At Thrive A Healthier You, we know what it feels like to sit in hospital waiting rooms, fill out paperwork through tears, and make impossible decisions in the middle of the night.
We’ve been there, scared, exhausted, and completely unprepared. That’s why we built Thrive: not to lecture, but to guide. Not from theory, but from experience.
Our team combines real-world caregiving expertise, certified coaching, and strategic health insights to help adults 40 and older take back control—one clear, compassionate step at a time.
Every resource we create is grounded in the truth of what we’ve lived. From managing chronic illness and navigating broken systems, to planning for independence, clarity, and peace of mind—we’re here for the moments that break routines and test everything you thought you knew.
You don’t need to be perfect.
You need something that holds.
That’s what Thrive A Healthier You was made for.
Founders & Editorial Leads
Chris Thompson — Founder & Editor-in-Chief
Chris is a certified wellness coach and former business executive whose personal health crises and caregiving experiences reshaped everything he thought he knew about being prepared.
His understanding of health began early. At 12, he watched his grandfather decline from Lou Gehrig’s disease, an experience that left him with a lasting sense of helplessness around aging and illness. But it was a quote from Steve Jobs years later that reframed everything: “If you don’t make food your medicine, you’ll be taking medicine for your food.” Chris immediately thought of his great-aunt, who walked a mile a day, took supplements, and thrived well into her 80s. That was the spark. Aging well wasn’t just possible, it was a choice, and it started long before the crisis.
That belief stayed with him through his battles. In his 30s, Chris was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and underwent gallbladder removal. In his early 40s, a sudden intestinal microburst nearly killed him, forcing emergency surgery and a complete reset on how he approached his health and his future.
But his real transformation came as a caregiver. He managed his stepfather’s rare cancer, his mother’s cognitive decline, and cross-border emergencies that no spreadsheet could solve. He learned the hard way that systems break under pressure, and most families are left to improvise in the dark.
At Thrive, Chris combines strategic thinking, lived medical experience, and hard-won caregiving lessons to help others avoid the chaos he lived through.
If the plan doesn’t hold when everything’s falling apart, it’s not a plan—it’s a risk. Thrive exists to build what holds.
Susie Thompson — Co-Founder & Senior Editor, Food & Wellness
Susie is a Certified Nutrition Coach and Food & Nutrition Specialist with hard-won insight into women’s health, high-stakes caregiving, and the kind of resilience you only earn by surviving what you never expected.
Her wellness journey didn’t begin in a textbook. It began in her 30s, after a uterine ablation for polyps forced her to confront sudden hormonal shifts—disrupted sleep, emotional swings, and a sense that her body was no longer following the rules. In her 40s, a partial hysterectomy added another layer to that disruption, reshaping her relationship with food, energy, and long-term wellbeing.
But everything changed when she became a caregiver.
When her father suffered a stroke and fell into a coma, Susie was thrown into the deep end: ICU protocols, emergency custody, complex decisions, and feeding him through a medical maze. Later, her mother’s cancer diagnosis brought international red tape, consular systems, and round-the-clock care, stacked on top of grief that didn’t wait its turn.
Through it all, she learned what most wellness advice ignores: that health isn’t about perfection—it’s about what still works when your life is unraveling. It’s how you nourish yourself on five hours of sleep and hallway decisions. It’s strength when there’s no backup, and clarity when your hands are shaking.
That’s why she co-founded Thrive: A Healthier You—a place where practical tools meet hard-earned truth, created for people facing the moments no one prepares you for.
At Thrive, Susie ensures every guide is compassionate, crisis-tested, and ready for real life.
Because when life breaks your routine, you need more than advice—you need something that holds. That’s what Thrive was built to be.
Why This Mission Is Personal
Thrive was born in hospital waiting rooms and sleepless nights—moments where we felt completely lost in systems that seemed built to confuse rather than help.
Chris watched his mother fade under the weight of cognitive decline, buried in bureaucratic red tape. Susie held her father’s hand in the ICU, drowning in insurance forms while trying to stay strong. Together, we faced a rare cancer diagnosis in Chris’s stepfather specialists without answers, endless appointments, and no clear path forward.
We’ve sat in sterile rooms where doctors spoke in jargon while our hearts broke. We’ve made impossible decisions at 2 AM, completely alone.
Thrive isn’t just a website it’s our promise. Every article, every guide, every word comes from the raw truth of what we lived. We’re building the resource we desperately needed—the one we couldn’t find when everything was on the line.
You shouldn’t have to face those moments alone.
We didn’t know that then.
We do now.— Chris & Susie Thompson
Thrive Guide Personas
Meet the trusted voices behind each topic on Thrive. Our editorial guides are designed to help you find the right advice, fast. Look for their names and faces at the top of articles to quickly identify content that matches your current needs.
To help readers navigate complex topics with clarity and consistency, Thrive developed eight editorial guide personas. These are fictional voices created by our team to reflect specific areas of expertise and communication style. While they’re not real people, their content is created and reviewed by credentialed professionals.
Each persona includes a visual avatar for approachability and recognition. You’ll see these faces throughout the site, but rest assured: the information behind them is built by real, qualified humans.
🔍 Note: Guide personas are editorial tools—not licensed providers. See our Editorial Standards for more
Margaret Wilson: Cognitive & Emotional Health Specializes in stress management, memory support, and mental clarity with a compassionate, grounded voice.
Grace Wilson: Sleep Optimization offers practical advice and hormone-aware insights for adults navigating sleep challenges after the age of 40.
Robert Thomas: Movement & Joint Health Offers mobility-focused strategies that prioritize safety, independence, and joyful movement.
Chris Carter: Nutrition & Anti-Inflammatory Diets Translates nutrition science into simple habits that support vitality and brain health.
Bill Anderson: Chronic Condition Support Helps readers manage conditions like cancer, inflammation, and autoimmune issues with lifestyle-first tactics.
James Foster: Preventative Health & Screening Brings forward-thinking advice to help prevent illness and promote aging with resilience and clarity.
Sarah Jenkins: Hormonal Health Focuses on hormone-balancing diets and stress support, especially during menopause and midlife shifts.
Elena Cruz: Integrative Aging & Lifestyle Connects holistic, mind-body aging strategies with modern, research-based tools for total wellbeing.
Our Standards
We combine:
- Lived experience (real caregiving, loss, planning)
- Professional credentials (certified wellness + nutrition coaches)
- Ongoing medical research
- Trustworthy editorial review
All medical and health-related content is fact-checked and supported by peer-reviewed studies, reputable health organizations, and Thrive’s certified professionals. Each piece includes clear disclaimers about scope and encourages medical consultation when needed.
We regularly review and update content as new research emerges. We follow Google’s E-E-A-T principles: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trust.
Transparency Notice
Our guide personas are editorial tools. They are used to give a consistent, human voice to each topic area, but are not licensed medical professionals themselves. All content that appears on this site is created and reviewed by real experts and always links to our contributor information.
Questions or Concerns?
Have questions about our content or want to share your own caregiving story? Contact our editorial team any time at on our contact page: