met mine in the middle. I didn't

want to look mean but, I was unable to smile I was way too nervous. She had long legs and

was nervous too. I could tell by the way she moved her foot back and forth waiting for the

reff to blow the whistle. At this point I heard nothing but the sound of my heart beating and

saw nothing but, my partner in front of me. The live crowd was all of a sudden mute. The
sense of nervousness seemed to trump everything I was feeling up to this point. My hunger,

weariness, weakness. Before I knew the whistle blew. It took us a while for us to engage we

continued to circle around the mat until finally she grabbed my neck. Her legs were very

long and they were exposed right there in front of me. My eyes were set there trying to

think of what I should do next. I pushed her backwards to have some momentum and I

picked her ankle timing it and there she fell on her back. The crowd went wild. I heard my

coach yelling but I couldn't make out what he was saying. I held her neck tightly and hoped

for the best. After 5 or so seconds of pinning her the ref blew his whistle. We walked back

to our sides. Took off our ankle bands and we hugged each other. I qualified for state. I just

placed 2nd in CIFs, but, [I wasnt as happy as I thought I would be]. My parents reminded

me that I have to make the decision to either go to state or help lead my basketball team to

being CIF champs. This was the first year we made it to playoffs for basketball. This was

the hardest choice to make and the sucky thing was that I was the only one who could make

it. Do I let my team down? Or do give up this opportunity that I have worked so hard for?

This was an ongoing struggle I have not yet learned how to deal with. Wrestling

season is around the corner and the pressure of going far is very high and intense this year.

(Need feedback on ending, I dont know how to end it since it has no resolution)