When she was 10 years old, Amanda Dettman received her first diagnoses of depression. Two years later, she was hospitalized after a suicide attempt. Medications to combat her depression put her on a downward spiral, and by her early 20s she had developed a serious drug addiction.
In 2009, at age 28, she survived an overdosed of pain pills, which she took as a wake-up call. “I wanted to get clean and start from scratch,” she says. Dettman was able to break her habit but in the process gained 50 pounds. By 2011, she weighed in at 160 pounds at 5’1″.
Her turnaround started with group fitness classes and cleaning up her diet. Before long, she started seeing changes in her confidence—and her body.
Her husband encouraged her to start lifting weights. “Once I started doing it and getting stronger, I was hooked,” Dettman says. She got certified as a group cycling instructor in 2014 and now teaches three classes a week.
“Exercise is now my medicine,” says Dettman, who has been drug-free for eight years. “Fitness allows me to set goals and achieve them. When I reach a new goal, I’m just amazed at what my body can do!
