"I felt like crawling back to the truck."

When you don't know what you don't know

David will tell you he didn't realize the kind of shape he was in. He'd struggled with low energy for years but never thought of himself as someone who was suffering. It was only looking back that the picture came into focus.

About a month and a half before things fell apart, the signs got louder. At the end of a long, hard day, walking back to the truck felt impossible. He was sluggish. His energy was running out long before his day did.

He hadn't been trying anything to address it — not consistently. Over the years he'd done sporadic supplement plans that seemed to help, but nothing stuck. By the time he found Melissa, he wasn't doing anything at all.

He'd watched this road before

David has been married for 27 years. His wife has been a diabetic since she was 10 years old. He'd watched her live inside that system his entire married life.

So when his own blood sugars came back in the 300s — consistently — he knew exactly what the conventional path looked like. A diagnosis, medication, and a label that follows you forever.

He didn't want that. He wanted to know if there was another way.

"Pretty much game on"

When asked what almost stopped him from starting, David's answer is simple: nothing. Once he realized this kind of support existed and that it could work, he was all in.

He wanted to work with someone who knew what they were doing and knew how to help him. And once he found that, his approach was straightforward: tap in and follow the plan.

Unfolding the layers

When asked what surprised him the most, David paused. Looking back now, with clearer eyes, the answer was the process itself: the way root cause investigation unfolds one layer at a time.

At the beginning, he couldn't fully appreciate it. His brain fog was so thick that he wasn't comprehending everything Melissa was discussing or trying to teach him. He'd just say, "Okay, I'll do that," and trust the process.

It was only after walking through the tunnel that he could see what had actually happened — and how much had changed.

What made the biggest difference

David points to two things. The first is specific — his body's response to targeted support with berberine, a piece of his plan built around what his body actually needed.

The second is relational. Staying connected. Meeting every other week at first, having someone to check in with when things felt uncertain. He describes feeling low between sessions, questioning whether anything was working, and then walking into a meeting and being raised back up again.

He'll admit he probably didn't reach out between sessions as much as he should have. But he followed the protocol. He stayed the course.

Today

David says he sees things more clearly now than he did in the thick of it. The fog has lifted. He understands the journey he's been on.

His wife, who has watched his transformation up close, is coming around to working on her own health. And when a new friend recently started asking questions — "What has he done? What's he doing differently?" — David's wife was ready to share the story.

When someone asks David what Melissa does, his answer is direct: "She's a health coach and she really helped me." Then he talks about the bloodwork, the precision, and the fact that this wasn't guesswork.

In this conversation

• Life before: "Something's not right here"
• Why he said yes — and what he'd watched for 27 years
• "Game on"
• Unfolding the layers through brain fog
• What made the biggest difference
• "There was some precision to it"
• What he tells his friends
• Who's next: his wife and a new friend