Mental health care has historically centered on talk therapy and cognitive interventions, but a growing body of evidence supports what somatic practitioners have long known: the body holds stress, trauma, and emotion in ways that require more than conversation to release. For Colette Ellis, founder of Libbie Health, this understanding became the foundation for a company born during one of the most stressful periods in recent history.
In her episode of The Growth Layer, Colette shares how she digitized Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT tapping) to make it accessible to more women—particularly women of color—and how Libbie addresses the full lifecycle of women's health, from first periods through menopause. We discuss the challenges of transitioning from service-based work to health tech, building trust through ecosystem partnerships, and measuring outcomes that actually matter.
The Origin: 2020 and the Need for Accessible Somatic Care
Libbie's origin story traces back to 2020, a year marked by overlapping crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, widespread lockdowns, and the national reckoning following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Colette, a behavioral health coach trained in EFT tapping, was working as a coach for Calm at the time. She began thinking about how to make somatic practices more accessible, particularly for communities of color and women who might benefit from tools that address stress stored in the body.
EFT tapping is an evidence-based healing method that involves tapping on specific acupoints while speaking about emotional issues. The practice helps release stress, anxiety, and trauma by working directly with the body's energy system. While the tapping points remain constant, what changes is the individual's input into the process.
Colette saw an opportunity to digitize this practice. She was working one-on-one with clients and leading workshops, but she wanted to put this tool directly into people's hands. During lockdown, she connected with a conversation designer and began building the first Libbie prototype, which guided users through the tapping process in an interactive, personalized way.
The company didn't officially launch until 2022, after multiple iterations and refinements. But the core vision remained: make somatic healing accessible, scalable, and responsive to the specific needs of women navigating different life stages.
Understanding the Women's Health Lifecycle
One of Libbie's key differentiators is its lifecycle lens. Colette recognized that women's bodies and mental health needs shift dramatically across different stages: menstruation, fertility challenges, pregnancy and postpartum, perimenopause, and menopause. Each of these transitions involves hormonal changes that impact both body and mind.
Rather than treating these stages as isolated experiences, Libbie segments its approach to speak directly to where women are in their journeys. Someone trying to conceive faces different stressors than someone navigating postpartum anxiety or someone in perimenopause. The app acknowledges these differences in both messaging and content.
This specificity serves multiple purposes. From a user perspective, it builds trust. When a product demonstrates that it understands the particular challenges of your current life stage, engagement increases. From a marketing perspective, targeted messaging allows Libbie to meet women where they are, reducing the friction that comes from generic wellness solutions.
Libbie currently partners with Lobo Health in the maternal health space, where the app is part of their marketplace. This partnership validated the approach of segmenting by life stage and opened conversations about how somatic practices fit into comprehensive care models.
How Libbie Works: Personalization Meets Evidence-Based Practice
Libbie functions as a guided companion. Based on the emotions a user shares, Libbie directs them to the appropriate tapping points and leads them through an experience that includes breathing exercises. The app supplements conversational tapping with guided audio sessions that offer longer, scripted experiences tailored to specific emotions and challenges.
Beyond standard emotional triggers like stress or anxiety, Libbie incorporates context that acknowledges systemic issues. The app includes factors like microaggressions and societal stressors, recognizing that mental health is shaped not just by personal circumstances but by collective and structural realities. This is particularly important for women of color, who often face compounding stressors that traditional mental health assessments don't fully capture.
Colette describes the app as offering "self-therapy in your pocket." The goal is to provide users with a tool they can access on their own terms, in their own time, without waiting for an appointment or navigating healthcare systems that may not understand their full experience.
The app also includes mood check-ins, which allow users to track emotional patterns over time. This self-reporting creates data that users can reflect on, helping them identify triggers and develop awareness about what situations or interactions impact their mental health. For example, a user might notice that conversations with a particular person consistently lead to anxiety, prompting them to either prepare beforehand or use Libbie afterward to regulate.
Building Trust Through Ecosystem Partnerships
Libbie has grown primarily through ecosystem partnerships rather than direct-to-consumer advertising. The company works with organizations like the Loveland Foundation, which provides free therapy vouchers specifically for Black women, and is listed as a recommended resource in their national directory. Libbie also partners with Willow Behavioral Health, which provides more acute behavioral health solutions.
These partnerships are strategic for several reasons. First, they position Libbie as complementary rather than competitive. Colette is clear that Libbie is not designed to replace therapists, coaches, or practitioners. It's meant to be part of a treatment plan or self-care routine, working in tandem with other forms of support.
Second, partnerships build trust faster than isolated marketing efforts. When care navigators at Lobo Health introduce Libbie to their members, or when the Loveland Foundation recommends it, the endorsement carries weight. Users are more likely to try a new tool when it comes through a trusted source.
Third, these partnerships allow Libbie to reach users who might not actively search for somatic practices but would benefit from them. Many people aren't familiar with EFT tapping or breathwork, so education is a critical component of adoption. By working with organizations that already serve the target audience, Libbie can offer workshops and introductory sessions that lower the barrier to entry.
Colette also does direct educational work: speaking at events, leading workshops, and creating content on LinkedIn and Instagram. This dual approach—partnerships plus education—creates multiple pathways for discovery and engagement.
The Founder Journey: From Service to Product, From Coach to Tech Leader
Colette is technically a second-time founder, though Libbie is her first health tech venture. Her previous experience was service-based: coaching, consulting, and facilitating workshops. That background deeply informed how she thinks about building a digital product, but it also required significant identity shifts.
She remembers the early days of building the prototype, before officially launching Libbie Health, when she had to practice saying "I'm a health tech founder" and stepping into that role. For years, she had been comfortable speaking in terms of "we" even when she was working solo as a consultant. But transitioning into tech required a different mindset.
One of the most challenging shifts was moving from the tangible trust-building that happens in one-on-one or group settings to creating a product that works without her presence. As a coach, Colette could read the room, adjust in real time, and respond to what she saw. Once Libbie is on someone's phone, she can't be there to guide them through each interaction.
This realization shaped her approach to UX and design. Early on, she resisted focusing on details like button colors or visual aesthetics. Her practitioner mindset prioritized outcomes and clinical integrity over interface design. But she came to understand that if the product isn't pleasing or intuitive, users won't engage with it—and if they don't engage, they won't experience the benefits. That shift helped her embrace the importance of design in service of the ultimate goal: helping users achieve better mental health outcomes.
Colette also navigates the unique challenge of being a founder in the digital mental health space while managing her own mental health. She acknowledges that it can be lonely at the top and that the demands of building a company require ongoing regulation and self-care. Practicing what she's building is both a necessity and a reminder of why the work matters.
Measuring Outcomes and Building Clinical Credibility
Libbie approaches measurement with the rigor of a practitioner who understands the value of outcomes. The company has conducted small studies on Black women with anxiety, examining how the app impacts their mental health. These studies use standardized assessments like the GAD-7 (for anxiety) and PHQ-9 (for depression), which are common in clinical settings.
But Colette is also aware that these assessments don't always capture the full picture, particularly for communities of color. The systemic and societal stressors that impact mental health often fall outside the scope of traditional clinical measures. Libbie is exploring additional ways to assess how these broader issues affect users, incorporating those dimensions into mood check-ins and future studies.
The company plans to pursue larger clinical trials as it scales, building a body of evidence that supports both efficacy and trust. In healthcare, clinical validation isn't optional—it's foundational. Colette's practitioner background means she came into this work already understanding that measurement matters, not just for fundraising or marketing, but for ensuring the product actually helps people.
Looking ahead, Libbie is exploring integration with wearables. Many users already track physical health data through devices, and combining that information with emotional self-reporting could provide a more holistic picture of well-being. For example, users might notice correlations between sleep patterns, heart rate variability, and emotional states, enabling them to anticipate stress responses and intervene earlier.
This integration requires technical work—API calls, data permissions, user privacy considerations—but Colette sees it as essential to making Libbie a true go-to resource that bridges physical and emotional health.
The Role of Community in Sustaining Growth
Colette credits much of Libbie's progress to community: other founders, advisors, mentors, and early believers who made introductions, offered guidance, or invested when the company was still nascent. One of her first angel investors came through a program Colette didn't even get into—a reminder that sometimes missing a target still leads somewhere valuable.
This kind of serendipity is common in founder journeys, but it requires showing up, taking shots, and staying visible even when outcomes are uncertain. Colette describes the experience as lonely and challenging, but also sustained by the long-term focus on helping women achieve better health and well-being. That mission keeps her eyes on the prize.
She's also learned that healthcare doesn't follow the traditional startup playbook of hockey-stick growth. The industry moves differently. Building trust takes time. Demonstrating outcomes requires patience. Navigating healthcare systems involves complexity that doesn't resolve overnight. Colette has embraced the reality that doing this work efficiently and well doesn't always mean doing it fast. Positive outcomes that can be tracked, refined, and scaled matter more than speed alone.
What's Next for Libbie
Over the next 6 to 12 months, Libbie is focused on expanding B2B partnerships, pursuing additional clinical studies, and exploring wearables integration. The company recently announced a partnership with Willow Behavioral Health and continues conversations with other organizations that serve women at critical life stages.
The roadmap also includes developing more content—guided tapping audios, educational resources, and features that help users connect the dots between experiences, emotions, and patterns. The goal is to make Libbie not just a tool for in-the-moment regulation, but a resource that supports ongoing awareness and growth.
Colette is particularly interested in how data from wearables can enhance the user experience without overwhelming it. The balance is delicate: more data can be helpful, but only if it's contextualized in ways that empower rather than confuse. Her practitioner lens continues to guide product decisions, ensuring that every feature ultimately serves the user's ability to regulate, heal, and thrive.
Why This Matters
Libbie Health represents a broader shift in how mental health care is delivered and accessed. Traditional models depend on appointments, availability, and often significant financial resources. Digital tools that bring evidence-based practices into users' hands expand who can access care and when they can access it.
Somatic practices like EFT tapping offer an alternative entry point for people who may not resonate with talk therapy or who need tools they can use independently. For women navigating the hormonal and emotional complexity of different life stages, having a resource that acknowledges both biology and context can be transformative.
Colette's approach—building trust through partnerships, measuring outcomes rigorously, and designing with both clinical integrity and user experience in mind—offers a model for other founders working at the intersection of wellness, mental health, and technology.
Key Takeaways for Operators
- Access is a form of care. Removing barriers to support—whether through cost, timing, or availability—fundamentally changes who can engage with healing.
- Context matters as much as content. Understanding the full scope of what impacts your users' well-being, including systemic stressors, builds trust and relevance.
- Partnerships accelerate credibility. Working with established organizations and care networks reduces the friction of user acquisition and builds trust faster than isolated marketing.
- Measurement must match the population. Standard assessments are valuable, but building tools for underserved communities may require additional metrics that capture their unique experiences.
- Healthcare growth doesn't follow the tech playbook. Patience, clinical validation, and iterative refinement often outperform aggressive scaling strategies in health.
- Design drives outcomes. Even for practitioners focused on clinical integrity, UX matters. If users don't engage with the product, they can't benefit from it.
- Founders need to practice what they build. Leading a wellness company while managing founder stress requires modeling the regulation and self-care the product promotes.
Libbie Health is available at tapwithlibby.com. The name "Libbie" is short for liberation—a nod to the emotional freedom that EFT tapping aims to provide.
If you're building in women's health, mental health, or digital wellness and want strategic support on positioning, growth, or lifecycle marketing, Future Digital partners with founders who are shaping the future of care. Let's talk.
