Meet Alexis Sissac

Today we’d like to introduce you to Alexis Sissac.

Hi Alexis, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I’ve lived in California my whole life. I grew up in Long Beach, California where my entire existence consisted of school and dance. I danced from the age of 4 to 19 and my entire universe revolved around dance. It was my one true love. Then, I went to Loyola Marymount University where I majored in Psychology and minored in Theatre Arts and Dance and while dance always stayed close to my heart, I fell in love with theatre and it ignited a passion in me that I had not felt in a while.

College made me into the confident, introspective, and well-rounded woman I am today and I am forever grateful for those four years. College is also where I fell in love with YouTube but I was always too afraid to start a channel, even though I wanted to so badly because I felt like people would not understand it or they would think I was odd for filming my life. However, the year 2020 taught me that life is way too short to worry about what someone else might or might not think about you. I started my channel and it is one of the best decisions I have ever made. We only have a very short time on this planet and I am determined to fulfill every single one of my dreams before my time is up. So, this is where I am today, striving to life a life that I can look back on and be proud of.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It has definitely not been a smooth road. Every day comes with its own challenges and hurdles, I am not one to label myself as strong because that feels arrogant of me but I can say that life has thrown a lot at me and I have worked through all of it to the best of my ability. One night in dance class, in my sophomore year of high school, I looked down at my left ankle and for some reason, it was extremely swollen…but I felt no pain. I sat out the rest of pointe class and I went to the doctor the next day and the doctor told me that it was simply a sprain and I should be back to normal in TWO weeks. Eight years, two false diagnoses, and one surgery later and my ankle is still not back to normal. I have chronic lymphedema in my left ankle that will never go away. Some days my left ankle will be twice the size of my right and other days, my legs look completely normal, most of my friends and family do not even know that I have lymphedema because I hide it so well. I have also grown to live with it and love it over the years but wearing a compression hose to my prom and graduation was not exactly the fashion statement that I was trying to make. So, to answer your question, it has not been a smooth road and this was not the only bump in the road either, there have been too many to count. But I wake up every single day extremely blessed and grateful for the life I live and I would not exchange it for the universe.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am an aspiring content creator and the casting assistant on the ABC hit series, Station 19. I started making YouTube videos in July of 2020, the day after my 23rd birthday because I was tired of telling myself I was not good enough and just decided to believe in my abilities for once. Life had slowed down to a glacial pace while in quarantine and there was no better time to dive deep into something I had always wanted to do. It has been six months on the platform and I am so incredibly proud of the 110 subscribers that I have gained, we are a little family and I am so honored that they trust me enough to bring them quality content. I hope one day I can look back on this article & see how much I have grown over the years but I am so happy with where I am now and so inspired by the mere thought of growing and thriving on YouTube.

When I am not making videos, I am the casting assistant on Station 19. I have to pinch myself every-time I tell someone this because it is honestly a dream come true and I still cannot believe it myself. I have been a fan of Station 19 for years and the day that I got the call that I got the job, I quite literally fell out of my chair. Casting is a huge passion of mine, diversity in television and film is something that is so close to my heart. I want every child to be able to look on the screen and see themselves represented in the content they watch. Diversity does not end at race and ethnicity, it should be present in every aspect of the human form and having just a small part in making that magic is the reason I get out of bed every day.

I am most proud of my work ethic. In a world where we are constantly bombarded with other’s accomplishments through social media and other platforms, it can be difficult to be proud of yourself when it seems as though someone else is always doing better than you are. However, I will never give up on my dreams and every single day I am one step closer to accomplishing them and for that I a proud. Being a black woman in the entertainment industry is far from the norm. I want to break through glass ceilings and give little black children someone to look up to and aspire to imitate. One of the main reasons why I started my channel on YouTube is because one day I looked at the people I was subscribed to and found, shockingly, that none of them looked like me. I want to be on the screen of someone that looks like me and I want them to know that they are more than capable of accomplishing every dream they set their mind to.

How do you define success?
Success is being content with the life that you are living. Growing up, I believed that success meant money, power, and fame. I was obsessed with the idea of being famous because I thought that was the only way I would ever be successful if everyone knew my name. With maturity and age has come the knowledge that success can mean whatever you want it to mean as long as you are happy with where you are in life. When I say I want to be successful, I really mean that I want to be happy.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexississac/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/alexississs
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf0DM9NpAqE8C02IqSF7nhg

Image Credits:
Maddie Carreon