We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Natalie Foster a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Natalie, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?
I came up with the name of my brand through my experiences with mental health issues since elementary school, with mood disorders during pregnancy, and with mental illness after pregnancy. During all these years of battling against my own mind, I did not have any form of mental wellness strategies, coping mechanisms, or resources to support me through the extreme highs and lows. A little over five years ago, I decided that I wanted to improve my mental health and take charge of my mental wellness journey. I prayed to God about guiding me toward the things and the people that would help me improve my mental health. I also asked God to always help me remember that he is the head of my life and that I wanted to stay rooted in my relationship with Christ. My husband, my then fiancé at the time, helped me realize that I could help other people as well who were on their own mental health journeys. He tried to reignite my dream of wanting to start a blog. I put the task off of starting my blog because I was solely focused on prioritizing my own mental health. I wasn’t sure anyone would want to read anything I had to post about anyway despite the dream that had sparked in me while I was in high school. Fast forward to nearly a year later, we had moved to a new city & state. We were away from the family we had always depended on. I had so much anxiety about being in a new city. That is when my husband encouraged me once again to start my blog as a place to channel that anxiety while serving others. Instead of starting a blog, I decided to start an Instagram influencer account. It took me about 5 days to come up with a name for the account. I knew I wanted the content on it to be centered around mental health and faith. I had so many other things to do while I tried to take care of my mind at the time. I prayed to God once again to keep me rooted and strong as I took on all these responsibilities. That is when the name of my new account dawned on me which would become the name of my overall brand going forward!
Natalie, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
For the people who may not know me, Hey yall hey! I’m Natalie Nicole. First and foremost, I am a believer in Christ and I know that he can do all things for the good of those that love him! In addition, I am a Blogger & Content Creator living in Charlotte, North Carolina with my husband and two boys. As a Black stay-at-home mom, I advocate for the mental health and wellness of millennial black women. I am able to use my life as a black woman who is dealing with anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts to help so many other women who look like me. The place I am now in life has allowed me to have a career where I serve God, use my educational background of a B.S. in Marketing and a Master’s of Public Administration, live out my purpose, and carry out my passion.
The path I took to get into the blogger and content creator industry is quite lengthy! Are you prepared for the story?!?! Okay so let go, story time! This passionate purpose was fully ignited in me after I won the battle against postpartum depression for a second time. The passion to start a blog was within me for so many years as I tried to suppress anxiety and depression since the age of 11. I tried to hide my mental health issues with poor coping skills and void less activities until the day came that I could no longer do so. One day in 2011 while I was in college, I had a complete mental breakdown that forced me to seek professional mental health assistance at a group outpatient hospital/therapy program. With the help of countless individuals who shared their journeys, I was able to improve my mental wellness by first prioritizing myself then by managing all the hats I was taking on at that particular time of my life. After I came to the point where I was consistently putting in beneficial self-work, I decided to start a blog where I would share my own personal experiences with mental illness in order to help other black women prioritize their own mental wellness. However, as soon as I planned on starting my blog I gave birth to my oldest in January 2015 which led to the development of postpartum depression, postpartum anxiety, and postpartum obsessive compulsive disorder. Once I was out of the darkness from that mental health battle, I took on responsibilities that many other people told me would help keep my anxiety and depression away. Those responsibilities actually kept me away from the coping mechanism that I believed would be a saving grace, starting my blog. Over the course of 3 years, life took on the direction of putting certain goals aside to care for my child and myself. As time went on, I got pregnant again with my second child. During my second pregnancy I experienced anxiety, bipolar depression, and insomnia. After my son was born in May 2018, I once again experienced postpartum depression and postpartum anxiety which was accompanied by postpartum psychosis. Once again I battled against these mood disorders and came out of the darkness. Life responsibilities increased and life itself moved quicker as well. I got engaged, moved in with my husband-to-be, took on more responsibilities, then suddenly moved to another state by November 2019. My family and I started to settle into our new home as we came into a new year in 2020. Towards the beginning of the year, around March, I realized my priorities were in a place I never expected way back in 2011. I couldn’t believe how my life had changed and I finally wanted to figure out how to start putting myself first again. The Covid-19 pandemic started a few days after I made that realization. I was forced to come to terms that I would be inside of my home for an unforeseeable amount of time while caring for my children and being a wife. When my husband saw the look of overwhelmed in my face, he reminded me of my passion to start a blog for so many years. My purpose was reignited once my husband pointed out that I had stopped prioritizing my mental wellness by doing something I was passionate about. I worked diligently on creating blog posts while my oldest son learned virtually and my youngest son learned through his father and I. On October 10, 2020, in honor of World Mental Health Day, my blog went live. Since that day, I expanded my blog to a digital content creator brand across Instagram. TikTok, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn!
Ever since I started my blog/digital creator business, I have helped numerous women get back to prioritizing their mental health and wellness. Creatively, I have been able to help not only other like minded black women but also women from other ethical backgrounds remember to put their mental health first through simple and easily applicable practices. I have been able to do so by vulnerably sharing my personal mental illness experiences of the past as well as the present. Through my transparent approach, I have reminded countless other women that they must do what they need to do to care for their mental wellbeing so they won’t get overwhelmed with the various responsibilities they take on and the hats that they feel inclined to wear. With all this in mind, helping so many has inclined me to bring those women together to share their experiences. I believe that is what sets me apart. With everything I create, I intend on bringing all the women who interact with it together in a space where they can talk amongst themselves as well. I want the women and men who find my content life-changing to be able to interact with one another in hopes they will find community amongst one another and lifelong friends to share their highs and lows with!
I am most proud of how I have helped so many women get back to putting their mental health and wellbeing first. Without a healthy mind, it is hard to care for yourself and others. I am proud of how so many women made the intentional decision to put themselves first for once and to realize that they don’t need to apologize for it. That is the greatest form of self-love that God has blessed us with! The matter of which I came about deciding to help them took some time. I want potential community members to know that my purpose is all a part of a bigger plan, God’s plan that he instilled in me over 15 years ago. Although the years have gone by, my next move is always going to be God’s move. His move to that will lead me to larger territory. The territory where I will one day speak publicly to rooms full of women facing hardships that I have and still face. In addition to territory where I will receive further higher education to become a licensed mental health therapist. Finally, my territory will reach a space within the walls of my own non-profit organization on a mission to help black and brown girls and women get the tools and resources they need to overcome various mental health issues and conditions.
How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?
I keep in touch with my community members through my bi-weekly newsletter! In my newsletter, I speak candidly about experiences I have been dealing with throughout the week. I offer spiritual encouragement as well as motivation to prioritize mental wellness!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.mindfullywellrooted.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mindfullywellrooted
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mindfullywellrooted
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalienharris1
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/mindfulwellrted
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvftDOZWlcZUl-EdLK5u9wQ