It started with a bad accident.
Purivex was not built to be a brand. It was built because of a promise one man made to himself about anything that goes on skin.
A long way back.
OUR FOUNDER’S STORY
Purivex was founded by Joe Infante. Before there was a jar, a label, or a formula, there was a night on a Florida highway that changed his life, and years of pain and prescription painkillers that followed. Purivex exists because of what he found on the other side of that struggle. Here is his story, in his own words.
My story begins in the late hours of August 23rd, 2005. The outer bands of Hurricane Katrina were hitting South Florida that night. I was driving home on the Florida Turnpike in Palm Beach County around 1 A.M. when, in a torrential downpour, I came across an overturned SUV lying on its side in the middle of the highway. I pulled over, put my hazards on, and ran into the highway to help. A tractor trailer was coming toward me. I could tell from the size and brightness of the lights.
A girl was trapped inside, the driver’s side pinned to the pavement. I tried to kick in the windshield, but my foot kept slipping in the rain. So I climbed up the tires, broke the passenger window, and pulled Julie out of the wreck. We were standing on the passenger side door, getting ready to jump down to the road, when it hit. The tandem trailer smashed into her car and threw us over 300 feet across the highway into a grass ravine. We were lying in and out of consciousness when the Trauma Hawk arrived. I thank the passing motorist who called 911, because the driver of the truck that hit us never called for help. He called his depot manager instead. And I can never thank the Trauma Hawk team of Palm Beach County enough for saving my life. That was the accident. Then came the rehab, and my struggle with opiates in the years that followed.
The impact cost me my left eye. I broke both legs and both arms, fractured my skull, and spent the first 9 weeks of my recovery in a medically induced coma. I was in rehab for two years, and the fight to get my life back was the toughest fight I have ever been in, and I have been in a few tough ones. I was on and off Percocet for almost 7 years. I finally got help in the form of therapy to understand the toll those meds were taking on me and my relationships. It cost me a lot of them. I had become dependent on narcotics to get through my days and nights. I would get off the painkillers and sleeping aids for months at a time, but every time I wanted to get in shape or be active, I had to go back on them to deal with the pain. Over time, I realized it was inflammation causing most of my pain. My mind would say one thing and my body would tell me another.
One jar. One promise. Unchanged for ten years.
After years of that miserable existence, I started looking for alternatives. I tried yoga, bike riding, anything low impact. The pain was still unbearable. Then I started using CBD topicals, and for the first time, I found legitimate relief. Understand something. I am not saying CBD takes the place of opiates. There is a real need for them, and they do a great deal of good in pain management. But our healthcare system is abusing them. They are overprescribed to the point that abuse has become an epidemic in this country. It is time we find an alternative approach to pain management that eases our dependence on dangerous narcotics.
Since I started using CBD for my chronic inflammation, the benefits have been both physical and mental. I can exercise without excruciating pain and sleepless nights. I have climbed mountains and functioned normally the next day. Being active again has improved my attitude and my quality of life substantially. I no longer rely on prescription drugs to get through my day, and I have been able to mend and sustain meaningful relationships again. With the extent of my injuries, it is a miracle I am still alive. With the invasive surgeries it took to put me back together, 33 to date, it is even more of a miracle that I have any semblance of a normal life. I still live with daily limitations and pain. But CBD lets me fight my inflammation and my aches and pains without feeling desperate and dependent on pills. It is an amazing feeling, and one I hope to share with the world.
Joe Infante
Founder, Purivex
Ten years. One formula.
Purivex has been made the same way for ten years, in Colorado, from Colorado grown hemp. The formula has never quietly changed. The jar you buy next year is the jar you bought last year.
For most of those ten years there was no advertising at all. Someone bought a jar and told someone else. That is how the clinics and surgical centers found it too, and they order it by the case.
