NAVY VETERAN GENESIS RAMIREZ HAS BEEN AN EXAMPLE OF PERSEVERANCE HER ENTIRE LIFE

Genesis Ramirez’s life has been anything but easy. 

Throughout her high school years, she had been to five different schools and went from living with her friends to living in a small car with her sister and mom. 

“It was rough but taught me to work hard so that I could support myself and my family when needed,” she reflects. “After high school, I got a scholarship to wrestle in college. I was super excited but due to financial reasons I was not able to attend that school. I ended up going to a community college and joined the Navy right after my second semester.”

She’s now been in the Navy for six years and got to be a part of the All-Navy Wrestling team for two years.

“I was the only female the first year,” she said. “And the year before that, my sister was the first ever female to join the team.”

Two years ago, while on deployment, she began to feel weak and started coughing a lot of blood. She didn’t notice how bad it was getting until she went for a run on the treadmill. 

“I used to run 10 miles like nothing and that day I could barely run one,” she said. “I was struggling. I started to cough blood and decided to get checked by the doctor. At first, I was told it was nothing serious by a corpsman. My Chaplain knew something was wrong so made the doctor check me personally. They found something on an x-ray and I was flown off the ship the next day. I went to Germany and that’s when they found out that I had this fungus called coccidioidomycosis on my lung and airways.” 

They decided at first to just treat her with antibiotics for a few months and when that didn’t work, the next step was surgery. They removed some of her lung and she had to recover while COVID was also taking place. 

“I was depressed throughout the process,” Genesis said. “I slowly started from walking to jogging within the first four months and decided to join a CrossFit gym. I remember looking for quotes to put on my wall to motivate me and I was wearing my APEMAN shirt. As I looked at my shirt, I remember looking at the website and how there was these quote cards. I ended up reading them and one stuck out. It was the post card OVERCOME. It’s like that card was meant for me! It motivated me to want to be better.”

She started pushing herself more and was able to achieve the goals she set up. She went from running 1 mile, then 2, and then randomly pushed herself one day and ran 7 miles. 

“It made me happy,” she said. “I’m still getting stronger every day. I am reading a book right now called, ‘Can’t Hurt Me.’ It’s about the life of David Goggins. Reading that book motivates me every day to set a new goal. Wrestling isn’t going to take place this year because of COVID, but I’m preparing for next year.  Training has helped me to get out of my depression state and my breathing has also improved.”

For anyone going through a rough patch in their life, Genesis wants you to remember that it’s ok not to be ok.

“You are not alone,” she said. “You may feel like you are, but you are not. You were brought to this world for a purpose. Take a deep breath and say to yourself. ‘I will overcome, I will persevere!’”