17 mm L4-L5 Disc Herniation, Sciatica and FOOT DROP: How Limitless Member Avoided Surgery

 

In this episode of the Whealth Podcast, Greg shares how he avoided back surgery, recovered from a 17mm L4–L5 disc herniation, overcame foot drop, and eliminated his sciatica.... going from barely being able to walk to running a half marathon in 1:48. 

Start here - Get out of pain with our 30 day money back guarantee. Whealth’s Limitless Program

In this episode, Whealth co-founder Cam sits down with Greg to unpack the full story behind his before-and-after photos: severe lower back pain, relentless back spasms, a significant lateral shift, and the fear that he might have to leave his job as a kinesiologist and put his osteopathy studies on hold.

After speaking with a surgeon, Greg gave himself 30 days to look for improvement with conservative recovery. Around day 26, he noticed progress.

That was an early turning point in a much longer process of rebuilding strength, restoring confidence, and getting back to the activities he loved. Greg explains how he combined Whealth’s Limitless and Strength & Conditioning programs with osteopathy, therapy, and community support.

He also reflects on being diagnosed with degenerative disc disease at 18, the emotional toll of chronic pain, and how he worked through the fear of re-injury.

From struggling to walk down a hallway to progressing from 100 meters of running to 21.1 kilometers, this conversation explores the small steps behind Greg’s comeback. If you’re searching for a disc bulge or herniation recovery story, sciatica recovery without surgery, or returning to exercise after a lumbar disc herniation, Greg shares an honest account of his experience.

GREG’S WORDS & KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Start with something manageable. “Every day is one percent.” Greg used small goals to make rehab feel possible when even basic movement was difficult.

• Track function alongside pain. His early improvements included walking farther, leaving the house, and standing to cook—even before his pain had changed much.

• Rebuild gradually. “I’m just gonna focus on building a body that can handle what I want to do again.” Greg spent time rebuilding strength before returning to running and increasing his distance.

• Look beyond exercises alone. Greg describes how therapy, stress management, osteopathy, and community support complemented his movement work and helped him regain confidence.

• Consistency doesn’t mean perfection. Greg acknowledges missing days. What mattered to him was continuing over time and building on small wins.

• Recovery changed more than his fitness. “I would never wish this upon anybody, the injury, but at the same time, I would never undo it for myself.” Greg reflects on the perspective, faith, and lessons he now brings to his work with others. As Greg wrote about his recovery: “Whealth helped create a roadmap to get out of injury. I knew I just needed to show up for myself, progress ever so slowly and lean on the things that push the needle forward.”

 

CHAPTERS 00:00 17mm L4–L5 disc herniation and severe back spasms 01:50 Sciatica, foot drop, and considering surgery 04:56 Why Greg gave himself 30 days 07:58 Small goals: the “one percent” approach 11:30 Early progress, setbacks, and walking again 14:27 Greg’s lateral shift and muscle spasms 16:25 Looking at the MRI and discussing fear 18:41 Stress, chronic pain, and seeking therapy 23:30 Reframing setbacks: books and mindset 29:52 How Limitless added structure to rehab 32:36 The full story behind the transformation video 40:33 Rebuilding strength and running a half marathon 46:02 Consistency and doing the foundational work 50:25 What Greg says helped his recovery 52:19 Osteopathy and how Greg combined approaches 55:33 School, training stress, and recovery 1:01:37 Bringing his experience into clinical practice 1:03:26 Age, beliefs, and confidence in recovery 1:08:19 A degenerative disc disease diagnosis at 18 1:13:03 What Greg gained through the recovery process 1:14:43 Closing thoughts and the Limitless Program Want to explore the structure and community Greg used? Learn about Whealth’s Limitless Program: https://shop.spreadwhealth.com/products/limitless-program What part of Greg’s story resonated with you? Leave a comment and subscribe for more conversations about back pain recovery, movement, and strength.

Full transcript:

Cam (00:00)
Craig, welcome to the wealth podcast. What was going on there? why were

you so shifted over?

Greg (00:07)
Yeah, so that was probably at the worst of my L four L five herniation, but like seventeen millimeter herniation. I was just trying to make it through, I think it was like maybe week one stuff, like is where you're standing on a book or something and you're trying to do a little bit of a hip hike and

Just anything at that point, right? Like you could see in that video or that picture. it was just brutal. it basically lateral hip shift. I was just waking up with crazy back spasms at the time. middle of the night kind of like a and I I try to explain this to people sometimes and I think it's

It sounds like ridiculous, you know, like it sounds like I'm exaggerating and things like this, but no word of a lie, I think it's what a knife in your back would feel like at the time. Like it ten out of ten, out of the out of the night, like sleeping to waking, pain and then just like not being able to move, to have to like crawl out of bed to get into some sort of, you know

position that's like not as bad, but like the pain at that at this at this point, where like that video was taken was like just round the clock. Like no break for probably six weeks. And then

Cam (01:36)
Wow.

Greg (01:37)
yeah, it's just brutal. it's just nothing else to say.

Cam (01:42)
And so your your

your actual your diagnosis was a seventeen millimeter L four, L five herniation. And then

Greg (01:49)
Yeah.

Cam (01:50)
you also had foot drop, sciatica. what I mean what I know you're saying it was so uncomfortable, unrelenting for six weeks. I've had sciatica. What does sciatica and foot I I never had foot drop or drop foot. what does that feel like?

Greg (02:09)
just it's just like like to be honest in in the kind of noise of everything, it is like the least like the foot drop it just feels like weakness essentially. But it's the least like thing you're thinking about in the time 'cause the pain is just so loud. in the sciatica mainly. It was it like the sciatica of the pain that was just like clouded.

everything right like you're going out to if you're trying to socialize because this like it was six weeks of like intense pain but like you know like probably six months of ongoing pain so it's affecting like social relationships and all that stuff. so like in terms of going out I'm like okay well how long do I have to walk for to get to the restaurant? How long am I gonna have to sit here? am I gonna be able to like readjust myself?

Even just driving was like okay, can I lean on the center console to like kinda make it a bit more comfortable for me? so the foot drop was scary because I know as well that that's a red flag for okay, we need to look into surgery a little bit more. I didn't have any loss of incontinence or like numbness in in the sow region, but that is like

Pretty red flag. And when I spoke with the surgeon, he basically said, You know this is a red flag, but if you think you can do it conservatively, getting back to healthy or relatively, then you can try that. And so essentially when that was taken, I was I gave myself like thirty days and I was already doing wealth at this point. I think this was

A flare-up possibly from like maybe six months prior.

Cam (04:12)
Yeah.

Greg (04:14)
and essentially was just like 30 days if I do it every day and it doesn't help, then okay, you know where we're gonna we're gonna give it a break. And I think it was like twenty-six days or something, and I was I was like, okay, like I'm feeling better. Like there's a trajectory here.

Cam (04:29)
Wow.

Greg (04:31)
And that's all I was looking for is like a consistent trajectory to be to to tell myself, okay, this is gonna get better, you know? versus okay, I'm gonna have to get surgery because I still have a drop foot and I'm gonna get nerve damage and not be able to walk properly and all of this.

but

Cam (04:48)
Yeah.

Greg (04:49)
yeah, it's it's more just scary and then you're just trying you're just survival, right? Like it's just so much pain. So

Cam (04:56)
So why did you give yourself thirty days of doing limitless and committing to that to say I need surgery or I don't? And I mean, talk about cutting it close. I'm so happy that you saw

Greg (05:08)
Yeah.

Cam (05:08)
those results on day twenty-six.

Greg (05:12)
I've had previous herniations, so in twenty sixteen is the first time I like have been introduced to Andrew and his his move you back then. And that helped me through a herniation back then. I got stronger. Got like probably up until that point, but like that injury ended up being a

facilitating me being the strongest more in shape than I've ever been kind of thing because I started actually focusing on mobility and like a full body postural approach. So I was a little bit more balanced, you would say, in terms of strength and mobility. So it ended up being great. And then I just kept building and then COVID happened, you know, took off probably about at least a year of working out properly.

just kind of here and there garage workouts with like wood or you know, you see in all the videos online at the time. But

Cam (06:09)
Yeah.

Greg (06:12)
coming out of that, trying to just like being hard headed and trying to just go back into where I left off a year before because of my ego or whatever else might be, right? And then you can't live the same and then you keep just doing all the things that you did when you were in your peak.

And then you're not still in your peak, so you're not listening to your body and all this, so hurt myself skiing and all that. and then repurchased the the wealth program, which was super cool 'cause I got to see like how things progressed from one to the other and yeah, it's much more comprehensive. There's a lot more like diet stuff in there, right? There's a lot more

Cam (06:55)
Yeah.

Greg (06:56)
like talking about how our our psyche as well and like

social behaviors all are tied into injury and it's not just okay we need to align ourselves and we'll be okay or we need to strengthen we'll be okay. It's like we have to take the mindset of okay it's okay where we are right now, accepting that and there's a lot of like, you know, psychosocial s sides to the injury as well.

Cam (07:19)
Sure.

Greg (07:20)
Yeah. I don't even know if that answered your question.

Cam (07:23)
Well, yeah,

no, and I I know we're it's crazy when I talk to people about injuries so complex and we're like, Hey, let's go over traumatic injury recovery in sixty to ninety minutes and we'll call it a day. You know,

Greg (07:34)
Yeah.

Cam (07:36)
it always leaves more questions than we started with. You know, we answer some and then we got ten more, but I was just curious, you know, with the foot drop, like, you know, you gave yourself thirty thirty days of

Greg (07:47)
yeah.

Cam (07:48)
of wealth and you saw those results on day twenty six. So

Had you not felt better by day twenty six or thirty, were you going to just inevitably do surgery?

Greg (07:58)
Yeah, yeah, basically. It was just a number to be honest. It was just something manageable. and what I've used in the past was like I think Andrew might talk about it in the program as well, but like I gave myself a hundred days essentially to feel better 'cause I was just like every day will be one percent and I'm not gonna say that, you know, it didn't work until I get to day a hundred, which is like a long time. But

I was also confident that I would feel better before that time. But it just helps to like kind of make it manageable. Every day is one percent. And if I don't do it, that's one less percent of like me getting better. and like one percent one day might be like pelvic tilts, glute bridges

and you know,

Cam (08:45)
Yeah.

Greg (08:46)
like some hip hikes, period. One time through or something. But it's just that one percent, okay, that's manageable. I can do that today and then build, build, build, build. Cause at the time it's hard to even like

Do anything, right? You don't wanna get out of bed, you everything hurts, so you're like, Okay, well, if I do one percent today, I can get a bit better. One percent a little bit better. and I think, yeah, thirty days was just a number that seemed doable for me. and, you know, four weeks time is a decent amount of time to like start training a habit and I just felt like

doing exercise for thirty days straight, there's no way that I can't get better. And if I don't then Okay, fair. Like we're in deep, you know, you gotta gotta actually like cut into me

Cam (09:36)
Yeah, at least give yourself the opportunity to know.

Greg (09:38)
and do all that stuff. Yeah.

Cam (09:42)
I I wish more people too had the perspective. I really like how you set that hundred day goal because, you know, we have people who are inevitably gonna actually enroll in this program because they're gonna see this podcast and they're going to want the result that you had, but they might get discouraged after doing two weeks of limitless and not seeing results, you know. And I think sometimes just in life, a lot of people quit before like just getting over one more peak and really seeing what they're capable of because they're frustrated. You know, there is

an element of unknown and there's also an element of trust and faith and then there's also an element of just like persevering and it takes some work, you know, and I think inevitably a lot of times with injuries, any sort of injury, it can feel like when you finally have that success, an overnight success, right? So it's like on

Greg (10:33)
Mm-hmm.

Cam (10:34)
day twenty six, not much was different from twenty five to twenty six, but yet you remember that day.

That was what stood out to you. And I think this happens a lot of times for people who are recovering. they have a really good week and it's like, I've been working on this program for eight weeks and then the ninth was incredible. You know, and it's n it's just that that thought process of the overnight success that people like, yet it's not about one overnight thing. It's just all the culmination of work that you did leading to that point. So kudos to you for that. I mean, that's awesome. Just

Such an insane kind of before and after there. what what do you remember feeling on day twenty six going from that foot drop, that insane lateral pelvic tilt? Like do you recall what day twenty six felt like and then how you kind of started to climb out of that hole?

Greg (11:30)
Yeah, and to be completely honest, I'm I'm not sure whether that video is from it's basically like two trajectories where I I got better through wealth and then I went and did like just like too much too fast. Like way too much.

Cam (11:54)
Again.

Greg (11:55)
Yeah, yeah, very much so. and

ended up flaring things up, right? But doesn't really matter regardless is like when I was at my worst, I gave myself that like thirty days. And yeah, from day twenty five to twenty six, like I don't think it was even necessarily you know, exponentially better. I wasn't like back

Cam (12:21)
Right.

Greg (12:21)
to the gym lifting all the things. Like it was a little bit better. Like I could like maybe straighten out a bit. Like I could

you know, like I could walk again, maybe. Maybe I was like returning to work at that point. like I I was working at the time doing rehab with seniors and like I was more debilitated than my ninety year old senior clients doing like leg

extensions

Cam (12:50)
Wow.

Greg (12:51)
for example and I couldn't even do a leg extension because it was too much dural tension and pain in my back. super humbling.

but I just remember like walking to some of these people's places and walking down the hall at the time was such a task because it was a long hallway and I I was just like, okay, one more one more room, one more room, one more room, one more room. Just breaking it up like it was a task to just walk down the hallway. And as I was moving through maybe like, you know, day a week

five, six, that walking started getting a little bit better. And I was at a point that was so painful for so long it was I was I was like if it stops here, you know what, it's it's it's okay again. Like like I can just walk again. You take it for granted,

Cam (13:43)
Right.

Greg (13:44)
but it was just crazy how much how bad it was. So then from yeah twenty-five to twenty-six just more functional gains. Probably pain didn't really change the

that that much, but functionally I was able to leave the house and maybe I started going to the gym to do my exercises rather than just in my room.

Cam (14:07)
Mm.

Greg (14:07)
lateral shift might have gotten better at that point. hard to say, but it was more just like functionally getting better. Returning to normal ish things. Being able to cook again, cut things like standing versus sitting down at the table.

Chopping things, you know?

Cam (14:27)
And what what was

actually so this is the screenshot, what was actually causing this massive shift?

Greg (14:37)
I mean it's just my body, I would say, well, I would say it's my body trying to offload the disc. So with the herniation, significant mechanical injury, it makes sense if I'm trying to offload it. But ultimately, part of this I think was also psychosomatic, where

I was just stressed for so long and then it was just another little stressor in my life that happened and all of a sudden like everything came back so quick. and it was just s muscle spasms, like causing the lateral shift. It was just like every night these these crazy spasms where I would just par be paralyzed and and then ultimately your body's just like a bunch of bones held by, you know, pulleys and things, so

You start yanking on one pulley way more, you're gonna start shifting.

Cam (15:35)
Yeah.

Greg (15:36)
and then trying to not rest and just go to work and all this stuff is just like you're just hitting the rev limiter even even more and it's not helping anything. so

Cam (15:46)
Right.

Greg (15:47)
I would say the mainly that was just the muscle spasms pulling me out of place and my body trying to do what would help it ultimately was offload and ideally rest. And it wasn't until I like accepted

where I was that I have to rest again and, you know, going to therapy, doing osteo, like regulating my nervous system, all these things where I was starting to come out of that shift.

Cam (16:10)
Yeah.

Greg (16:11)
yeah.

Cam (16:13)
Y yeah, I mean I had a I had an eight mil discarnation. I had a little bit of a shift, but as I look at yours, I'm like, Whew, that that catches the eye for sure. Yeah,

Greg (16:22)
Like a question mark. Yeah.

Cam (16:25)
that catches the eye for sure. so then and we can kinda talk about the psychosomatic stuff, the the mindset because it's interesting you're talking about a mechanical injury and the Ri let me pull up the R. I here, but the R I, you know, it

I think people want to see an image there, right? So

like the four or five, right? So you have your four

Greg (16:47)
Mm. Yeah.

Cam (16:50)
or five in here. Did you have any other discriminations?

Greg (16:52)
And and

and probably L five S one, yeah. Yeah. Looking at that MRI big time L five S one.

Cam (16:55)
Yeah, okay. Yeah. That's kinda

I I'm not a radiologist, so I won't say, yeah, but it's I've seen a lot of MRIs and

Greg (17:02)
Yeah, no.

Cam (17:05)
I would probably assume there's something going on there, right? So I think a lot of times

Greg (17:09)
Yeah.

Cam (17:09)
people people like seeing members of ours who have look at this MRI, it looks so severe, it looks like that is the problem. That's the mechanical problem. and I think it's

it's pretty difficult to separate. Like, you know, you gotta do you gotta do the physical work, learn these exercises in my mind, but also as you're kind of talking about the fear around it, the considerations of what if I never succeed and what if I never get out of pain and the stress that you place on yourself because you have that injury and also the stress that's coming pre-injury and during the injury and that sort of thing. So I think it can make

Dealing with a a severe injury, very difficult unless you have a very comprehensive program like ours. But you were also kind of mentioning too, like you had to kind of analyze your situation and it wasn't just about the exercises for you, but for someone who is going through limitless or an injury, okay, say they're taking care of the rehab. And I want to talk about maybe what was insightful about the wealth physical movements, but

We can get to that. What are some other things that you found very helpful for you to scan your situation mentally? you you mentioned the biopsychosocial model, like some some other considerations that might even help someone get and feel better in their rehab, their recovery, their pain.

Greg (18:41)
Mhm. Yeah, and like I think in my case, because it was such a chronic thing, I mean basically from twenty twenty two to twenty twenty four ish, somewhere like that, on and off back pain, right? And every time school started, the back pain would flare back up. so

For me, it's like, okay, this isn't a one time thing. It's it's it's tied together, right? Like the stress stiffens up my body and all this and then I am more susceptible to injury. Or like I'm

Cam (19:24)
Right.

Greg (19:25)
going to the gym and doing too much when I'm too tired and I'm more susceptible to injury and like those are behavioral things that I needed to address in things like therapy and and and

you know, identity things.

Cam (19:40)
So you were actually seeing a therapist

outside of the program. Very cool.

Greg (19:44)
Yeah, very much so.

just for I mean, if you think about months on end like being in that much pain, it gets pretty dark. So, I was at a point where I like, Okay, I need to reach out outside of the program to address some of like these like suicidal ideations and things. In terms

Cam (20:02)
Okay.

Greg (20:02)
of in terms of like

Cam (20:05)
Is that is that where

it got when you mean that was like the darkness?

Greg (20:10)
Yeah, just like the amount of pain, like you okay, how long does this last? Kind of thing. so I was like, Okay, I need some support here. and what

Cam (20:20)
What do you do you feel comfortable

sharing where your mind went in that dark place?

Greg (20:26)
Yeah, well just like I I just preface like I would never end my life but you are at a point where it's just so much pain all the time. And it's like coming from the health background, it's great to know, okay, like usually herniations like resolve within a year, like, you know, all this stuff. But then as it just keeps going and like you start

playing tricks on your mind, like, okay, well this is getting worse. This is like not getting better. You know, there's no like measurable progress over these couple of weeks. Like I'm and you you spiral, but yeah, it's just like w just starting to visualize

like what it would be like if I ended my life or all this stuff. And yeah, that's kind of like, okay, well you know at the point where logically I should reach out

elsewhere for for therapy and things like this 'cause you just need some support and honestly one of the biggest pieces of the program is the community on Facebook and having other people and that's actually the resource that ended up leading to like some of my discoveries on where to look for kind of resources on this psychosomatic stuff so

I you you know, like some rough days I'm just typing into the Facebook chat like I'm struggling here, like anybody else have a flare up and then someone else would or not someone, it'd be like ten people messaging like, Hey, I've been there, it happened I flared things up, it's like twice on my recovery, and now I'm back to normal life or it's like someone last week like had the similar issue and they're in a dark place too, but like you're not alone.

'Cause you know, you go out and function in the world and like everyone's moving around and you can't really tell who's struggling, who's not. Everyone looks fine in your mind. And then you go to this page and it's people who have similar experiences. And I think that was like one of the most powerful things, is like you're not alone in the injury. It's like you can lean on this group of people that are like you don't even know, but you start to almost like develop like little relationships by like tagging them in your posts when you post and they tag you in your post and you can like tell them what helped

you for like different cueing and they can tell you what helped them and it's like kind of this little yeah, it's just community that is super supportive. So some some people from that community recommended like podcast which is Tell Me About Your Pain which talked about psychosomatic stuff and Andrew sent me a video to look into different books or a book

was it healing back pain by John Sarnos and then the

Cam (23:16)
Yeah.

Greg (23:17)
obstacle is the way that one really helped as well by for something holiday I can't remember his first name

Cam (23:23)
Brian Holliday.

Greg (23:24)
Ryan Holiday yeah those were pretty pretty big I think yeah and

Cam (23:30)
Do you do you

have any any ideas that stand out to you that someone could tactically pull? Recommendation too. Maybe go read Healing Back Pain by John John Sarna or Obstacles

Greg (23:42)
Yeah.

Cam (23:43)
the Way by Ryan Holliday. Ryan Holliday also does the Daily Stoic, I believe. He's got some great ideas, but do you have any tangible ideas that stand out to you from either one of those books?

Greg (23:58)
I think

Partly probably the audiobook by Ryan Holliday that I listened to this helped me reframe as like this isn't necessarily a bad thing that I'm injured, right? It's that my body is telling me something is wrong and mechanically like I injured myself because something was susceptible to being injured. So what can I learn from this experience? And like taking, you know,

stock on like what I do have right now and like how this can be reshaped in my perspective to be an opportunity for something.

Cam (24:41)
Yeah.

Greg (24:41)
And I mean like every day getting out of bed like I had this is actually computer chair that I had to like lean on to till I got like standing with my weight. And it was like man, looking it back now, like when I feel a little bit tired

And I don't wanna go to work or I don't wanna go and like do this early gym session. It's like this is an opportunity that like I didn't have before, you know? so when you reshape to be like, this is gonna make me so mentally strong that like other people won't even understand the like mental strength I'm gonna pull from these moments and use them in the future, right? so so something like that, like it's it's taking stock of what you have and like

writing it out even like of being how can this help my future self? Like how will this be a learning opportunity or like a character building for my future self? and then in terms of the the book Healing Back Pain, it was again just taking perspective of how I'm viewing the world and what areas of my life where I could be perceiving as

something that's very threatening to me, where it's not actually. Where it's not like it's just stress. It's just an anxiety. And like naming that thing as what it is and just taking away the like power that it holds over you as like something that's like agitating you and like causing you to stiffen up and, you know, fear it and just be like,

Cam (26:16)
Hmm.

Greg (26:18)
that was just like I don't know. It's just my presentation that

is causing me to feel this anxiety and like that anxiety can be used as energy and excitement to like do a really good job on this versus that

Cam (26:33)
Mm.

Greg (26:34)
is anxiety that's gonna cause me to like stress out and if I stress out too much my back's gonna start hurting and then you know spiral.

Cam (26:43)
Very cool.

Greg (26:44)
just the biggest thing like taking perspective and naming the things that are scary right now but that could be used as

future like positives.

Cam (26:58)
Yeah. That's that's super cool. I think, you know, sometimes people when they have a disc herniation or they have sciatica or they have shoulder impingement or an MCL injury or an ACL injury, I think there's this there can be a very quick assumption to what are the exercises I need to do to rehab this and what bad movements did I do that caused it on

Greg (27:22)
Mm.

Cam (27:23)
the first first place, right? And so i I think it's logical like

You're just like, what is the simplest, most straightforward path to fixing this injury? And then if you kind of talk about stress or you talk about mindset or anxiety or other things in your life, sometimes people don't like looking at that because they're like, Maybe it feels woo-woo or it doesn't feel real or you're telling me it's all in my head. No, it's it's actual pain in my knee or it's actual pain in my back. and they don't like to think that it's not real and that's not what saying

mindset or psychosomatic or biopsychosocial is saying. It's saying the pain is real, but also it's not because it's influenced by other things, right? So

Greg (28:06)
Mm.

Cam (28:07)
in my perspective, I actually find that while some people want the straightforward just give me the exercises cut and dry, if it is an injury that's persisting longer, having other avenues to see maybe why you're having pain can actually be more beneficial because you're like

You know what? Like I've been grinding so hard on this movement rehab stuff for months and like it's making progress, but it's not. Yeah, there's an opportunity that maybe you're not doing the best physical movement rehab, but also then that means there's an opportunity as well to like look into your other stressors and anxieties. Maybe it's therapy, maybe it's whatever it is for you, maybe it's spirituality, but maybe you're lacking or not using other opportunities and avenues to bring the pain down and start to reorient. So

I think for someone such as yourself that dealt with back pain herniations, like you had a herniation in 2016 and you recovered and then you got really strong, COVID happened, you stopped taking care of your body as well, then you tried to jump back in, you got injured, and then you started at school studying what, osteopath osteopathy,

Greg (29:14)
Osteopathy. Yeah.

Cam (29:16)
right? That's stressful. You know, so there's all these ups and downs kind of going on, and I think for you, when it became kind of this chronic thing.

Yes, you needed to refine your movements via limitless, but clearly there were other things going on. So I think that's really cool that you're bringing light to that. What's tough about that is sometimes people like the movements because it feels clear, cut, and dry, like give me this, this, this, this. But then when you start talking about the mindset stuff or therapy or labeling anxieties or fears, it doesn't seem as much of a formula, right? So that that's what's hard for people.

Greg (29:52)
it's yeah.

It it was it and that was hard for me 'cause I again that's what's great about like I can't recommend wealth limitless enough because when you're trying all the rehab and you go to physio and it's rehab and it's they give you three to six exercises or even if they if you get a good one that writes you a proper program, that would be rare, I would say, when you're going to physio 'cause usually it's

couple here, a couple there, a couple there, and then you end up with all these things and you're like, when do I do this? Or when do I do this one? Or do I am I supposed to do all of these for like an hour and a half when I'm flared up? opposed to the program is so good, especially on the app you guys have, it's just like you go through, read, watch the videos, and then you have clear cut on this day I'm gonna do this, this, this, this, this, this. And as someone who gets bored easily, like every day is a little bit different, which is great.

And and then if you post your stuff in w how you're having a hard time, you know, someone will tell you, just do like minimal amount. Do like one set today. Do like half the amount of reps. and it's just so structured, which is great. But then when something like the psychosomatic side comes in, you're exactly like you said, there's all these different avenues to take now and now you have to teach yourself that movements are safe again.

And like at the worst of it when my when I couldn't even like walk. It was like, okay, if I tell myself I'm safe and you know, all these things, maybe I can walk it. And but then if you actually feel and believe it, it all of a sudden, you know, a couple of these steps don't hurt. And I was

Cam (31:40)
Right.

Greg (31:41)
like, if it's mechanical at this point, all of my steps should hurt all the time. Or if you like focus

Cam (31:45)
Mm.

Greg (31:46)
on the pain, you do your somatic tracking and stuff like this, it's like

well now it's kind of moving around. And mechanical pain would stay the same. And when you're trying to teach reteach your brain and those kind of behaviors, it's exactly like you said, so much more difficult, diffuse, it's not clear and cut, but ultimately I think there's people that are going through the same thing in the community that you can lean

Cam (32:15)
Yeah.

Greg (32:15)
on for like some of these questions and answers to, which is super helpful to be

Like am I just swimming in like you know, like

Cam (32:22)
Yeah.

Greg (32:23)
middle of nowhere with this or and then people can kind of help you create a little bit more structure where there isn't, through just shared experiences which helps.

Cam (32:34)
Yeah.

Greg (32:35)
yeah.

Cam (32:36)
You know, I think that's really cool just that you're talking about these other things because again I was I just was having this thought because you posted this sixty second video summing up your transformation. I'll I'll share it and then you know I'll link people to it as well. So, you know, you kind of shared your trajectory of

up you shared your trajectory of going through having this really crazy lateral tilt and then also to here i'll just let it play you know you had really bad sciatica and then here you are starting your rehab working on some hinges as well seated and then okay now you're going into lifting lowering the weight and then kind of talking about

You know, the benefit of the community, looking jack, doing some pull-ups, a half marathon, which I assume you just ran at 148, which is awesome. And then a marathon, right? Okay, so

Greg (33:42)
Mm.

Cam (33:43)
here is this crazy transformation summed up in 30 seconds. We posted on Instagram. for the testimonials, it does super well. There's over 150,000 views on there, like thousands of sends. So people are are looking at this because you showed a really cool transformation, but then we have people who are inspired by that on Instagram.

Then we had some people be like, make us a reel for every single exercise you did to heal. And I'm like, dude, you're missing the point.

Greg (34:08)
Yeah.

Cam (34:10)
Like, if you want all the exercises, buy the limitless program.

Greg (34:14)
Mm.

Cam (34:15)
But it just it kind of had me laughing because we're trying to show that healing is possible. And you started that video that we post on Instagram with the first thing you said wasn't like everyone needs to do limitless. You said,

Our body's capacity to heal is incredible. So you started with that underlying idea, which is really what this podcast, really what we're trying to get out. Sure, we want members in our limitless program. But if someone watches this podcast and they're like, you know what? I'm not gonna try Limitless, but maybe I'm gonna go read the obstacle is the way, or maybe I'm gonna go read Healing Back Pain, or maybe I'm gonna do all of those.

and do the limitless program because I need the exercises, I need the community, I want to save my time. Cool. But I had this podcast of this gentleman, Ben Torrens, I believe, from from the UK. And he had multiple disc herniations, got back surgery, pain didn't get any better, and was just really, really struggling. He went through the wealth program, got out of pain, rehabbed, ran a marathon to the hospital that cut him open.

Because they were telling him, hey, you're never

Greg (35:27)
That's cool.

Cam (35:28)
gonna be able to run again, this and that. And he

Greg (35:30)
Mm-hmm.

Cam (35:31)
sent me a message the other day. He's like, Hey Cam, I just wanna let you know like you're doing great work. There was this guy at the gym that was struggling with sciatica, and I told him to watch my podcast. He comes up to me like maybe three or six months later and goes, Hey, I watched your podcast. I didn't do the limitless program, but your story gave me hope that I actually had agency to heal in a physical way and do the rehab.

But also kind of start assessing other aspects of my life. So just want you to know like the message is getting out there. And I was like, that is so cool. The fact that we can just share this message and ideas. Obviously, would love for people to join our program. But if that's not what people are getting out of this and they're just getting hope, or maybe for the first time they're feeling like, I'm not alone. Greg went through it. Like just boosting

Greg (36:19)
Mm.

Cam (36:19)
people's confidence and agency, that's the ultimate point of this podcast. Not

what are the exact exercises, you know, 'cause I've also had trolls on YouTube be like, Okay, like help us out. All you're doing is selling a story and a and of course you're just trying to drive to the program. I'm like, if you want

Greg (36:34)
Yeah, classic.

Cam (36:36)
the program, buy the program. Otherwise there's plenty of good content in here, you know, to to get going on.

Greg (36:45)
Yeah, there's and like you guys like Andrew and Katie provide so many videos and like you c like this you also have to make a living like this isn't just volunteer work, you know? This is your job. they have a

Cam (36:55)
Yeah. No, no. Yes.

Greg (37:00)
job, they they provide service for an income. Like it's crazy, yeah. People everybody wants

Cam (37:05)
Yeah.

Greg (37:06)
like and it's the people want the quick like what can I do right now and be fixed in this

Cam (37:11)
Yeah.

Greg (37:11)
30 seconds like this video.

even though like the this video was over you know, a year of at least probably two years of like on and

Cam (37:22)
Yeah.

Greg (37:23)
off pain. previous injury in twenty sixteen and like this is so, you know, twenty sixteen to twenty twenty four of the journey and then now I'm at a place where I'm comfortable of saying, Okay, I'm I'm out of like that re injury phase or like

Cam (37:39)
Yeah.

Greg (37:39)
even the first time it happened it was two two years and then I got

good and then took some time, COVID happened, you know. so it's like, yeah, exactly that. People want that like quick, what can I do and be good next week? And it's like no, it's like the classic montage of, you know, like rocky cutscenes where, yeah, I can do that and if I just do it for a week, you're like, I want the results of like being world champion next week. It's like no. You you get the results of like feeling good in your body after putting in months

Cam (38:10)
Yeah.

Greg (38:11)
of work.

And like for some people, maybe you know what? Maybe it is like they go through one time and they're good to go. And

Cam (38:20)
Yeah.

Greg (38:20)
but it but it's also the principles you kinda learn about injury and y you putting yourself in your body again and like learning these movements and learning that like okay, I can be a little bit more mindful through movement and like activating in different areas and

Cam (38:37)
Yeah.

Greg (38:37)
not just like ripping through stuff.

Cam (38:41)
Yeah.

Greg (38:42)
yeah.

Cam (38:45)
Yeah, you know, I think what what I think is cool about the program, and I think I'm not putting words in your mouth as well, based off of what I think you're saying is cool and helpful about the program is, you know, there's a hundred and twenty exercise videos in the program in fifty six days and there's you got your movements to do every single day for a long time, and that's really helpful for some people to

have that sense of I am getting better at movement, mechan biomechanics, my body's intuition, proprioception, joint strength, muscular strength, decompressing the spine, working on my core, my hips. Cool. Those are all great things to do. And for some people, they don't really need to dip into the the mindset part of our program, the community, the nutrition, because I'm not saying everyone's perfect, but some people frankly don't have necessarily all that additional

Greg (39:36)
Yeah, exactly.

Cam (39:36)
Family stress,

financial stress, work stress, and it might be a more mechanical injury. but then some people, as they're going through, you're a good case in point, you needed the movement stuff, but you also clearly kind of realized, hey, there are other aspects of this pain, and it's gonna be helpful for me to not only dip into the community resources and asking questions and asking Andrew and our other members what

Direct things can I do from the program. But if there's not things to do in the program, we will point you there, start with this work here. So I think that's really cool that you use that hybrid approach of the program, but also you took the initiative. We're not therapists, we're not qualified for that. So if you went and saw a therapist, talk to me a little bit about your well, okay.

It's been forty minutes now we've been chatting. I think we've alluded to you're a lot better, right? So

Greg (40:30)
Yeah.

Cam (40:33)
sim sim i in simple terms, you went from and you're out of this really big spell. I think it's been a few years since flare-ups and stuff. So you're in a great state. I just saw you ran a 128 148 half marathon, you're lifting some good weight. So let's just kind of try to sum up really quickly that that most recent transformation, you went from

Debating surgery, foot drop, weakness all the way down the foot, six weeks of ongoing, unrelenting pain, needing assistance to get out of bed. we talked about some of those very dark dots that you were having as well, and having to work through those to what where are you now? What are you doing now? How do you see your body?

Greg (41:19)
Yeah. So like he said, worst of it, literally a week of stuck on my knees sleeping on my bed, like sleeping, eating an entire week, not moving. and then ended up getting osteopathy treatment and wealth together. which helped within, you know, like

six weeks I would say like significant significant difference and then continued building just in the gym for about a year just like not gonna do anything crazy, just gonna like keep progressing. I I did the Wells strength and conditioning program like just over and over until I felt like okay, you know what? I'm starting to get like my weight back on because I lost like twenty pounds. it's back to like regular weight.

was strong for l a whole year. I'm like this is like that was like twenty twenty five. I was like, I'm just gonna focus on building a body that can handle what I want to do again. And then in twenty twenty six is when I was like, okay, I still can't run or I haven't tried running again. That's where I'm gonna introduce this. Cause it was the main thing. I couldn't run more than you know, it was actually like a hundred meters without knee or back pain. And then just step by step

continuing I think I was still doing well's exercise strength and conditioning, but it's just starting to run again, you know? Same ideas that like all the exercises in wealth are okay, we're gonna do a hundred meters, two hundred meters, three as things kept getting better. And it was like compounding just like that like twenty-six days, you know, it was like all of a sudden now I can run a kilometer. Two kilometers. Three, five, and then

by what was it April I got up to like twenty one and ran that in June at my

Cam (43:20)
Wow.

Greg (43:21)
half and yeah I was happy with that. and then now I'm just at the point of just being back to where I was like prior to COVID, being like, Okay, well what can I throw at it now? I always want to do a Spartan race, cool, maybe triathlons next year. looking at like Iron Man in the distant future.

Cam (43:42)
Yeah, let's go.

Greg (43:44)
but yeah, even like I'm looking at, you know, a marathon next year and it's like still scary thought. I haven't ran that far and I've heard there's a big gap between half and full and it's like cool. Might have some knee pain come up at during the process, like got coaching for that, that helped. I get osteopathy treatment, that helps. I know my exercises and like I can always refer back to to the wealth stuff 'cause I still have that.

And even still do for like some, you know, muscle release stuff or like different exercises. Looking at it how Andrew does does something sometimes helps to like, maybe I actually have been doing this a little bit off or I could focus on like this core activation or whatever else when something kinda comes up. Yeah. Sorry that wasn't very concise.

Cam (44:31)
Yeah. No, I mean again it's we're trying to make a very

complex drawn out thing concise. in part because, you know, people are I think their attention spans are short and everyone's trying to figure out these answers of like how do they heal.

Greg (44:47)
Yeah.

Cam (44:48)
And I think having that a little bit of a concise summary of the story gives people hope, but the reality is like it like you said, the way that you started

was splitting up the program and your recovery into micro goals. Hey, if I don't see improvement within 30 days, I'm gonna get the surgery. You had that improvement within 30 days, but even before that, you're like, but it's really gonna take about a hundred days. And then if I do something for a hundred days every single day and I don't improve, then I can say, hey, it's not working for me. But even then you knew that if you actually did something for a hundred days you would improve. That's what I see with

Greg (45:24)
Yeah.

Cam (45:25)
our program.

You know, I don't see people actually do the program for a hundred days and not improve. What I see occasionally, because we do have a a refund policy, it's sometimes two, three, four percent of people refund the program. It's always people quitting before it's too early, you know? It's like, Hey, I'm not seeing

Greg (45:42)
Yeah.

Cam (45:43)
improvements in one or two weeks. I'm like, You never were going to, you know, you're the exception if you make those massive improvements within two weeks. You know, you're calling it too early, but that's I don't know.

You know, I I get it, I have empathy because it's a tough position to be in, but it's too early to call it quits in my opinion.

Greg (46:02)
Yeah, I remember and it actually still sticks in my head, so shout out to I think his name is like Sam the Wave Doctor or something like this. he once said it's not hard or it it might seem hard to do something every day for thirty days, but it's a whole lot easier than being in pain and not being able to do anything during your daily activity every day

Cam (46:28)
Yeah.

Greg (46:29)
or s like the super

paraphrase but that concept of yeah, it's hard to be like consistent, but it's a whole lot harder to not be able to live your life. And

Cam (46:41)
You know what's crazy is

Greg (46:43)
yeah.

Cam (46:43)
back when I was doing Move You, Sam had one of those simple statements that was just a light bulb moment to me as well. Cause I was twenty one at the time going through and I was studying, I was doing engineering and I was like, my gosh, pain's really limiting me. I'm not able to do things that I want to do in my life. But also I d I think I post in the group, you know, I have all these responsibilities, I'm studying, blah, blah, blah.

And he's just like, look, man, doing doing the rehab program following it is the easy part, not being in pain and not being able to do what you want to do, that's the hard part. And it was just such a simple idea that stuck with me. And that helped me

Greg (47:25)
Hm.

Cam (47:25)
switch my mindset around. You know, it's just that concept of choose your hard. I I will be the first to admit it's not.

necessarily the most fun programs to do at the beginning. When you're working on your breathing and your pelvis and your hips and your core and these small exercises, you're like, come on, really? Like can't I just do more fun stuff, bigger stuff? It's not supposed to necessarily be fun at the beginning. It's meant to provide a a base level so that you can build off so you can do the hard and more fun things again. But it's way harder to live a life in pain than just to maybe accept, hey, maybe I gotta do these things. You know, and I think

Even when some people have the absolute most reason to change, the most reason to drop their ego, the most reason to be patient, which is pain that's detracting from them, they still stay in their own way.

Greg (48:18)
Yeah. Yeah, I mean even I I joined the program with my mom actually. So I she

Cam (48:26)
Mm.

Greg (48:27)
she was going through a knee issue and I I joined her and it's kind of similar issues like where she's struggled to find some results as well and and it's it's ultimately just you have to buy in. You have to just do it and do these annoying breathing exercises that and

Cam (48:46)
Yeah.

Greg (48:47)
and like

posting your videos, which you know, is it can be like very vulnerable, especially when you're not like feeling your best. But like at the end of the day it's so much more rewarding to just go through those like uncomfortable, boring things to like like you said, build the foundation and then like anything, it compounds. So all of a sudden, those boring exercises that you can't do very much of or this and that.

all of a sudden like compounds and you feel a lot better, all of a sudden.

Cam (49:21)
Yeah.

Greg (49:22)
and it's just you only get that compounding through actually doing it consistently. It's like investing. You like, I gotta take all this money away from like spending on like whatever going out to eat and like gonna put a hundred what is a hundred dollars in my bank account. And then over you know, like twenty years all of a sudden you're like, wow my bank account's pretty sick. Like this is a lot of

Cam (49:44)
Yeah.

Greg (49:45)
lot of money now, it's way funner to look at now than a hundred dollars. But it's like it only happens if you put it in consistently, weekly.

Cam (49:52)
Yeah.

Greg (49:52)
And it's like you only get the reward from being the consistent. And like, don't get me wrong, I probably didn't do a hundred days straight. It probably took like a couple of days here and there. But then when you take that zoom out, it's like even if I did eighty of the hundred or ninety of the hundred, that's a win in the overall s scheme

Cam (50:11)
For sure.

Greg (50:12)
of it. You didn't quit, right? It's just like don't quit.

You only will like not progress through the program if you quit. Eventually

Cam (50:21)
Yeah.

Greg (50:21)
it's gonna it's gonna hit.

Cam (50:25)
Yeah.

Y yeah. It it's a lesson that successful people hammer and will continue to hammer over and over and over. Investing, building a business, a tough relationship, a family, your health. Like it's all the same lessons. It's just there's different challenges and pain points and yeah, injuries can be so frickin' tough, you know, but I think

Ideally, if someone's still watching this right now and they don't even join the Limitless program, like knowing that you're not alone and other people have gone through this injury and you can too. Now, if you need guidance, you know, you you want to find a a structure support to do that because I think sometimes people get inspired, like, I'll just go do it myself, and then they're all over YouTube and Instagram and whatever. Like I think you need to program, right? But yeah, it just it takes some work. When

When people ask you like how did you heal your back or avoid surgery, how do you synthesize that? 'Cause I've thought about that. Like, how would I if I were to say someone on the street right now, you know, 'cause when I'm at the gym and I I come across someone who's dealing with sciatica and I'm like, Hey, I went through that or you meet someone, Greg, and you're like, they're dealing with what you're dealing with right now. Maybe it's not foot drop, but it's it's

it's back pain that's really troublesome or it's sciatica or it's an injury. What pieces of advice would you give to them if they were like willing to listen to you for a little bit?

Greg (51:58)
Yeah, I am an over talker so it usually gets conv convoluted

Cam (52:01)
Ha ha ha ha.

Greg (52:03)
but I'll keep it concise is for me the biggest thing was definitely the wealth program and osteopathy. And it was a mix between osteopathy regulating my nervous system and

Cam (52:19)
Okay, so

let's l can you break down what is osteop maybe you're gonna do that. What is osteopathy? That's what you're studying. so what does that mean?

Greg (52:27)
Yeah.

So osteopathy is holistic manual therapy. It'd be like a mix between chiropractic, massage, physio like in person. So like a very the beauty of it falls within the assessment. Very thorough assessment, looking at the entire body, all the muscle attachments, all the digestive system, which are muscle that attach to the bones, the nervous system.

blood flow and we tried to look at the entire picture so that we can find what's going wrong, what's the pattern that's going wrong, and then how do we start to reverse engineer that through alignment, through promoting blood flow. And ultimately at its core is just how do we get your body to do what it does, which is just heal itself.

Cam (53:19)
Hmm.

Greg (53:20)
It's like if you get a cut, your body heals. So if you get an injury

Your body will heal, but like what might be preventing it from healing quicker, right?

Cam (53:30)
Interesting.

Greg (53:31)
So at its core, it's a manual therapy that looks at the whole body and promotes blood flow, promotes alignment through structural and functional alignment, and yeah, and essentially just getting your body back to what it does naturally, which is heal.

Cam (53:54)
Cool. So that was that was helpful for you.

Greg (53:54)
Reg in terms of regulating the nervous

Yeah, so in my injury, osteopathy and the limitless program together were great because the osteopathy was helping align my body structurally because you could see I was shifted and like my bones are physically like bent out of place and it you know doctors

Cam (54:18)
Yeah. Yeah.

Greg (54:20)
saying I had a scoliosis and stuff, which it was adaptive to

These muscle spasms that were happening because my body was just so charged all the time. I couldn't get out of that state. So releasing pressure on the nerves, pressure, and just like general like over activation sympathetically throughout my whole body. So bringing that down and then giving me windows to be able to do the exercise and like reactivate these muscles that are going dormant with

like inflammation and all and just lack of movement, right? So

Cam (54:59)
Yeah.

Greg (54:59)
so it's kind of just the alignment and nervous system being regulated added with the exercises were like the biggest thing for me. so basically osteopathy gave me a window and then wealth gave me the like day-to-day activities and exercises to get out.

of this crazy acute state and then continue

Cam (55:28)
Yeah.

Greg (55:29)
building on my own. yeah.

Cam (55:33)
Very cool. That's awesome. so what what does your school structure look like? I mean, you mentioned getting stressed and not contributing to your back pain. So has has your school study into this career has it been very stressful? What's been most stressful about it to you?

Greg (55:50)
Yeah, so very different structure with our schooling here for osteopathy. It's we're not doctors like in the States. We are manual

Cam (55:59)
Yeah, you're in Canada.

Greg (56:01)
yeah. So we're manual practitioners. so our schooling is part-time for five years. Excuse me. so we go in for about a week or so of schooling, do some overview of theory.

and all the practical knowledge that like applied knowledge we'll have to know for techniques and things. And then we have a about three week break and then we'd come back, write an exam on that theory that we've studied over those three weeks. And then

Cam (56:31)
Mm-hmm.

Greg (56:32)
we learn the next kind of like course and then repeat that over four years. And then I finished all my schooling now and now I'm in writing a case series and performing case series in my

clinical practice on how osteopathy and a global approach to treating a body can help with knee osteoarthritis, which is cool.

Cam (56:57)
wow. That's very cool. and you were saying

Greg (56:59)
Yeah. But every September,

sorry, when this would come, it I would have a flare up and it was it was just having, you know, all these responsibilities in school as well as it's part time so you're working as well, like part to full time. So it's just busy schedule and you heighten stress, you don't wanna fail exams and things like this, right?

Cam (57:22)
Yeah.

Greg (57:23)
And then it's n what happened for me was not listening to my body.

and still operating when tired or stressed out at the gym like going all out, not re not having like recovery days or offloading weeks and then ultimately injury's gonna happen at some point and that's what would happen.

Cam (57:42)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, and I think that I mean that's a a a good component of overall stress management that I think sometimes people are just looking at their injury is just mechanical. It's like, yes, you there's stress to the overall system. your central nervous system can accumulate stress, whether it be from over exercising or work or family or finances, whatever that is. And

I know some people would make the argument your body doesn't necessarily know the difference. You know, I think sometimes, yeah, sometimes I think there are different stresses between, you

Greg (58:19)
Mm-hmm.

Cam (58:20)
know, movement and family and whatever. But at the end of the day, if you're bringing a bunch of stress in, sometimes you can get injured in the gym and that's not just a gym injury or it's not just an athletic injury. And I think it's helpful to think about the overall picture. Again, which maybe sometimes

Greg (58:36)
Yeah.

Cam (58:36)
complicates it for people. For other people, it's like, maybe that's what I need to do. It's not just

about the biomechanics. Like biomechanics are important and sometimes it's really all you need to do, but sometimes it's not all that needs to be focused on.

Greg (58:56)
Yeah. and like a good actually thing they have nowadays is is the buzzword of like HR V, what's your HR V and recovery score and all this and like that's a pretty objective measure, right? Of what's going on? Why am I not recovering? I I I didn't maybe go to the gym today, but like I'm going through like this stressful time at work and now my recovery's lower, what's going on? And it's like, Well, that's your nervous system

being dysregulated, probably running more sympathetic. The same thing could happen if you had a huge workout, you just ran a marathon. Your recovery's gonna

Cam (59:32)
Yeah.

Greg (59:32)
be a little bit lower the next day because you're charged. And it's

Cam (59:35)
Yep.

Greg (59:36)
like like you said, like that's a measure of

Cam (59:39)
Yeah.

Greg (59:40)
that that stress on the body. And it it's like if people watching their watches or whatever the next day be like it'd just be like a little bit of a trigger for the maybe to be like reflecting on

is this just exercise related or could there be other factors where I'm not acknowledging the stress, you know? Or

Cam (1:00:01)
For sure.

Greg (1:00:01)
yeah.

Cam (1:00:03)
Yeah. I think the I hope people appreciate how severe your injury was and also how much determination and persistence you showed during that because I think sometimes maybe you missed that mark of like how cool it is that you actually overcame

Greg (1:00:21)
Mm.

Cam (1:00:21)
this. I see it, I acknowledge it, I recognize I hope you're proud of that because it is sciatica is

one of the worst things potentially to deal with. Like at least it can feel like that. But what's also cool for me now is like I'm so grateful for that experience. I I am so happy and my life has been blessed because I've gone through it. which I think sometimes feels easier said than done because people are gonna listen to this podcast and watch your video and be like, man, this is horrible. It's like yes it can hold both beliefs at the same time. It's horrible

Greg (1:00:54)
Yeah

Cam (1:00:55)
but also the obstacle is the way. It's just a way to reframe

The the goal is to not eliminate the obstacle, but the obstacle is the way forward and there's a lot of beauty that can come through it if you let it and if you change your mindset and your lifestyle around it to allow it to make you a stronger, better, more grateful person, whatever that is, which you know clearly you have. And now, Greg, I think it's cool, you know, you're sharing your story, but also you have so much experience now going through injuries, and you're working with people.

Helping other people through pain and injury. what what's been some highlights with your work? Are you done with school and now just in practice?

Greg (1:01:37)
I'm just in the process of writing my paper on this study that I did with in my clinical practice. So I've I've done all the

Cam (1:01:45)
Okay.

Greg (1:01:45)
examin exams and stuff, so essentially practicing both as a kinesiologist and then osteopathy as well within my practice. and yeah, like I've seen some really great results, even with like an age is like not even a factor. It it is, but like

Some people think, you know, I'm too old, it's not gonna happen for me as well. I worked with a ninety one year old woman who broke her leg and could not walk, was not moving for six months, and then after a few months of rehab and some osteopathy at the time, she was walking again. And it was like she at ninety one was like ready to just be wheelchair bound for everything, all tasks, and now she's she's walking again. So like

an example like that. Or, you know, people more my age that have a car accident and they're they got like whiplash or shoulder injuries and down and out. And then after a few months it's and again it's not gonna be a week, right? Like this isn't super fast stuff. Like your body needs time to heal. but again with realigning the body through osteo and doing exercise, like you're gonna get better.

And there's and then if you don't, that's where you have to look into okay, well what is going on in my personal life? What is going on with the way I see the

Cam (1:03:15)
Right.

Greg (1:03:16)
world that's keeping me here? What might be I what might I be pulling value from from being injured and like a looking into that?

Cam (1:03:24)
Mm.

Greg (1:03:25)
But yeah.

Cam (1:03:26)
You know, that concept of age is kinda interesting because I I was just having a consultation with someone the other day and we were chatting. She has a disc herniation and back pain and she's got other injuries. And I was learning more about her and I was telling her about my experience going through at twenty one and it almost became this like, aha, that's why you healed your disc injury. I'm so much older than you. Like I feel bad for you, but it you know almost like a must be nice. Like you were way younger and that's why you healed. And I'm like

How old are you? And she's like turned out to be 38. I'm like, dude, I'm 30 right now. You know, like it's

Greg (1:04:01)
Yeah.

Cam (1:04:02)
you're not a hundred and twenty. You know,

Greg (1:04:04)
Yeah.

Cam (1:04:04)
you're ten years older than me. And then I told her as well, I'm like, our eldest member's seventy-eight, you know. And again, all I can say is I feel better now at 30 than I did at twenty one. Like I felt like absolute crap at twenty-one. And I think sometimes people will hear these stories and they're gonna look at you, Greg, and be like, Well, Greg's young, so of course he healed it, but I'm older.

And there's two sides to every coin. You know, I think when older people look at younger people and don't necessarily get inspiration from them, rather the expectation is they should have healed because they're young and I'm old and you don't know what it's like to be old. What I will say is on the younger side, I have members come in all the time who have said, doctors have told me I am too young to have this pain and they don't know how to help. So now that's the negative side of being

too young. Like, okay, maybe you heal a little bit faster when you're too young, but it can create more fear and more unknown with why is someone in their teens or 20s or 30s or 40s or 50s dealing with something that should be 60, 70, 80. So the whole point is yes, age is a real thing, but what I see a lot of times, because I've had members who have been half my age with the same injury as me and I've had members be

Two and a half times my age with the same injury as me. Both people, everyone in between, they get better. The reason why they get better, sure there's biology behind aging, but it's also the mindset and the belief system that you're carrying about your age. Does it really matter that I'm fifty when Greg did it? How old are you?

Greg (1:05:43)
Twenty nine.

Cam (1:05:44)
Okay. Does it really matter that Greg healed in twenty-nine and I'm struggling with the same thing at fifty? Am I really gonna disclaim or discredit myself's my body's ability to heal because I'm too old? Or am I gonna look at it like, this is my life, all I can do is choose to age better and make each day count? You know, you have options in the ways in which you look around this age thing. I find sometimes people are so not helpful with their beliefs. Like they they

They discredit themselves, they just maybe it's an excuse, it's the smoke screen, or they just don't want to do the work, or they already tell themselves they can't achieve something because of XYZ before. And then it becomes the self fulfilling prophecy.

Greg (1:06:27)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, even like I've worked with a 80 year old woman, mainly for personal training type stuff. And again, she came in and she was just and you go grab a weight and that's too much weight, I'm gonna hurt myself, my wrists hurt when I I do this, my knees hurt walking up hills, and then after a couple months, I think I could do more weight.

actually my wrists are starting to feel better as she's gotten stronger. my knee doesn't hurt going upstairs anymore. actually I think I might go for this hike now. And like her life is getting better at eighty years old than it was the last ten years. And it's like, yeah, it's because she chose to like invest in herself. and like as you get stronger, actually thinking about my injury, I lost weight from being injured, so I lost strength. My legs. All of a sudden I started getting knee issues walking up the stairs, you know?

All of a sudden like carrying the groceries felt like a lot of work. And it's just like because I allowed or like I didn't allow myself, but I I got to a point where I was weaker and I was not doing as much exercise. And like if you get to a point where you strengthened your body, it's like those some of those things will just go away. And those things that

Cam (1:07:46)
Yeah.

Greg (1:07:46)
make you feel old. Like, well my knees just hurt. my back just hurts. Now I'm like, okay, like

Putting on socks isn't sore anymore. And it's like

Cam (1:07:56)
Right.

Greg (1:07:57)
also I've worked with nine-year-olds that have no pain and

Cam (1:08:00)
Yeah.

Greg (1:08:01)
that have never had an injury. So like age is not the issue. It's yeah, like

Cam (1:08:05)
Yeah, yeah. Or or the someone will call

in and they're like, Well, my dad my dad and mom have bad backs and my grandpa did and so that's why I do. I'm like

Greg (1:08:16)
Yeah, even me.

Cam (1:08:16)
You're

Yeah.

Greg (1:08:19)
Yeah, even me, I when I first got a disc herniation, I was eighteen and diagnosed with degenerative disc disease. At eighteen I was like, I have a disease in my spine

Cam (1:08:32)
Yeah, yeah.

Greg (1:08:34)
and and she's like, You this you're very young for this. Usually this is when you're like seventy and all of a sudden active person, you know, like sport is my identity at the time and I'm like, Life's over.

Crazy. And then, my aunt also has degenerative disc. my grandma and my dad has a bad back. All of a sudden I'm like, I am destined to have a bad back. Yeah, maybe there's some like hypermobility, laxity or something that's you know, like in the genes, but ultimately I don't want to live my lives

less active than I am, so what do I need

Cam (1:09:13)
Yeah.

Greg (1:09:13)
to do to get there is just like progressively get stronger. And do all these people with the back pain take care of their health like in the gym? Like not usually, right? So like if you w

Cam (1:09:25)
No. Yeah. I think I

Greg (1:09:29)
don't want that life, don't do the things that lead to that outcome.

Cam (1:09:35)
Yep. I think there are stages in which we can help people in Limitless. If you're listening to this podcast right now and you're like, okay, the mindset things that they're talking about genuinely resonate. I believe I have some agency and ability to heal, I just don't know what to do. Limitless is an awesome place to just take you through what you need to do. But if you're sitting here and you're just battling a lot of doubt, belief

My dad has back pain, so I do. I can't do it. I'm too old. I'm too young. I you know, someone else has to fix it for me. I don't think we're a good fit maybe forever or at least now until some of those beliefs get changed or you can kind of work with those. I genuinely believe that this program really could help ninety-nine point nine nine percent of people with back pain and disc injuries and stuff like that. but there's a barrier.

To who we can help based off of the mindset that they come into the program with or without. You know, some people are already predetermined that they're not gonna get better and they're not gonna do the work. So I think that's a it's a cool unlock though, too. Like I think the mindset approach to believing that you can make a you can make improvements in your body is very liberating if you truly come to that.

conclusion, I think then the healing process becomes easier.

Greg (1:11:04)
I very much agree. and like you one hundred percent will get out what you put into it. Like bottom line, if you don't commit to it, you won't get anything out of it. And like part of that is spending the money to be like this is a big enough investment in myself that like I give a shit and

Cam (1:11:26)
Yeah.

Greg (1:11:27)
I'm committing to this. And then if you consistently go through it, you'll get consistent results.

If you don't go through it properly, like you know, consistently, you're not gonna get results. It's as easy as that. And like we see it in as a clinician, if s even just helping somebody in terms of osteopathy, more passive treatment or exercise, ultimately they have to do stuff on their own in their lifestyle to get better. And if they don't wanna get better, we're not gonna like passively make them better by you know aligning some.

things and and help regulating their system if they go back home and they don't do anything to regulate their stress, they don't sleep and they don't exercise.

Cam (1:12:11)
Yep.

Greg (1:12:12)
They're gonna come back and then we're gonna go through the same process and the same process. We can't like it's not magic, right? and I mean they're making they're we're getting pretty close to taking pills for exercise and things, but

Cam (1:12:26)
Yeah. Yeah.

Greg (1:12:28)
it it's not that easy, right?

Cam (1:12:30)
No, I don't think so. I still think I you know, I think maybe there's some there's some cool medical advancements within certain medications and procedures and whatnot, but I don't know what's gonna actually if there will ever be my belief is there probably won't ever be something that's going to actually replicate your own ability and body's desire and need to actually

Greg (1:12:59)
And I don't think you want it.

Cam (1:13:01)
No, I don't think so either.

Greg (1:13:03)
and that's partly like the obstacle is the way is I was I was mentioning this that like I would never wish this upon anybody, the injury, but at the same time, I would never undo it for myself. And like one it taught me so much that I can carry into my own clinical practice. Two, it brought me to faith, which is a whole other story.

And three, it taught me consistency again that which I was falling off of the time with. And like since then I've been able to just gradually improve my life. And that was the like the like precipice of it all. That's where it started. It was at you kinda have to hit rock bottom sometimes and it's like if you could take a pill and then just be back to normal, you wouldn't gain all the things in the process of becoming

the person that rehabbed out of all these things, out of like these dark times, you know. Now when things are thrown at me, I can rely on the things I learnt in therapy. I can rely on like an osteopath here. I can rely on the exercises I learnt or the way I I know my body now. So it's like it's the process out that ends up being so much more beneficial long term than just if you were to take a magic pill and make everything better again.

Cam (1:14:27)
Fully agree with that. Yeah. Greg, you are the man. Thank you so much for sharing and and spending your time. I have a crying baby in the background right now that I'm gonna go attend

Greg (1:14:39)
That's okay.

Cam (1:14:40)
to. So I'm gonna wrap this up. best

Greg (1:14:42)
Yeah.

Cam (1:14:43)
of luck on the upcoming marathon. You'll have to keep me in touch if you've made it this far in the podcast and you need the structure, support, community that Greg got and thousands of other

Of people have gone through chronic pain, disc injuries, shoulder injuries, knee injuries, clink click clink click the link below for the limitless program. if you have any questions, you can drop a comment here. we'll Greg, I'll tag you or I'll I'll tag your Instagram post in there if you have any questions too. I'm sure you probably already got a bunch of DMs on that post, but thank you so much for sharing your story. You're the man. Appreciate you, Greg.

Greg (1:15:19)
Thank you, man.

Cam (1:15:20)
All right. Hey, take care, man.

Greg (1:15:22)
You too.