I'm Not a Wellness Guru. I'm Someone Who Needed This.
I grew up in Indian Rocks Beach, Florida — a small beach town where my family was the anchor. Oldest of five kids, all homeschooled. When you're the oldest in that kind of setup, you don't really have the option of not showing up. You lead. You figure things out. You make sure people are okay.
I was a swimmer and a runner. Competitive enough to earn a scholarship. Not because I was gifted — because I worked. That's what I knew how to do.
By my junior year of college I was a certified personal trainer, and after I graduated with my exercise science degree in 2019, I thought I had the map figured out. Help people move better. Build something in fitness. Clean and simple.
Then I took a detour that turned out to be exactly what I needed.
In 2021 I took a role at a big bicycle company. Not because I wanted to sell bikes — because I wanted to learn how business actually works. And I did. I learned what unreasonable hospitality looks like. I learned how to tell a story that sells. I learned how to build community-first from a boss who understood that a profitable business is built on people, not transactions. I learned how to read a P&L. How to lead a team. How to see the whole picture.
That job taught me a lot. And then it changed. When I started, they wanted stores to feel like local small businesses — embedded in the community, personality intact. By the time I left in 2025, it was a different story. Corporate playbook. Cookie-cutter. No room for meeting people where they actually are. I knew my community meant more to me than that. So I left.
But before all of that — before the pivot — 2023 happened.
2023 was the year everything came apart at once. I had been wrapped up in addiction that led to burnout, relationships ending, health concerns, and a complete loss of identity. Everything at once, which is how hard years tend to work.
I want to be honest about what got me through it, because I've seen people oversell this part: it wasn't a product. It wasn't a method. It was a practice. Every morning I'd do breathwork and journal. I started to pair that with cold exposure, then I'd sit with whatever came up. I didn't come out of those sessions with answers. I came out ready to face the day instead of hide from it.
That's the thing about cold exposure that nobody in the hype world wants to say: it doesn't fix anything. What it does is put you in contact with yourself under pressure. Your nervous system gets real information. Vagal toning. New parasympathetic pathways. Less reactivity over time. And something harder to measure — the reminder that you can show up for something hard and not fall apart.
That year taught me the difference between avoiding discomfort and metabolizing it. Avoidance prolongs stress. Facing it — with your body, your mind, and your spirit — actually rewires something.
I kept looking for a place that taught this the way I experienced it. Something science-backed but human. Challenging but accessible. Not a biohacking trend. Not a fitspo event. Just honest, coach-led work for people who want to show up differently. I couldn't find it. So I built it.
That's Y'alternative Wellness. This is my community. This is the work.
Be Kind. Be Caring. Be Bold.
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