Long COVID Recovery While Running a Business Full-Time

What Caused Nate's Long COVID Symptoms?

Nate caught COVID in January 2022 while living in Los Angeles. He was down for about a month. By February, he thought he'd beaten it. But something wasn't right. Every morning, he'd wake up a little more tired than before. At first, he chalked it up to running a business: staying up late, waking up early, burning the candle at both ends.

The slow creep of post-viral fatigue

By March 2022, the fatigue had company. A severe lower back pain showed up on his right side, so intense he'd have to lay flat on the ground for 10 minutes before it would ease off. On a flight from L.A. to Pennsylvania, the pain got so bad he had to ask the flight attendant for Tylenol. It didn't help. When he landed, he drove to the nearest parking lot and laid on the grass for 15 minutes until it passed.

Then came the heart palpitations. The vertigo. The brain fog. And the symptom that scared him the most: full-body muscle twitching. Fasciculations firing in his face, his legs, everywhere. With ALS in his family history (both his grandfather and great-grandfather had it), those twitches kept his mind racing to worst-case scenarios.

How Did Trauma and Stress Make Nate's Symptoms Worse?

August 2022 was a turning point. Two major traumatic events stacked on top of an already stressed nervous system and things spiraled.

The car accident and the moving scam

First, Nate was in a car accident with his grandparents. His grandfather fell asleep at the wheel and they collided with a tractor-trailer. They were about two seconds from a head-on collision. Everyone walked away physically fine, but the nervous system impact was massive.

Then, in the middle of his cross-country move from L.A. to Pennsylvania, his moving company turned out to be a scam. The quote went from $2,000 to $10,000 in 30 minutes. While driving across Death Valley in 130-degree heat, his back pain hit the worst level he'd ever experienced. He tried to find shade in the desert to lay down. Nothing worked.

These two events didn't cause his condition. But they poured gasoline on the fire. His nervous system, already stuck in a stress response from the post-viral state, got pushed even deeper into fight-or-flight mode. This is a pattern we see constantly: trauma and stress don't create the illness, but they keep the nervous system locked in a protective state that prevents recovery.

What Treatments Did Nate Try Before CFS Recovery?

Nate went through the full gauntlet. 3 ER visits, 3 trips to urgent care, 2 neurologists (including one at Hershey Medical Center, a top clinic in Pennsylvania), EMG and nerve conduction tests, CAT scans, genetic testing, and every blood test imaginable: thyroid, liver, autoimmunity panels, the works.

The supplement cabinet and failed protocols

On the naturopathic side, he saw three different practitioners, including one of the top naturopaths in Los Angeles who works with celebrities. He tried over 30 supplements, the carnivore diet for 3-4 months, parasite cleanses, enemas, infrared sauna therapy, and various detox protocols. His supplement cabinet looked like a pharmacy.

The carnivore diet dropped his weight from 155 to 140 pounds on a 6-foot frame. He wasn't getting better. He was just getting thinner. When he stopped restricting and went back to eating normally, his weight slowly came back, but his symptoms stayed.

The medical merry-go-round

The most frustrating part was the conflicting information. At one urgent care visit, they told him his heart test was so abnormal they almost called an ambulance. Hours later at the ER, they ran the same tests and said everything was completely normal. When Nate asked the ER doctor to help him make sense of it, the response was: "Well, you went to an urgent care. They don't really know much."

One neurologist finally mentioned CFS. "It sounds like this could be something like CFS," he said. "I don't know if you've heard of it." Nate hadn't. "What's that? Is it just being tired?" He was told there's more to it than that. But beyond a referral to another specialist, there wasn't much guidance. No clear path forward. No real answers.

How Did Nate Find CFS Recovery?

This is where the story takes an interesting turn. Nate and Miguel had actually known each other for years. Years before either of them got sick, Miguel was just starting his video production business, and Nate gave him an opportunity to film a project. They had breakfast together. Neither of them knew what was coming.

A connection that came full circle

When Nate posted on Instagram that he was struggling with mysterious health issues, Miguel reached out. "Hey man, praying for you. If things don't check out with these medical specialists, let me know. I'll be here for you." Once Nate's tests came back inconclusive and nothing was making sense, Miguel introduced him to the CFS Recovery program.

They hopped on a call. Miguel explained the nervous system retraining approach. And Nate committed. "At this point I'm all in. Let's go."

What Made CFS Recovery's Program Different for Nate?

For Nate, the biggest shift was understanding what was actually happening in his body. After months of confusing test results, conflicting doctors, and supplement protocols that didn't move the needle, finally having someone explain the nervous system in a way that made sense was transformative.

The nervous system explanation that changed everything

Nobody had ever broken it down for him before. Not the ER doctors, not the neurologists, not the naturopaths. The way CFS Recovery explains how the nervous system gets stuck in a stress response, why symptoms persist even after tests come back normal, and what you can actually do about it clicked in a way nothing else had.

Instead of chasing individual symptoms with individual treatments, Nate started addressing the root cause: a nervous system stuck in protection mode. That understanding alone gave him more clarity than two neurologists and three naturopaths combined.

Before vs. after: Nate's recovery progress

Metric	Before Program	During Recovery
Understanding of condition	No clear diagnosis or answers	Clear understanding of nervous system
Daily fatigue	Exhausted every morning	Improving energy levels
Brain fog	Constant, couldn't think clearly	Clearing up, sharper thinking
Running his business	Struggling to keep up	Operating with real tools and knowledge
Supplements	30+ daily, no results	Focusing on what actually works
Mindset about recovery	Confused and scared	Confident and moving forward

Where Is Nate Now in His Recovery?

Nate's still on his journey, and he's transparent about that. He's not at the finish line yet. But he's making real, measurable progress while continuing to run his business, write, and stay active in his community. The difference now is that he understands what's going on and has the tools to work through it.

What stands out about Nate's story is his refusal to let the condition define him. Even in the hardest moments, he kept showing up. He kept running his business. He kept helping other people. That drive, combined with the right framework for recovery, is exactly what progress looks like.

His story is one of over 70+ documented recovery interviews from people across 20+ conditions who've gone through CFS Recovery's programs. Every single one of them started in the same place: confused, scared, and wondering if they'd ever feel normal again.