People often don’t realize where gaps in health care are — until they directly affect them. Nicole Connell experienced these gaps in maternal care and funneled her journey into something that is now helping more than 70 women.
Connell is the founder and CEO of Mère — which means “mother” in French — a telehealth website that specializes in maternal care and mental health support. The platform connects women to perinatal mental health-certified therapists, pelvic floor specialists and parent mentoring. It’s designed to “fill the gaps” of traditional health care, with services such as a maternal functional medicine consultation for $200.
Mère meets women in all stages of their motherhood journey, Connell said, whether they’re trying to conceive, struggling with infertility, postpartum, in perimenopause and everything in between.
Collaboration and communication are the hallmarks of Mère’s care agenda. Most of health care is siloed, and communication (or lack thereof) between providers can allow things to fall through the cracks, according to Connell.
“There’s no one there to catch women in the in-between,” she said.
To address this, Mère takes a holistic, all-in-one approach to care. All the providers are within Mère, allowing them to easily communicate about a patient’s various needs and tend to them with “a seamless transition.”
Mère’s comprehensive functional medicine method allows them to get an expansive view of what might be affecting a woman, according to Connell.
“It just gives us a lot more space to ask questions and help these women,” Connell said.
According to Mère’s website, 20% of women suffer from a maternal mental health disorder, and more than 6 million women struggle with infertility or recurrent pregnancy loss.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
“Mental health is never really focused on during pregnancy,” Connell said.
Connell experienced prenatal depression during her first pregnancy, miscarried her second, and returned to work three weeks after her younger daughter was born. Her experiences inspired her to found Mère and provide support for other women going through the same struggles.
“That journey can be really difficult from a mental health perspective,” Connell said.
The stigma doesn’t help. Many women are hesitant to say they’re struggling or ask for help. But Connell encourages women to take the leap. Not only will it allow them to get help, but it can be an opening for other women in their lives to do the same. Each struggle is valid, and women shouldn’t worry that their problems aren’t “bad enough.”
“Everyone’s hard is hard,” Connell said.
Connell believes having a resource like Mère during her own experiences could have been significantly impactful for her.
“There are times now when I question what it would be like if I were to have another child now, with the support and the education and the village that surrounds me,” she said.
Mère launched in November 2024 and currently serves patients across Georgia and South Carolina, with plans to eventually expand services throughout the Southeast, Connell said.
Connell encourages other women who see gaps not being addressed, in health care or elsewhere, to step in.
“If you see something that nothing has been built to fix, then fix it,” Connell said. “If not you, then who?”
She said not taking “no” for an answer — whether from an actual person or just the circumstances around her — has allowed her to make Mère into what it is. It’s a strength she hopes other women stepping into the startup space will embrace.
“Sometimes things happen and doors close and you’ve got to find a window to squeeze through,” Connell said.
AJC Her+Story is a new series in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution highlighting women founders, creators, executives and professionals. It is about building a community. Know someone the AJC should feature in AJC Her+Story? Email us at herstory@ajc.com with your suggestions. Check out all of our AJC Her+Story coverage at ajc.com/herstory.
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