There are moments in life when the butterflies are not warning you to step back. They are reminding you that you are standing at the edge of something that matters.

I woke up this morning with butterflies in my stomach.

The excited kind. The nervous kind. The kind that come when years of experience, months of hard work and one very big belief are about to take physical form.

This is the week our Health Canada licensed Echolight REMS technology lands on Canadian soil. It is the week we move from planning the Wallis for Wellness Beyond Your Scan Experience to putting it into action.

I am deeply grateful. I am filled with anticipation. I am also nervous, because meaningful new beginnings rarely arrive without uncertainty.

But beneath all of those feelings is trust.

Trust in the preparation. Trust in the people who have helped build this. Trust in the purpose that has guided my work for 34 years.

And as I sat with that familiar combination of fear and exhilaration, I realized that I have felt it before.

I felt it while standing at the open door of an airplane, preparing to jump.

Fifteen years ago, we launched Wallis for Wellness by taking one unforgettable leap.

The First Leap

Fifteen years ago, the clinic I had founded as Wallis & Associates had grown beyond its original name.

What began as a practice had evolved into something broader. It had become a place where education and empowerment mattered as much as treatment. Where collaboration mattered more than professional silos. Where giving back to the community was not an occasional campaign, but part of the foundation.

I needed a name that reflected not only what we did, but what we believed.

That was the beginning of Wallis for Wellness.

We were preparing to unveil the new name and launch a new website. But I was not about to mark that moment by simply pressing “go live.” The evolution meant too much. It needed to become an experience that represented the values already woven into the fabric of the business.

So, naturally, I launched myself out of an airplane.

And because I have always believed that we are braver, stronger and more impactful together, I convinced ten other people to jump with me.

We called the event Jump for Jack, Bail for Bethell.

Two Causes, One Community

The event grew from two deeply personal connections.

My cousin Jack lives with spinal muscular atrophy, a serious genetic condition that can profoundly affect muscle strength, movement and, in its most severe forms, life expectancy. Jack and his family gave a name, a face and a reason to one half of our mission that day. I wanted to raise money and awareness for Cure SMA Canada.

The other half was Bethell Hospice, a special organization in the community where my clinic existed. I had witnessed the importance of hospice care: the dignity it offers people nearing the end of life and the support it provides families during some of their most vulnerable and painful moments.

At first glance, spinal muscular atrophy and hospice care may have appeared to be two separate causes. To me, the connection was human and undeniable. Both were about honouring life, supporting families and surrounding people with care when they needed it most.

Why choose one when we could bring both communities together?

That kind of collaboration was not typical. That was exactly why it mattered.

Together, we raised more than $20,000 for two charities. But the impact of that day cannot be measured only in dollars.

When our feet touched the ground and we launched the new Wallis for Wellness website, we had done more than complete a skydive or meet a fundraising goal. We had breathed belief and hope into an idea: that people and organizations with different roles can create something stronger when they stop working beside one another and start working with one another.

Living Right Now

That same belief led us to connect the event with CBC’s Live Right Now initiative, a nationwide campaign encouraging Canadians to take action and live well.

Lisa Fender, one of the CBC producers helping lead that health movement, did not simply cheer us on from the ground. She put her money where her mouth was, strapped on a parachute and jumped with me.

The video captures the exhilaration on our faces when we landed. We had faced the fear, trusted the process and accomplished something together.

That moment still makes me smile because it reflects a truth that has followed me throughout my career: health education is most powerful when it moves beyond information and becomes action.

Before PHAM had a name, its heartbeat was already there.

Before Become the CEO of Your Health became our call to action, I was already asking people to step into the driver’s seat.

Before collaboration became a word used in every strategic plan, we were practising it, in clinics, in communities and, on that particular day, thousands of feet above the ground.

This is not a new direction for me. It is the continuation of a promise.

The Story Beneath the Work

Thirty-four years ago, I began with hopes and dreams shaped by my own healthcare story.

For years, I lived in a body that was telling me something was wrong while struggling to feel seen, heard or believed. The consequences of that experience were not mine alone. The uncertainty, pain and hardship rippled through my family.

Those years changed me. They also gave my work its purpose.

I wanted to help bridge the space between receiving care and understanding what comes next. Between being handed information and feeling empowered to act on it. Between healthcare professionals working in separate silos and a community working around the whole person.

Wallis & Associates grew from that purpose. Wallis for Wellness expanded it. The Preventative Health Awareness Movement gave it a louder, collective voice.

Four years ago, I closed the clinic in the form people had known. From the outside, it might have looked like an ending. Inside me, however, something larger was asking to be built.

I was not finished. I was being pulled from delivering impact mainly within four clinic walls toward helping create change across many clinics, professions and communities.

From an Idea to a Movement

The Preventative Health Awareness Month began as an idea: prevention deserved greater attention, healthcare professionals needed more opportunities to collaborate, and everyday people deserved practical tools to participate confidently in their health.

Today, PHAM is a Health Canada-recognized grassroots movement with more than 100 healthcare professionals and community champions and climbing, across Canada and North America. It has engaged people from different disciplines, communities and levels of government around a shared belief: healthcare is not done alone.

In June 2026, the Government of Canada launched the National Advisory Committee on Preventive Health Services. Its mandate includes advancing evidence-based, inclusive preventive health guidance and strengthening patient and public input.

That national work matters. So does the grassroots work that helps prevention live in the real world.

Policies and guidelines can help set direction. Communities turn direction into action.

That is where PHAM stands: prevention in action. We help translate a national conversation into education, tools, partnerships and human connection, one person, one clinic and one community at a time.

And perhaps, one day, one policy at a time.

Not My Last Chapter—My Legacy Chapter

I have found myself calling this the last chapter of my career.

My family and friends laugh when I say that. They insist I will never retire because I love what I do too much.

They may be right.

This does not feel like a final chapter. It feels like a legacy chapter.

It is the chapter where 34 years of lived experience, clinical work, advocacy, education and community building shift into another gear. The goal is no longer simply to serve the person in front of me, although that will always matter deeply. The goal is to build something capable of creating a ripple far beyond me.

I want to help change the legacy of healthcare for my children, their children and generations I will never meet.

Not by pretending one person, one device or one movement can fix an entire system. But by doing our part and inviting others to do theirs.

The Next Leap: Beyond Your Scan

That brings me back to this week.

Our Echolight REMS technology is about to arrive. It is innovative, portable and radiation-free, assessing not only bone density but bone quality and fragility score at the lumbar spine and femoral neck. Yet the technology alone is not the vision.

The vision is what happens around it and after it.

The Beyond Your Scan Experience was created because people deserve more than an appointment and a report they may not fully understand. They deserve quality scanning, meaningful education, a personalized What Now consultation, continued access to practical resources and a community that helps them turn knowledge into action.

They deserve to feel seen, heard, believed and supported.

That is why this is not simply a scan service. It is another bridge between information and empowerment. It is another way to help people stock their musculoskeletal health toolbox and become active leaders in their own healthcare.

This week represents a piece of equipment arriving on Canadian soil. More importantly, it represents decades of belief taking its next physical form.

The Parachute Is Not Certainty

When I look at the photograph taken just before I jumped from that airplane, I can see the butterflies in my smile.

I did not know exactly how the jump would feel. I could not control every second of the descent. I had to trust.

But trust did not mean jumping without doing the work.

The parachute was preparation.

It was the people beside me. It was the expertise of those who knew how to guide the jump. It was the courage to move forward despite not being able to predict every moment between the plane and the ground.

That is what this new beginning feels like.

The parachute is months of hard work. It is an exceptional team. It is collaboration, community, passion, purpose and the people who believe in this vision enough to help build it.

There is fear because the work matters. There is anticipation because the possibilities are enormous. There is gratitude because I know I did not and could not build this alone.

And there is trust that we will land somewhere different because we were willing to leap.

What Is Calling You to Jump?

Maybe you are standing at the edge of something too.

What is tugging at your heart?

What gives you butterflies, not because it is wrong, but because it asks you to grow?

What might happen if, instead of running from that feeling, you moved toward it?

And who makes up your parachute? Who are the people who will prepare with you, believe with you, tell you the truth and help you land with purpose?

We are not meant to make our biggest leaps alone.

As Wallis for Wellness enters this legacy chapter, I invite you to come with us. Follow the arrival and unboxing of our REMS technology. Meet the people behind the experience. Join the PHAMily. Help us keep turning prevention into action and changing the legacy of healthcare together.

If you are ready to better understand your bone and musculoskeletal health, learn more and book your Beyond Your Scan Experience.

We will also be celebrating this launch with a series of prizes, including a complimentary REMS scan and other tools designed to help people take their next best step.

Watch and follow for the official giveaway details later this week.

And if someone you care about needs the courage to take their own leap, share this story with them.

Trust the preparation.

Trust your people.

Trust yourself.

Then jump anyway as the PHAMily parachute is here to help you land safely with a positive impact. 🪂