Addressing the Anxiety Epidemic: One Startup’s Effort to Lower Barriers to Mental Wellness

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Addressing the Anxiety Epidemic: One Startup’s Effort to Lower Barriers to Mental Wellness

There’s a quiet weight a lot of us carry. It may not be the most noticeable part of our lives, but it’s a subtle heaviness that greets us each morning, and can make some days feel a little overwhelming. It’s discreet and often manageable. Still, it lingers in the background, coloring our lives with a darker tint. Many may believe this is a uniquely difficult experience, but more and more, it is becoming a shared reality many of us have. This burden is much more common than we think. So it’s about time we’re taught to manage it better.

For context, around a billion people live with a mental health condition. Perhaps more importantly though, among those affected, a mere one in fourteen get effective treatment WHO World Mental Health Surveys. So many suffer, and most do so quietly, without support.

And still, when facing stress or anxiety, the standard path to feeling better often takes a lot. It asks us to find a therapist, it asks us to wait, it asks us to go, and it asks us to only then figure out if this is the right solution for us. Which it may not be.

More modernly, there is also the digital version. Yet, even then, we’re forced to download an app for a specific tool, we’re forced to make an account, to go through an onboarding process, to build a habit, and to then see if this app’s specific tool is what we need. Each task feels reasonable on its own. But, when stacked together, in front of someone already low on energy, they become a wall.

And here is where the part of most importance lies… the part we can actually do something about.

The reality is that, as mentioned, thirteen out of fourteen people who are suffering don’t get effective help. But, I think we can all agree this is not because we don’t want to feel better. We skip it because the entry point is designed for someone who is already high on energy and doing fine, when the people who need the help are often not. The tools meant to help demand exactly the resources we have least of when struggling: energy, time, know-how, and perfect rationality. Our solutions expect perfection from us. But what if they didn’t?

The question I couldn’t stop asking myself wasn’t “how do we convince people to get help”? It was: “how do we make the first step so easy that people can actually take it?”

That question is the reason I’m building Bemellou.

And the idea at its starting point is almost embarrassingly simple: make the first step toward mental wellbeing, something we can do with no energy, no effort, and no appointment. In other words, make the first step so simple, that it doesn’t feel like a step at all, it just feels like a gift.

So we made it a plush, and we called each one “a Mellou.”

Each Mellou is designed to serve as a physical reminder that support exists. Mellous sit quietly on our beds, sofas, shelves, or in our backpacks. When users choose to engage, they can access wellness resources through the accompanying app. Each Mellou unlocks an app with calming tools, exercises, programs, therapist-led wellness sessions, and a community of people who meet us where we are. A platform built around the idea that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to well-being. And so, we made many sizes.

The plush is the on-ramp, the step before the step, built for the people the system usually loses at the door. Only now, the door is always open.

And this didn’t come out of nowhere. It’s just about time we did something about it. Each of us behind this has lived with our own anxiety, stress, burnout, loneliness, or just overall discomfort. Some of us did something about it, and some of us didn’t. But, we all got tired of seeing people around us suffering, and set out to make something we wished had existed on the days when “get help” felt like one more impossible task.

The point of Bemellou is never to replace therapy, medication, or people. Its goal is to encourage engagement with wellness resources and support options.

We’re building this not because we’re past it. Because we’re in it. And if something can meet us there, then maybe it can meet you there, too. And maybe, that’s where everything starts.

Learn more about Bemellou at Bemellou.com.

About the Author

Rodrigo Arismendi is the co-founder and CEO of Bemellou, a comfort plush and wellness app built to make the first step toward mental health easier. He is also a university student, studying Math and Economics at Northwestern University. As a person who has felt what it’s like to feel pressure and not know where to look, he is deeply interested in how we can deal with pressure, stress, anxiety, and the human side of mental wellbeing.