Two years ago, as a 48-year-old mother of four, I was ranked as the strongest female deadlifter in the world. But before then, a few weeks after my two-year custody battle ended in the mid 2010s, I realized I needed something to keep me busy. I had never felt like a particularly strong person. I had been in a tumultuous marriage and suffered through substance abuse and mental illness , and I shopped compulsively. When alone with my children, I was not always very disciplined. I fed them ice cream for breakfast sometimes when we ran out of eggs.

I decided I needed to be stronger. I wanted to be calm and measured in my interactions with my three early-elementary-aged children, to be somebody that they could come to in any situation for help.

I decided that if I were physically strong

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