MY STORY

I Didn’t Burn Out.

My System Finally Collapsed.

From the outside, my life looked disciplined and successful.

I was a former Division I athlete, a long-term corporate professional, and an elite endurance competitor, Ironmans, ultramarathons, extreme physical output paired with relentless mental drive.

Inside, my nervous system had been running in survival mode for years.

I ignored the warning signs the way high-functioning men often do:
push harder, optimize more, keep going.

Eventually, biology collected the debt.

When Survival Mode Breaks the Body

The collapse wasn’t gradual.

It was sudden and total.

Sleep disappeared weeks without rest.
Anxiety, panic, and cognitive dysfunction followed.
My nervous system was locked in fight-or-flight with no off switch.

Doctors offered prescriptions to manage symptoms.
Stimulants, sedatives, mood stabilizers anything to keep functioning.

They didn’t fix the problem.
They accelerated the breakdown.

My body followed:

• Severe injuries

• Hip replacement from inflammation

• Chronic nerve and dental damage

• Repeated ER visits

What failed wasn’t willpower.

What failed was the system.

The Realization That Changed Everything

At my lowest point, one thing became clear:

If I wanted to live not just survive I had to understand what was actually happening at the biological level.

So I stopped searching for motivation and started rebuilding the system.

I studied root-cause medicine, detoxification, neuroscience, inflammation, and nervous system regulation.
Not as theory as survival.

I tried everything.

But what worked wasn’t more information.

What worked was sequence.

Giving the body what it needed in the right order:

• Nervous system regulation

• Sleep and circadian repair

• Gut and liver detoxification

• Metabolic and brain energy restoration

When survival mode finally shut off, clarity returned.
Then calm.
Then strength.

Not because I pushed harder 
but because my system stopped fighting itself.

The Rebuild

The rebuild took years.

System by system.
Layer by layer.

I learned how inflammation hijacks cognition.
How toxins short-circuit emotional regulation.
How identity stabilizes only after biology stabilizes.

Out of necessity, a framework emerged.

Not a business plan.
A survival map.

A repeatable process to:

1. Regulate the nervous system

2. Repair detox and metabolic pathways

3. Restore brain energy and identity

This is the same framework I used to go from near collapse to the strongest, calmest, clearest version of myself at 53.

Why I Do This Work Now

I didn’t build Ilios Health to motivate people.

I built it to help high-functioning men exit survival mode permanently.

Most of the men I work with aren’t broken.
They’re capable, driven, and exhausted.

They’ve tried discipline.
They’ve tried optimization.
They’ve tried pushing through.

What they haven’t done is rebuild the system that makes discipline possible.

That’s the work.

Today

Today, I wake up clear.
I’m present with my family.
I train, teach, and serve from calm not pressure.

Not because I avoided the darkness.
Because I understood it.

And because biology, when given what it needs, always moves toward balance.

If this resonates, you don’t need more motivation.

You need your nervous system back online.