She was looking for a distraction from drinking. This childhood activity helped her lose 100 pounds

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Connie Stowers was 32 days sober and in the midst of a painful divorce when she finally gathered the courage to attend an adult roller-skating meetup. With drinking off the table, she needed a distraction, especially on the nights when her daughter was with her dad.

“I showed up at the rink and I fell right on my ass,” Stowers, 38, tells TODAY.com. 

Weighing nearly 300 pounds at the time, a determined Stowers refused to let the challenge hold her back. She got back up, dusted herself off and kept going. By the end of the evening, she was black and blue.

“It sounds crazy, but I couldn’t wait to come back,” Stowers, a real estate agent in Rhode Island, recalls. “You know that happiness and freedom that you feel when you’re a kid on skates? It’s the same feeling you get when you’re adult.” 

From that moment on, when Stowers felt an urge to grab cocktails, she laced up her roller skates instead. 

Newly divorced with a 1-year-old baby, Stowers describes skate nights as a form of therapy. The endorphins left her feeling exhilarated, and she also found a supportive group of sober friends. According to Stowers, a significant number of people in the roller skating community choose not to drink alcohol.

With each trip to the rink, Stowers felt herself growing a little stronger — mentally and physically.

“It started to feel like, “OK. I may not be great at this now, but I wonder if I could be,’” Stowers says, noting that not everyone shared her optimism. 

“There were certain people in my life who were like, ‘You’re too old, you’re too big. You’re gonna hurt yourself,” Stowers says. She acknowledges they were right about the injury part. 

“There were a few sprained ankles and minor concussions,” she shares. “But the benefits of roller skating outweighed the risks for me. I felt alive again. I felt powerful.” 

In 2023, about a year after Stowers took her first spin on eight wheels, she felt ready to examine her unhealthy relationship with food. 

“Society wants us to fix everything at once, but I wanted to focus on my sobriety first before tackling my eating,” Stowers explains.

Intermittent fasting appealed to Stowers because it allowed her to focus on when she ate, rather than what she ate. Giving up carbohydrates was not an option.

“I’m a foodie!” Stowers says. 

As the pounds melted away, Stowers found herself skating faster with each lap. Soon, she began incorporating other forms of movement into her routine, including running, weightlifting, and hip-hop dance classes.

“Shockingly, for the first time in my life, I was decent at sports. In high school, I was the benchwarmer, always,” Stowers says, noting that while losing 95 pounds helped, skating transformed her into an athlete. 

“It’s how I built strength and flexibility, and my confidence,” she says. “Self-love is pretty powerful.”

Stowers becomes emotional when she reflects on how far she has come in three years. She no longer recognizes the woman who numbed herself at bars.

“I knew I was meant for a bigger and better life than the one I was living, and that if I made small changes and stuck to them, I could get there,” Stowers says.

Stowers’s daughter, Autumn, is now 4, and only knows the best version of her mom. 

“I’m so grateful that I’m giving her an example of how to get through hard things,” Stowers says. “I’m showing her how fun life is without alcohol, and how good it feels to be strong.”

Stowers, who has been documenting her health journey on Instagram, can’t believe how many followers have messaged her, saying she inspired them to buy a pair of roller skates.

“Hundreds of people have started rollerskating because they watched my videos,” she says. “Roller skating has no time clock. It has no score card, it has no start and no finish. All you have to do is show up.”