I kept fighter jets flying. Now I keep bodies moving.

The mechanic's mindset

In the Marine Corps, I was an F-18 jet mechanic. When a $60-million aircraft comes back with a problem, you don't polish the warning light — you trace the fault through every connected system until you find the actual cause. Guessing isn't an option when a pilot's life depends on your work.

Bodies work the same way. The knee that aches on every run is rarely a knee problem. The headaches that show up every afternoon usually start in the neck and shoulders. Pain is the warning light; my job is finding the fault behind it.

Why I walked away from physical therapy

After the Marines I enrolled in the Physical Therapy Assistant program at Lone Star College — anatomy and physiology, functional anatomy, physical rehabilitation, therapeutic exercise. I finished the coursework. And then I didn't take that path, because of something I couldn't stop noticing.

The protocols were carrying people from injured and in pain to better — and then the appointments ran out. Better, but not actually healed. Meanwhile my own clients kept improving month after month, well past the point where a protocol would have discharged them. I realized "better" was never going to be a finish line I could hand somebody in good conscience.

So I built the practice I'd want to be treated in. One therapist, no session caps, no discharge date decided by anyone but your body. My whole plan of action fits in one sentence: focus on the cause, and the symptom will disappear.

The training behind the hands

I went deep on the clinical side instead: massage therapy licensure, medical massage certification, and years of continuing education. I studied under Julie D. — international speaker, author of more than a dozen books, and creator of the Julstro muscular therapy method — and that training convinced me I needed a massage license to fully use what I could already do with my hands.

• L.M.T. — Licensed Massage Therapist (Texas)
• M.M.P. — Medical Massage Practitioner
• N.A.S.M.-C.P.T. — Certified Personal Trainer
• N.A.S.M.-C.E.S. — Corrective Exercise Specialist
• Pain-Free Performance Specialist
• Functional Movement Systems Specialist
• Holistic Lifestyle Coach & Fitness Nutrition Specialist
• CranioSacral Therapy training

That mix matters. A massage therapist can release a tight muscle; a corrective exercise specialist can keep it from tightening again. You need both, and here you get both from the same set of hands.

The client who taught me what this work is for

Early in my career a young man named Leelo M. came to train with me. At eleven years old a head injury had put him in a coma his doctors did not expect him to wake up from. He woke up about six months later — and that was when the extent of the brain injury became clearest.

We worked together for eight months. At the end of it, Leelo was named the inaugural — first ever — Most Improved Member in Gold's Gym's worldwide "Change Your Body, Change Your Life" contest, across more than 700 gyms.

I didn't give Leelo anything. What I did was refuse to accept the ceiling somebody else had drawn for him, then work the problem methodically until his body proved that ceiling wrong. That's the same thing I'm doing when I put my hands on a runner's hip or a grandmother's shoulder. Somebody has usually already told them how much life they're going to get back. I'd rather find out.

What clients get that a chain can't give

You'll never be handed off to whoever's on shift. Every session is with me, so nothing about your body gets re-explained or forgotten between visits — and you leave knowing how to treat yourself between appointments. Nearly every client story on this site mentions that part, because a fix you can maintain is the only kind that holds.

Who I work with

Runners chasing a marathon PR on The Woodlands Waterway. High-school athletes coming back from injury. Desk workers whose shoulders have crept up to their ears. People who've been told surgery is the next step and want one honest opinion first. If that's you, the first move is simple — call or text and tell me where it hurts.