New York Post 124 member and Army Col. Christina Fanitzi is using her platform to support her young son who has Spina Bifida.
At 16 weeks pregnant during a routine ultrasound, Christina Fanitzi’s unborn son was diagnosed with Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus, which impacts development, continence and mobility. With a three-page document in hand about what Spina Bifida is, her son’s potential disabilities to include not walking, and pregnancy options, it “weighed on us,” said Fanitzi, a U.S. Army colonel who has served on active duty for 22 years and deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. “What I came to was like, I’ve never quit anything in my life. So, why would I quit my kid.”
Fanitzi, a member of American Legion Post 124 in Milton, N.Y., found a platform to advocate for her now 2 ½-year-old son, Christian – who is walking, a jokester and is called “Mr. Smiles” at daycare – and other Spina Bifida families at the state and national level: pageantry.
Fanitzi was crowned Mrs. New York America on June 23 and competed in the Mrs. America pageant in Nevada on Aug. 27, where she placed sixth. “I’m really proud of the opportunity and my placement,” she said of Mrs. America, which she was encouraged to compete in after seeing Air Force 2nd Lt. Madison Marsh win Miss America in 2024.
“I said to my husband (Andrew, an active-duty U.S. Marine lieutenant colonel), if the Air Force can win Miss America, the Army can win Mrs. America,” said Fanitzi, who currently serves as a West Point Regimental Tactical Officer, leading more than 1,100 cadets. “I applied to Mrs. New York. It was amazing. It was everything that I love. I love community service; I love fellowship; I love fitness. This organization allowed me to turn adversity into action and partner with the Spina Bifida Association in New York State and to start to use my leadership skills to serve my community and country in a different way.”
Since entering pageantry 19 months ago, Fanitzi has become a board member on the Spina Bifida Association of New York State; has helped establish a dedicated person to meet the needs of Spina Bifida families from Hudson Valley to Long Island, which didn’t exist before; is creating a more friendly and helpful resource guide for hospitals to provide families with children diagnosed with Spina Bifida; and is supporting her platform as Mrs. New York America with community outreach events.
“The outpouring and opportunities from a crown and a sash … the power of that thing is unreal, and it is my intention to do good. To use it for good for as many people as I possibly can,” said Fanitzi, who will serve as Mrs. New York America until May of 2026. “Pageantry is an intense sport, and it is not about the crown. It’s about the journey. It’s about improving physically, improving mentally, improving your community, improving your sisterhood. Just being better.”
The opportunity to compete in Mrs. America gave Fanitzi greater appreciation for pageantry. While in Vegas for 10 days, she had 4 a.m. wake-up calls for hair and make-up, photoshoots, stage rehearsals, interviewing rehearsals, fitness, and a team of dedicated coaches who helped with it all.
“I did it with a really robust team of professionals that I’m honored to have worked with,” she said. “I think there’s a lot of myth busting about women in pageantry that maybe they’re not the smartest. But the number of intense interviews you have to do … If you watch the pageants the women know what they want to achieve, and they’ve worked hard to come up with what they intend to do if given that title. Pageant women do a lot in their community surrounding their platform. They are doers.”
Fanitzi credits the Army for her ability to be successful in pageantry from sustaining the long days to being “the best version of myself,” she said. “I wanted to represent my state and my country. I wanted to represent the Army well. And that comes with wanting to be the best for your team and to be the best for others.
“The military taught me that you don’t have to do things, you get to do them. So it’s a privilege to compete in Mrs. America. It’s a privilege to serve as Mrs. New York. It’s a privilege to be in the top six and compete with 50 other women.”
Fanitzi knew a military career was in her future upon visiting Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C., at the age of 12 with her family. “I was really stopped in my tracks at the Tomb of the Unknown Solider,” she said. Then, upon watching the Eternal Flame at the gravesite of President John F. Kennedy, her mother asked what she thought. She said she wanted to attend college in Washington, D.C., join the Army and then the CIA, and “take over the world. It really changed the course of my life from that day. There was nothing taking me off the path to come to school in D.C. and join the Army.”
Among many of her military achievements, Fanitzi was commissioned from Georgetown University ROTC in Washington, D.C., was a White House Fellow in 2018, has been to over 30 countries, led troop formations of 45 to 1,200, and competed “in a sport I’ve never really done before, Mrs. America, and that only happened because of the United States Army,” she said. “Anybody who wants to be even one inch better tomorrow than they are today, the United States Army is the place that can do it. That’s the place that did it for me because none of those things would have happened for that little girl if not for the Army.”
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