I got here the hard way. These are the things that stuck with me along the way.

There is a version of me that was driving eight hours a day, eating whatever was closest, working in a field that was never built for someone like me, and calling it fine. I was not fine. I had not been fine for a long time, longer than I could remember. The migraines. The anxiety. The IBS so relentless I stopped expecting anything different. I just kept moving because that was what I knew how to do.

I do not remember deciding to stop. I remember peppermint tea.

A remedy so old it barely feels like medicine anymore. Something a grandmother would say. I was skeptical, and then I was not, because it worked. The bloating that had followed me for years started to ease, and that one small thing cracked something open in me. I started pulling the thread. Where did this come from? Who knew this first? I went deep into herbalism, into the history of plant medicine, into the Indigenous knowledge that was tending this land long before any wellness brand thought to name it. It changed how I saw things and connected things I already knew.

But it did not change everything. Because herbs are not a magic pill. I watched people abuse the plants, expecting them to be, and I felt the stress of that, the way it flattened something true into another thing to consume. So I kept asking. I went further back. How did people eat before food became an industry? Before it was made to make a profit? The answer was simple enough to be embarrassing. Protein. Vegetables (carbs). Fat. Real food. I learned about how the metabolism actually works, how the body runs on both fat and carbohydrates, how ketones are produced when fat is used for energy, how giving the body what it was built to use changes things at a level that shows up everywhere.

Thirty pounds. Gone. Labs stable. Sleep, finally. Energy that does not require caffeine to fake. The IBS is gone. The anxiety is quieter. The migraines are still there, and I am going to say that plainly because I think it matters. I have not solved everything. I am still in it. But I am not who I was, and I know the difference.

I work remotely now, helping thousands of people shift their health through technology and nutrition-based research for an amazing company making huge strides forward in metabolic research. I grow herbs, vegetables, and flowers on my small patio in Northern Illinois (zone 5b). I have a growing pet-friendly indoor plant collection that my cats have mostly decided to leave alone. I am working toward a bigger garden. I have the mental clarity now, something I did not have when I was running ragged.

Wildground is what I was always moving toward. A place to put what I have learned, plainly, without performing certainty I do not have. It covers herbs, whole food cooking, the rhythms of a grounded life, and the quieter work of finding your way back to yourself. Everything here started with something I actually lived. That is the only qualification I offer.

If something brought you here, you are in the right place.