Dr. Sean Matteo
I am a Christian, husband to my high school sweetheart, father of three Beautiful children, successful Chiropractor,and all around entrepreneur. I grew up in a small town in Southern New Jersey, just 25 miles from Philadelphia and on the way to the now infamous Jersey Shore. It was a place where the children walked or rode their bikes to school and played outside until the sun went down. The town had it’s own beaches and it’s own day camp during the summer. From one end to the other, the street I grew up on was loaded with young families, whose parents had decided to settle in suburbs. Everyone knew each other and grew up together. Even though it’s been years since my family left Nahma trail, we still keep tabs on many of the families we grew up with. Thanks to Facebook, I chat with many of them. We also had great schools which gave us a great foundation to build upon for the future. My point is that it was a great place to grow up. I’m grateful for that because I know that many people don’t have such fond memories to look back on.
As I moved into my teen years I became very passionate about sports, playing anything involving a ball, but focusing mainly on hockey. Ice hockey, street hockey, roller hockey, it didn’t matter as long as it was hockey. One of my fondest memories with my Dad, was going to Flyers games at The Spectrum in Philadelphia. There is nothing like seeing a hockey game in person and I was lucky enough to go all the time. Being only 45 minutes from Philly it was easy to go to Flyers, Phillies and Eagles games. I miss that a lot.
I used to make fun of my two best friends because they would go out and play golf together. Truthfully I was a little jealous but I never let them know that. Then one day some other friends asked me to go play golf with them, so I did. As is often the case with hockey players, golf came very naturally to me. While I hit some horrible shots, I also crushed a few drives. One in particular prompted a player in the group ahead of us to say “who’s the Greg Norman back there?” Well, I was hooked after that. My passion turned to golf. I joined our local country club and played or practiced every single day. At that point I was seventeen. By the time I was nineteen I was asked to try out for the golf team at Rutgers University. I was blessed to play varsity golf for four years at Rutgers. That time produced some of my favorite memories. Not to mention forging lifelong friendships.
About two years into college I became trained as an EMT, which ultimately changed the course of my life. For the next six years I was 100% dedicated to serving my local community as a volunteer EMT, giving over 20,000 hours during that time. It’s also prompted me to change my Major from business administration to Nursing. On the first day of my last semester of nursing school the President of the Nursing School came into our class and reported that we would all have a hard time finding jobs as the marketplace was full, especially the better high paying jobs that a BSN such as myself would be seeking. Even for me, who was at the top of the class in clinical skills with shining recommendations from my professors, it was impossible because there were NO jobs! After a year of searching, the true turning point came when my wife, then girlfriend was preparing to depart for chiropractic school. She knew I was frustrated and one day she said to me, “why don’t you come with me, you would make an amazing doctor?” It took me about 30 seconds to decide YES! I applied, was accepted, and we shoved off for St. Louis Missouri. While Holly started her first semester at Logan College of Chiropractic, I was enrolled in an accelerated program so I could finish some required classes, Organic Chem I and II and Physics I and II, which I completed in only 12 weeks. I started on the chiropractic path one semester after Holly.
Webster’s dictionary defines serendipity as “the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for”. Without a doubt this is the path I was meant to follow!
