ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a nuanced analysis of the possibilities and limitations of CrossFit (CF) as an embodied healing practice for women survivors of sexual trauma. My work examines two central features of CF methodology, functional movement, and high intensity to explain how CF engages the survivor’s nervous system in a way that is both therapeutically beneficial for sexual trauma survivors and distinguishable from other forms of sport and movement. I argue that although the CF space operates as a site of exclusion, like most other health-related enterprises, it is simultaneously flushed with therapeutic possibility and holds immense potential in creating a depathologizing healing strategy for sexual trauma survivors. By weaving together neurobiology, critical disability studies, and trauma studies, this work illuminates both the power of using corporeal healing practices to survive trauma and the inherent barriers that exist to claim survivorship.
