Today we’d like to introduce you to Brianna Wolin.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Brianna. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
My inspiration for Find Your Ditto is highly personal — it really is my life story. I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes and celiac disease as a small child, ages 4 and 5 respectively. Though I had a support system growing up – my mom and grandma both live with T1D and my mom worked feverishly to ensure I had a “normal” childhood – my experience as an undergraduate student at the University of Michigan was far different.
With forty thousand students on the campus, I was under the impression that I would meet someone with either – or both – of my chronic conditions – someone who could just say “me, too” and understand what it was like to worry about a low blood sugar episode during an exam or whether you had enough safe food in the fridge for dinner. However, by the end of my senior year, I’d met no one. The patient experience with isolation when living with chronic illness was the impetus for the patient end of FYD, though we later realized that no one was aggregating data about the psychosocial health and emotional experiences of those with a chronic illness beyond the clinic doors, and therein lied our business opportunity.
Has it been a smooth road?
I don’t think any entrepreneur has a perfectly smooth journey! Though we were fortunate to start FYD on the University of Michigan campus, where there was a strong emphasis on entrepreneurial opportunity, being not only a first-time founder, not only a young founder but also a woman founder (!) has made the road more difficult.
Additionally, operating out of the Midwest {we founded the company in Ann Arbor and I have since returned to Chicago post-grad where I’ve worked on FYD full-time ever since} poses additional complications in ramping up business — investors are extremely different in the Midwest compared to the coasts. We are expected to prove extraordinary traction prior to any investment dollar. However, this “struggle” has actually been valuable, as we’ve scaled Find Your Ditto over the last 2 years with money primarily from competition wins, alongside some investment from an accelerator. We’ve acquired our first paid customer, created our v2 technology on iOS and Android, launched a new website, gained a full board of advisors and more without raising an official round.
For other young women starting their journey, I would emphasize the necessity of not only building something that ignites your passion {because the days and weeks and months and years get very long if you don’t live and breathe your mission!}, but also the importance of seeking out every single available resource for your endeavor. There are endless opportunities that don’t cost a penny — a mentor of mine once said: “always throw your hat in the ring.” No matter how many reasons you can come up with — that you’re too early, that you don’t have a technology, that you don’t have a team, that it is just a side gig — ignore the negative voices and put yourself out there.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into Find Your Ditto story. Tell us more about the business.
Find Your Ditto is a mobile platform that connects people with the same chronic illness for on-demand, in-person peer support.
FYD is 100% patient self-identified information. By making this decision, we are able to circumvent the need for full HIPAA compliance. Additionally, the app has several safety features – the first is a report user function and the second prevents people from creating meet-ups within 24 hours of requesting a meet-up (this ensures people don’t use FYD in a mental health crisis). Finally, we’ve only hired developers with experience building secure platforms.
The platform itself provides a mobile-forward, ultra-intuitive opportunity to create on-demand, in-person, informal and personalized matches for chronic illness communities sponsored by healthcare systems for their patients.
Our mission is that no person living with chronic illness ever has to feel alone. As the first company that has created a mobile-first solution to drive improvements in patient emotional health — and ultimately their physical health — we’re proud to contribute to the arsenal of tools available to the 1/2 of all US adults living with 1 or more chronic conditions combatting the 2-3x higher likelihood of developing depression due to their management routines.
It would be great to hear about any apps, books, podcasts or other resources that you’ve used and would recommend to others.
Besides sitting as the founding CEO of Find Your Ditto, I’m also a blogger in the gluten free/allergy friendly space. As a result, I’ve come to love learning from other bloggers — there’s nothing like learning from someone who has been-there-done-that.
However, the person who I always look to for inspiration, advice and passion in the chronic illness/mental health space is the former head of the US Health and Human Services under President Barack Obama, Susannah Fox. I feel fortunate to call her a mentor and a friend. Her Twitter and blog represent her unique perspective regarding the evolution of mental health care in the US.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.findyourditto.com
- Email: info@findyourditto.com
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/findyourditto
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/findyourditto
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
