Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Tracey Holmes. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Tracey , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Over the course of your career, have you seen or experienced your field completely flip-flop or change course on something?

I complete did a u turn on my career path and changed, but I also feel like this was always meant to be…

Out of high school and into college I studied Child Development and graduated with my degree and teaching license and became a first-grade teacher right out of school. I loved it, had such a passion for the kids, but also for leading in learning in the classroom and because they were so small I could teach them life lessons and skills too because they were with me a significant amount of the day, so life skills basically. I worked under two women, one was a tough cookie who I didn’t really care for much, the other became a mentor for me over the next few years. During this time, I realized the leader part of this job was something I really strived for, and I sat down with the Assistant Principal and asked her if she would be interested in writing a referral for me for grad school. She looked at me and said “what do you want your master’s degree in? and I said I figured Education. She quickly retorted that I had already had a degree in that, and it should be something bigger, she said I should apply to get my Masters in School Administration. So, a few months passed, and I was accepted. I worked on the accelerated route for this and finished it in 2 years. Once I finished, I found myself back in the classroom as the budget cuts for the county I was now working were overwhelming and I had no option to enter this newfound profession. Since this is where i started, of course I had no problem being back. But what transpired over the course of that final year was definitely where my path started to bend away from what I had initially planned. The teachers were pretty line in the sand with me, my teaching was far from conventional, and I truly feel that now that I was armed with a license to be a principal they were trying to make sure I didn’t make it that far. I ended the year with my students being #1 in the entire country for 3rd grade test scores and jobless. I am a firm believer that God has a plan, and I didn’t know it at the time, but he was gearing me up for what I needed to be doing instead.
I took a sabbatical at this time; I truly needed it. I found myself coaching at a CrossFit gym while the friend who owned it was working on base at Camp Lejeune. Another guy also came and was helping to coach. One day we looked at each other and said, “why are we running someone else’s gym?” And it was there that Port City CrossFit came to life. Keith and I were both at a place in our life where we needed a break and were also not entirely sure what we would do next, so we created a business plan and brought to life a gym that over it’s years of existence made an absolutely overwhelmingly amazing community of people all from so many different walks of life. It was the perfect combination of us working on our passion of exercise and fitness as well as us working literally half days ( I taught the am classes and he taught the pm classes – like two ships passing in the night it was perfect until it wasn’t perfect anymore :) I started to actually use some of my administration running the business and had meetings with the then head of zoning for Wilmington, North Carolina at the time. We had grown way too big for our current location, so we needed a new and bigger spot! The zoning in downtown Wilmington was set back in the 50’s and 60’s when textiles ran the show. So basically, nothing was zoned appropriately anymore. I pointed this out to him, and he gruffly told me the mechanic shop I wanted to take over was no suitable for a gym. I did not give up of course, because this was crazy. But before I could try to convince him otherwise again, he actually reached out to me and asked me to come down. He told me I was right and for downtown Wilmington to grow and change and improve, something needed to change. I wrote him a thank you note, which quickly was returned with an in person visit to let me know I was the only person who had ever taken the time to write him a thank you note :) Keith and I worked on nutrition and lifestyle with our clients, as it was also an imperative part of the fitness journey to eat and live cleaner. This has always been my passion, but I never knew what it would amount to until now. I was coaching at the gym, and I managed to meet my husband at an event where another local CrossFit gym did an even with us. Once I went on my first date with him, I knew he was going to be my husband, so things moved rather quickly. It was time for me to grow up and I left my partner to run the gym alone and took a job in the Aerospace industry as an Account Executive. Now I know I needed to be more of an adult at this point at 29, but I really jumped headfirst into that lol. I had a job with insurance and a salary. I was big time :) haha.
My husband and I got married and I continued to work for the Aerospace job for 12 years. I learned a lot about myself and how to work with people and support them, finding solutions to problems, versus just leaving them or complaining about them. I found myself still yearning for so much more. I felt that if I could just find something I was actually passionate for…
Then 2020 happened. I feel like everyone at this point has a 2020 story. Most of them I hear are based in fear, sadness, bitterness, anger, etc. but for me it was life changing. I remember it like it was yesterday, I was sitting on my couch in the garage like most people seemed to be doing and the weight of everything was holding me there like an elephant sitting on my chest. I looked up and told God I could no longer manage everything I was feeling alone that I needed Him to help me from this place and put me where I truly needed to be and what He had in store for me. I felt like I was staring up from the bottom of the well and truly knew that it was only going to be up from here on out. Because I left it there on the floor, I knew that each instance when something would radically change was either a door opening or shutting, and it was God leading me. It was really cool.
I got really sick with Covid, not the moment I felt I needed, but one God knew I did. I was sick for an entire month. My son and I sat on the couch and snuggled and watching BBQ cookoff challenge on the Food Network, the entire season LOL. I realized it was the first time I had slowed down and actually stopped in a long time. Even though I was sick, it made me realize my priorities were all jacked up and needed my attention. I needed some extra support, so my husband suggested I go see his friend Rob’s wife who is a Nurse Practitioner and get an IV. In came Jennah the next step in the plan God had for me that I was not privy to :) Jennah and I quickly became good friends. She and I would talk on end about health and food and the body. She looked at me one day and said “why aren’t you doing this for a living you are better at it than most of the doctors I know” so that was all I needed. I enrolled in school once again and this time I knew it was meant to be. My inner nerd was on cloud 9, I was learning so much while simultaneously working my corporate job and homeschooling our son. It seems like a lot, but in the end my undergraduate and graduate degrees prepared me to work with my son, so one student was a breeze. My corporate job was on automatic at this point and the learning, well it made my heart just so happy. I completed my schooling, started my LLC and have continued to learn as much as I can each and every day. I have completed a blood chemistry course where I can look at standard blood labs and compare them to symptoms and tell far more about dysfunction inside the body than most. I completed level 1 to advanced Level 3 muscle testing (kinesiology) to find what the body needs to heal. I was working full time, running my business and teaching and now taking on new clients, every single one of them is a referral. I was taking on one person who quickly turned into me working with their entire family. I was taking people who have gone to every doctor and specialist, handing me their blood labs telling me how they look great on paper, but feel like crap. I was seeing myself as a catch all at this point but giving them relief enough to the point that they sent their family members to me to also heal or proactively keep them from getting sick. I can finally say when I gave my notice to my corporate job and jumped right into my business that I felt that I was exactly where God intended me to be the whole time. Sometimes the detours are what we need to learn in order to get where we need to go!

Tracey , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am an FDN-P, Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner. I show people how to heal themselves by fixing dysfunction in the body and removing things that have kept the body from performing its normal functions. We all have toxin buckets, the world is a super toxic place, depending on how full it is will show how well or poorly the body is performing. Metabolic health (the health of your cells or your DNA specifically) is the most important and often overlooked part of the body. Never have I been to the doctor, and they asked me how my mitochondria were fairing :) I spend quite a bit of time educating, or re-educating my clients rather on the body and what it’s capable of doing and how symptoms are its ability to communicate to you something is wrong and therefore muting it with pain relievers that don’t actually cure the issue are not ideal. I teach people how to truly heal themselves without synthetic medications that keep you stuck in trial and error with little to no relief. Your body once you start a protocol to remove the things that are plaguing it, it should be responding with answers on how to continue to help support it – I make a literal flow chart for healing with each of my clients. It’s the most rewarding opportunity I have ever been afforded!

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

When it comes to a service versus selling a good, many look to marketing in its various forms. Social media is huge obviously, but I am not technologically savvy so that is not where I look. I learned a valuable lesson about marketing for a service drawn industry, the existing clients are your best marketing effort. They already have set relationships with family and friends who trust them, seeing the changes in them gives those family members and friends the instantaneous desire to also feel that good! In this scenario, I have many clients who instantly feel relief after months to years of discomfort. They truly learn to embrace the healing journey they are on and understand that the quick fixes don’t work. They then in turn want that same healing or preventative, proactive change to be a part of all their loved ones lives.

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

I am a Bonafide hand holder and proud of it. I think it’s so important to walk with someone as you teach them. It makes me realize the culmination of all the things I have lived is why I lived them now in this time. Which is pretty rad. It is also pretty rad that the bible says to teach a man to fish means he will never go hungry and that’s my goal. I don’t want to hold the power I want to give someone the power to help themselves and continue to help themselves. I teach every person I work with how to fundamentally change their life with the foundations that are key to achieving and maintaining health.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.healwithtracey.com
• Instagram: traceyholmes_fdnp
• Facebook: Tracey Holmes
• Youtube: Heal with Tracey

Image Credits

Samantha Evans photography