About Julio
About Julio Catano.
Metabolic Health Practitioner · HTMA Practitioner · Metabolic Health Educator & Coach
I didn't begin this journey because I wanted to build a health business.
I began because I needed to understand what was happening to my own body.
My Story
My health changed my life.
In 2020, my health changed dramatically. I was dealing with high blood pressure, liver inflammation, and a growing collection of symptoms that I did not understand.
I went looking for answers. I received medical care and different recommendations, but I remained frustrated because I still did not understand one fundamental question:
Why was this happening to my body?
At one point, I remember being asked why my blood pressure was not responding as expected. My answer was simple: “I don't know. That's what I'm trying to understand.”
I was taking multiple medications and still did not feel that I understood the larger biological picture.
- I felt confused.
- I felt anxious.
- I felt disconnected from my own body.
That experience changed me.
Then It Became Personal In Another Way
I wasn't only watching my own health change.
At the same time, I was watching people I loved struggle with increasingly complex health problems.
My parents were becoming weaker. More medical conditions appeared. More medications appeared. Their strength, mobility, cognition, and quality of life were changing.
I also began noticing similar patterns among relatives, friends, neighbors, and people around me. That made me ask a much larger question:
Why do so many of us wait until something goes wrong before we learn how our bodies work?
I didn't want to wait anymore.
The Question That Started Everything
I wanted to understand the biology.
I began studying. Not because I wanted another title. Not because I wanted to sell supplements. I wanted answers.
I wanted to understand:
- Metabolism
- Nutrition
- Minerals
- Hormones
- Energy Production
- Laboratory Testing
- Why Lifestyle Matters
- How All These Systems Interact
What began as a personal search eventually became thousands of hours of education, advanced courses, certifications, accreditations, study, experimentation, reflection, and continuing education. Over time, something became very clear:
«People deserve to understand how their bodies work.»
Why “Ancestral”?
The human body did not develop inside the modern world.
Our biology developed around natural cycles.
- Daylight and darkness
- Movement and rest
- Physical challenge and recovery
- Whole foods
- Periods of eating and not eating
- Nature
- Family and community
- Sleep
Our modern environment changed extremely quickly. Human biology did not change at the same speed.
That realization became one of the foundations of my work:
«Create the environment your ancestral body was designed to thrive in.»
“Ancestral” does not mean rejecting modern life or modern medicine. It means understanding the fundamental conditions human biology developed around and asking how we can intelligently incorporate those principles into modern life.
What I Believe
Health is more than the absence of disease.
I believe health gives us the capacity to live.
I also believe health is influenced by much more than food. Our biological environment includes nutrition, sleep, movement, light, minerals, stress, relationships, nature, purpose, and many other factors interacting over time.
The body is not a collection of independent parts. It is an interconnected biological system.
That is why I teach people to understand the biology before chasing individual symptoms.
- To think.
- To move.
- To work.
- To love.
- To contribute.
- To enjoy our families.
- To pursue purpose.
- To remain independent as we age.
My Role
I help people decide.
I help people clarify the health goals that matter to them and the life goals that depend upon being healthy enough to pursue them. Then I help them understand their biology more clearly. That may include education around:
- Health History
- Lifestyle
- Nutrition
- Metabolic Health
- Laboratory Trends
- Mineral Patterns
- HTMA
- Sleep
- Circadian Rhythm
- Movement
- Muscle
- Stress
- Recovery
- Foundational Health Behaviors
My goal is not to make decisions for people. My goal is to help people become educated enough to participate intelligently in their own decisions.
I Am Not Your Doctor
And I don't want to replace your doctor.
Medicine and health coaching serve different roles.
Your physician
Diagnoses disease, manages medical conditions, prescribes medications, performs procedures, and provides medical treatment.
My role
Education and wellness coaching — helping you understand concepts, organize information, observe patterns and trends, develop sustainable lifestyle behaviors, and prepare better questions for your healthcare professionals.
When something requires diagnosis, treatment, medication management, or medical investigation, it belongs with the appropriate licensed healthcare professional. I believe the best outcome often comes when an educated individual and qualified healthcare professionals can work together.
Collaboration, not confrontation.
Why I Teach People To Ask Questions
Your healthcare should include you.
I learned from my own experience how powerless it can feel when you don't understand what is happening. That is why I encourage people to:
- Know their health history.
- Keep copies of important laboratory results.
- Understand what common biomarkers represent.
- Look at trends over time.
- Ask why a test, medication, or intervention is being recommended.
- Understand benefits, risks, and alternatives with the appropriate healthcare professional.
- Ask questions when something does not make sense.
- Seek another qualified opinion when appropriate.
- Never discontinue prescribed medication solely because of something learned from educational material.
Being your own health advocate does not mean distrusting everyone. It means learning enough to participate.
Test First. Don't Guess.
Test. Identify. Correct. Retest.
I do not believe health should be built around randomly adding supplements. Nutrients interact. Minerals interact. Biological pathways interact. And more is not always better.
Testing has limitations, but appropriate testing can provide useful information when interpreted in the proper context. That is why one of the central principles of my educational approach is simply:
Test first. Don't guess.
My Educational Approach
Make the complex understandable.
I love biology. But I don't believe someone should need a medical degree to understand the basic principles affecting their own health.
My teaching style uses:
- Simple language
- Visual explanations
- Infographics
- Biological sequences
- Analogies
- Trends over time
- Systems thinking
- Practical examples
If a complicated biological concept can be explained with a road, a school bus, a factory, a battery, or a delivery truck, I will use it. The science remains important — but understanding comes first.
My Professional Development
Credentials & training.
My education has focused on metabolic health, wellness coaching, nutrition, human physiology, mineral patterns, HTMA, and related areas of health education.
NNP
Nutrition Network Coach Practitioner
Training focused on therapeutic nutrition and coaching people through sustainable dietary change.
MHP
SMHP-accredited Metabolic Health Practitioner
Accredited education in metabolic health, insulin resistance, and metabolic health trajectories.
HTMAP
Hair Test Mineral Analysis Practitioner
Training in reading mineral patterns, ratios, and the limitations of Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis.
Faith, Nature & Purpose
Health has meaning beyond numbers.
My personal journey also strengthened something that was already important to me: my connection with God, family, nature, and purpose.
My faith influences how I see human life and the responsibility we have to care for ourselves, one another, and the world future generations will inherit.
I believe our bodies deserve respect. I believe our health allows us to fulfill purposes that extend beyond ourselves. And I believe reconnecting with some of the fundamental conditions that have supported human life for generations can teach us important lessons about living well today.
These are personal values that influence my philosophy. They are not presented as medical claims or requirements for participating in The Ancestral Metabolic Health Method™. People of all backgrounds are welcome to learn here.
What I Want To Leave Behind
A roadmap for future generations.
My goal is larger than helping someone improve one laboratory marker. I want to leave behind knowledge — a clear roadmap that helps people understand:
- How their bodies work.
- Why their environment matters.
- Why health should be protected before it is lost.
- Why strength and independence matter as we age.
- Why families should preserve and share health knowledge.
- Why we should care for the natural world that supports us.
- And why understanding biology can change the decisions we make throughout life.
If this work eventually helps children, parents, grandparents, and future generations live healthier, stronger, more meaningful lives, then it will have accomplished what I hoped it would.
My Message To You
You do not need to become a doctor.
You do not need to memorize every biochemical pathway. And you do not need to understand everything at once.
- Start by becoming curious.
- Learn your history.
- Understand the basics.
- Know your numbers.
- Watch your trajectory.
- Ask better questions.
- Create better habits.
- Work with qualified professionals when you need them.
Understand your biology. Create the environment your ancestral body was designed to thrive in. Take charge of your health.
«My journey started because I wanted to understand my own body.
My mission continues because I believe you deserve to understand yours.»
Julio Catano · The Ancestral Metabolic Health Method™