CrossFit Lanier owner Amanda Wright gets sober, gives back to help others do the same

Photo credit: CrossFit Lanier | crossfitlanier

After CrossFit Lanier helped Amanda Wright get sober, lose weight, and regain her health, she bought the gym in Cumming, GA in 2021.

More recently, Wright decided he wanted to give back and help others get sober, so he hosted a fundraising contest, the Spring Thaw Throwdown, which raised $3,500 for No Longer Bound, a local charity that helps men to sober up and reconnect with their family through counseling and bonding and healing, Wright explained.

The event was such a success that he plans to turn it into an annual fundraising event.

• For the first time in a long time, it felt like every moment of my fight was worth it to pay off, Wright said.

Wright’s story

For a long time, Amanda Wright had a drinking problem that got progressively worse, but she managed to remain functional in her life for years.

Then, in 2016, she found CrossFit while sitting on the couch, hungover, scrolling through Facebook, said Wright, who now owns CrossFit Lanier.

While scrolling, an ad popped up calling for women who are out of shape and looking to change their lives, she recalled.

• And I was like, Ooooh, it’s me, she added.

CrossFit Lainer was a 30-minute drive from her home, but Wright decided to take the plunge anyway and signed up for their six-week challenge.

She liked it right away, started going regularly and was able to lose 30 kilos.

Wright’s drinking slowed down as her priorities shifted and she was on a decent path for a while. She even gave up drinking altogether for three months, but she couldn’t sustain it.

Soon, he began finding ways to manage his alcohol consumption during his CrossFit program. She continued to drink until she was out of it or until she was drunk until she went to CrossFit the next morning.

• I was tackling the problem rather than quitting, she said.

And then, after divorcing, in 2019, he gave up alcohol.

She stopped going to CrossFit and her drinking went from functional to not quite so functional, Wright explained, adding that she essentially bingeed throughout 2019, something that continued into 2020 as the pandemic hit, everything fell into place. turned off and found herself drinking every day. , starting at noon.

On May 4, 2020, Wright really woke up with a hangover and looked in the mirror. He saw a woman who was forty pounds overweight and who developed a heart palpitation.

• I was not well. Not good at all. And I knew I had to make a change, she said.

So she called the owners of CrossFit Lanier because she was too ashamed to go to AA and went back to the gym.

• I was terrified because the last time these people saw me, I had abs, I was in great shape and was on my way back, 40 pounds over and not well, she said.

In her head, she thought their reaction would be, What happened to you, but it was anything but. Instead, everyone was just thrilled to see her.

• They didn’t know it, but I was going through sobriety, depression and suicidal thoughtsNobody knew what my private struggle was, but what they didn’t even know was that they were saving my life, Wright said.

Nine months later, in January 2021, the gym’s owners approached her and asked if she was still serious about buying the gym, an idea she had pitched to them in 2016 when she first fell in love with CrossFit.

She was. And in October 2021, Wright not only ran the Chicago Marathon, but she became the proud owner of CrossFit Lanier, an 86-member gym.

Now, nearly two years as a gym owner, Wright calls the experience the second hardest, but also most rewarding thing she’s ever done, behind only raising children.

• I really love it and it doesn’t feel like I’m working. It seems to be the purpose of my life. I’m changing lives, said Wright, whose gym now has 140 members.

Most importantly, he said he feels his life has changed forever because of CrossFit and the community, and he encourages anyone trying to get sober to walk through the door.

• It’s a unique and eclectic group of people and no one here judges anyone. We all have our trauma, we all have our bullshit, and life sucks for everyone sometimes, Wright said.

But on the other side of that door is a whole world that can help change your life.

So walk in the damn door.