Lifting weights put food on my table. It was like I'd found a doorway into another world. I'd spent my childhood and early teenage years overweight, out of shape and lonely. Through weightlifting, I started to become the person I always knew I was. As my body changed my sense of who I was and what I could accomplish grew stronger as well. My chunky frame toned up and transformed to muscle; women began to turn their heads and drop their jaws as I walked by. Things only snowballed from there; I had received the Teenage Mr. America title, Mr. New York title, and Mr. California title.
Eventually, I moved to Los Angeles and over time I became a personal trainer to some of the most powerful and famous people in the movie industry. I moved into a penthouse apartment in the Hollywood Hills, had a booming business and more elite clients under my belt than I had ever dreamed possible. But really, I'd long since gotten over the thrill of being seen in the company of celebrities. I was more than just one of the countless hangers-on and gawkers that hover over Hollywood like a cloud of gnats. I wasn't some would-be actor or a steroid-peddling hustler. I had become an integral part of the machinery that turns the wheels of Hollywood.
So many people had told me I was a fool to pursue bodybuilding. My days as an overlooked and unkempt fat kid had left me with some deep emotional wounds, and while it felt wonderful to have a muscular physique and to have a gorgeous and adoring woman on my arm, the real thrill was that people looked at me with respect. They valued my time with them, and valued how I was able to motivate them.
Action stars don't get those physiques overnight. It takes time, sweat, and discipline. That's where I came in. I was the guy behind the scenes who maximized their time at the gym, took their phone calls in the middle of the night when they had a question about what to eat from the catering service on a movie set halfway across the world, and convinced them to put in the extra effort that transformed them into the superheroes they portrayed on screen.
One night I attended a party at one of my celebrity clients. As I looked across the crowded room that night, I knew that not all the eyes that appraised me were friendly. I knew some of those party-goers looked me up and down to see if they could notice if my muscles weren't as hard as they'd been before. They were hoping, as always, I'd gained weight, or lost my toned physique. When you're on top, the wolves wait around for you to fail. They wanted gossip. They wanted to be able to say "Did you see Mike Torchia tonight? He looked terrible. I guess he's finally washed up." I would never give them that satisfaction. I couldn't slip an inch.
The Hollywood machine had provided for me, but trying to stay afloat in that image-conscious and reckless world had only amplified my deep-seated insecurities leftover from childhood. Inside, I was still the fat kid I'd been years before. I was still the overlooked wallflower who hadn't gone to his prom, whose father had berated him, who'd had nobody to turn to in his darkest moments. My muscled body had hidden my long-dormant insecurities, but they were starting to emerge in other troubling ways.
Over the years, I became bored of my life and felt unfilled. I have seen good friends get sucked into the drugged-out decadence of LA to never return and I didn't want that happening to me. I knew it was all connected to that afternoon in White Plains, and to all those years of feeling like a nobody. I knew something had to change. LA is the makeover capital of the world, but it's not normally the place you go to discover your true self. I knew I faced an uphill battle, but I was willing to do whatever it takes to change my life. That was the day I decided to create a health and fitness program for children. I called it operation fitness, because I spent a great deal of time studying the military physical conditioning programs at West Point Military Academy. The rest is history, since then I have devoted my life to preventing children from going through the suffering of being of unhealthy and unhappy, as I did for many years.
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