The Short Version
I spent 29 years wearing different uniforms — military, fire, EMS, and federal law enforcement. Each one taught me something about service, but also something about the cost of silence. I grew up with an alcoholic father who used his fists instead of words. I learned early to be strong, capable, and invisible. I chased that through every uniform I ever earned. I carried a wound from before any of it started — a childhood that primed my nervous system for hypervigilance before I ever ran my first call.
By 2005, the symptoms had started. By 2007, life was coming undone. When my best friend Bob died by suicide in 2014, the last part of me holding the line let go. What stopped me was my dog, Zeus, who put his head in my lap and refused to move — and my grandfather's voice, Thomas Lorne Peart, a decorated World War II infantry officer. I stayed.
In 2016, I met Michele, the woman who would become my wife. She saw me clearly and stayed anyway. We have twins together — a boy and a girl. They are my reason.
I still struggle. I don't say that as a pitch — I say it because I promised myself this platform, and everything I do, wouldn't be another polished lie about "overcoming."
My credentials aren't academic — they're lived. Twenty-nine years in the thick of it, plus the ongoing work of rebuilding a life that makes sense. I built Through The Fire because I know how isolating this fight can be. I wrote it for the ones still in the fire, the ones who think nobody sees them — and for the ones who walked through the fire and survived, who know exactly how close it got and are still standing. I see all of you. Let's get to work.
The Field Guide
Through The Fire: A Field Guide to Recognizing and Reclaiming Life from Complex PTSD is available now, alongside a short-form survival guide and a 30-day journal. See all three →
The Memoir
A separate, full-length memoir — a deeper, more personal telling of the story behind Through The Fire — is currently being written. It is not yet available. This site will be updated when there's more to share.