Samantha Lander needed help.
It was 2005 and the St. Louis native was struggling with substance abuse. Although she had stopped selling drugs, she was still using them. A police raid on her Los Angeles home only added to the chaos. As her life spiraled and her legal issues mounted, Lander began to recognize the depths of her problems.
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“I looked at my dog and said ‘I need to go to rehab, right?’” Lander recalls. “My dog rested her head on my lap and so I picked up the phone and called my parents and said, ‘I need to go to rehab.’”
This was the beginning of Lander’s journey from addiction to recovery to wellness consultant. Now, after years of working on her own health, Lander is helping others with their wellbeing. She’s the founder of SeeFit Living, a St. Louis-based wellness company that focuses on personal training, nutritional consultations, and more. It’s important work to Lander, who leverages her personal experiences to inspire others and provide proof that transformation is attainable.
“You can change your life even when you feel there is no hope,” Lander says.
Before the throes of addiction sent her life spiraling, Lander had been passionate about her health. She was an athletic kid who rowed with the St. Louis Rowing Club, and played water polo and field hockey, among other sports. But after graduating from the University of Michigan in 2003 with a degree in sports management, Lander moved out to Los Angeles. She had already been dealing with substance abuse, and it escalated to using hardcore drugs such as GHB and methamphetamine while she performed there as a DJ. Years of partying took a toll.
“I checked myself into rehab and it was the best thing I’ve ever done,” Lander says. “Within three days of going through detox, I felt like I was on a pink cloud. I was flooded with emotions and feelings again. I don’t think I had actually laughed in years. I felt like myself again. It was unbelievable, but it was a hard road getting there.”
Although she was able to get sober, Lander still had to deal with the consequences of her past. In 2006, she started a 27-month sentence for money laundering after striking a deal with prosecutors. While incarcerated, Lander had opportunities to share her story as a cautionary tale. During a talk with high school students, she had an epiphany.
“I realized, ‘What a gift,’” Lander says. “I could save a young adult from going down the path I went down by being open about my story. I knew that I wanted to continue sharing my journey.”
After her release in 2008, Lander started a personal training business. She also took stock of her own physical and mental health. For much of her life, Lander had struggled with her weight, irritable bowel syndrome, and other nagging issues that left her feeling bad.
“I was really sick as a kid, with a lot of underlying symptoms that didn’t suggest an exact diagnosis,” Lander says. “I’ve had chronic stomach problems my whole life, inability to lose weight, and hormone imbalances. So I started to run these functional labs on myself and realized this was how I can bridge the gap for so many people who are doing all the right things but not getting any results.”
The idea for SeeFit Living was born. The practice uses detective work called functional diagnostic nutrition to find underlying causes of issues rather than treating symptoms. Lander takes the findings and engages each client in a personalized process tailored to their needs.
Brandi Fleck was a client of Lander’s for a little over a year. They met in August 2021, around the time when Fleck started experiencing unexplainable health issues.
“I had started getting all these weird symptoms that nobody could explain,” she says. “I went to doctor after doctor and had test after test and everything was coming back normal, but I was dizzy; I was sick to my stomach. Basically, I couldn’t live my life normally, because I just felt so sick all the time. I could not figure out what was going on, so I called Sam.”
Lander not only helped Fleck feel better by introducing her to a clean diet, she educated her on her food sensitivities, hormone imbalances, and liver and gut health.
“Sam listened to me and supported me through it,” Fleck says. “She was honest, direct, and informative. She was really insistent on helping me find answers, too. … It changed the trajectory of my life.”
For her part, Lander knows a little something about that.
To learn more about SeeFit Living, visit its website. You can follow Lander on Instagram at @seefitlivng.
