For more than two decades, I built a career designing places where people could thrive.
As an architect, urban planner, and business development consultant, I had the privilege of working on projects across the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and North America. My work took me from Dubai to Gothenburg, Abu Dhabi to London, Singapore to Kuwait, Riyadh, Cairo, Amman, Guangzhou, and beyond. I spent years helping create environments that supported how people lived, worked, gathered, traveled, and connected.
From the outside, life looked successful. My career was growing, I was constantly engaged in exciting projects, and I was fortunate to work alongside remarkable people around the world.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that while I was helping design strong foundations everywhere else, I had neglected the foundation of my own health.
Like many professionals living in the Gulf, I became accustomed to operating at full speed. Long working hours, travel, stress, irregular eating habits, and poor recovery gradually became normal. I ignored the small signals my body was sending because there was always another meeting to attend, another deadline to meet, another project to deliver.
Eventually, those signals became impossible to ignore.
In 2021, I was diagnosed with leaky gut.
At first, I approached the diagnosis the same way many people do. I looked for quick solutions and expected a straightforward answer. Instead, I found myself entering a world that felt overwhelming and often contradictory. There were endless opinions, conflicting advice, and more information than I knew what to do with.
At the same time, my health continued to decline.
I struggled to focus during the workday and found myself canceling meetings because I simply didn’t have the energy or mental clarity to show up as myself. I felt disconnected from who I was. Tasks that once felt effortless became exhausting. My confidence diminished, my body felt unfamiliar, and I gained over 28 kilograms during a period when I felt increasingly disconnected from my own well-being.
The hardest part wasn’t the physical symptoms.
It was the feeling of slowly losing trust in my own body.
For someone who had spent a lifetime solving problems, creating plans, and building solutions, I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t solve this one.
Looking back now, that frustration became the beginning of something much larger.
Around that time, I found myself having regular conversations with someone who would eventually become my business partner.
Whenever I traveled to Kuwait, I would meet Dr. Lemia Shaban for a ‘coffee catch-up’. At the time, she was simply a family friend. Our conversations often drifted toward health because I was searching for answers, and she had spent years helping people through her work in functional nutrition and medicine.
What struck me wasn’t that she offered complicated protocols or dramatic promises.
Quite the opposite.
She focused on simple changes. Better habits. Better awareness. Better foundations.
She spoke about supporting the body rather than fighting it, about understanding root causes rather than chasing symptoms, and about consistency rather than perfection.
At first, I was skeptical.
The solutions seemed almost too simple.
Yet slowly, things began to change.
For the first time in years, I slept through the night and woke feeling genuinely refreshed. My digestion improved. My energy returned. The anxiety that had become part of my daily life began to ease. The constant bloating subsided. My ability to focus returned.
Then something unexpected happened.
I started looking forward to movement again.
I signed up for early morning spin classes. I became more intentional about how I ate, trained, rested, and recovered. What began as small adjustments evolved into a completely different relationship with my health.
Over time, I lost more than 28 kilograms, but the physical transformation wasn’t the most important outcome.
The greatest change was that I felt like myself again.
Stronger.
Clearer.
More present.
More connected.
And then life presented me with a lesson that would change everything.
In 2023, my mother was diagnosed with Stage 3 Alzheimer’s disease.
Not long after, I decided to step away from work and become her full-time caregiver.
Nothing prepares you for watching someone you love lose pieces of themselves.
The moment that changed me most wasn’t a medical appointment or a diagnosis. It was witnessing everyday tasks become difficult. Watching my mother struggle with brushing her teeth. Watching her struggle to take a shower. Watching her struggle to hold a spoon.
These are simple moments most of us never think about.
Until they are no longer simple.
I remember standing there and realizing that health is not something we can postpone.
We postpone many things in life. Holidays. Projects. Goals. Conversations.
Health is different.
Without it, every aspect of life becomes harder.
Our relationships suffer.
Our ambitions suffer.
Our independence suffers.
Our quality of life suffers.
Becoming a caregiver taught me that wellness is not about chasing perfection, looking younger, or achieving unrealistic standards.
It is about preserving our ability to live fully.
To think clearly.
To move freely.
To care for ourselves and the people we love.
My mother’s diagnosis fundamentally changed how I view aging and prevention. It made me realize that the goal is not simply to live longer. The goal is to maintain our quality of life, independence, vitality, and ability to participate fully in the moments that matter most.
That experience deepened my commitment to understanding health, not as something we react to when it begins to fail, but as something we nurture long before problems appear.
As I continued learning, researching, and speaking with experts, I became increasingly aware of a gap in the market. The Gulf region faces unique wellness challenges. Extreme heat, indoor lifestyles, chronic stress, dehydration, nutrient deficiencies, and demanding schedules affect millions of people every day.
Yet most of the supplements available to us were designed elsewhere.
Imported products were often expensive, difficult to find consistently, or created for lifestyles that looked very different from our own.
I kept asking the same question:
Why wasn’t anyone building wellness solutions specifically for life in the GCC?
Why were we relying almost entirely on imported products that didn’t fully reflect our environment, climate, routines, or needs?
That question became the foundation for NEYA.
The word Neya means “intention” in Arabic.
And when I reflect on my journey, intention is where everything began.
The intention to feel better.
The intention to learn.
The intention to take responsibility for my health.
The intention to support my mother.
The intention to create something meaningful for our region.
NEYA was never created to be another supplement company.
It was created from the belief that wellness should feel accessible, clear, trustworthy, and relevant to the people it serves.
We wanted to create clean, science-backed formulations designed specifically for life in the GCC. Products rooted in functional medicine principles, formulated with purpose, and free from unnecessary complexity.
Most importantly, we wanted to create a brand that empowers people to take small, meaningful steps toward better health.
Because meaningful change rarely happens overnight.
It happens through small choices repeated consistently over time.
One better habit.
One better decision.
One better day.
And often, one simple intention.
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