Coffee and Postpartum Anxiety: Kelly's Story and the Birth of a|dash
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After a difficult birth experience and battling postpartum anxiety for over a year after her son was born, Kelly was sick of not feeling like herself. Even as a former two sport DI athlete that always loved fitness, that season was HARD. She eventually sought out support from a holistic health practitioner and that started Kelly on the road toward self healing through food as medicine.
Kelly has been working in the wine industry for 12 years, but her passion lies in health and wellness. She created a|dash in her kitchen as a way to keep her wellness routine SIMPLE, but her passion for helping others on their journey turned her personal problem into a vehicle for true change in the community.
In this episode you'll get to hear Kelly's experience with PPA more in depth, what her experience with holistic health was like, you'll get some education around adaptogens and ashwaganda, find out what makes a|dash coffee different, and how it can be a tool in your healthy lifestyle toolbelt!
Use "LIZ15" to save 15% on any orders!
What we talk about in this interview:
Kelly’s story of becoming a mom
How her postpartum anxiety manifested
Why she felt the need to look at holistic medicine as a way to heal
What habits and changes to nutrition helped her heal
The main benefits of a|dash that makes it different from typical coffee
How adaptogens and ashwaganda help and support our bodies
Benefits and results other women are experiencing from a|dash coffee
Are you ready to go from overwhelmed and stuck to disciplined and consistent in your journey?
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Hey mamas. So raise your hand. If you are a coffee drinker. So many of us, right? So many I'm personally someone who likes to have sweetened coffee, put some cream in it, make it all the fancy stuff. It's like creamer with coffee, right. Instead of coffee with creamer and that's because I just genuinely am not a huge, huge fan of black coffee.
And I just wanna taste. I wanted to taste good. But I also always crash after drinking coffee and it's something that has been a struggle for a long time. And for a while there, I gave up coffee, especially through pregnancy and breastfeeding. I was like, I just don't wanna drink it because I just don't feel good afterwards.
But the reason was because I was drinking coffee. That wasn't good for me. I wasn't drinking stuff. That was good for me. I wasn't just coffee. It was a stuff that was in it, and that was added to it. And Kelly and a dash coffee is out to fix that problem. And not only. Fix the, the sugar and the junk. That's in a lot of coffees nowadays, but [00:01:00] also to help you give you a tool that's gonna help your mindset.
the way you show up and the way you feel day to day, because Kelly is, um, she's a mom, she's a working mom. She was in the wine industry for 12 years, but she has a huge passion for health and wellness. Overall. She was a college athlete, um, and has just always loved fitness and being active, but she wasn't able to focus on her overall wellness until she became a mom because postpartum, she struggled a lot with mental and physical health for almost a whole year.
When she finally said enough is enough. I don't feel like myself. The stuff I'm doing is not helping. She went to a holistic health practitioner and we'll get more into her story. You're gonna hear a lot about her birth experience and how a lot of that affected her postpartum. She dealt with some pretty severe postpartum anxiety and the stuff she was trying that first year just wasn't working through the traditional route.
So through the help of a holistic health practitioner, she found some answers. She. [00:02:00] Really felt like she was starting to feel like herself again. And from that came a dash coffee and what she created, um, it's infused with adaptogens, which help keep you. And you'll hear more her talk more about this so much more eloquently than I do, but it helps keep you just more stable and not have that high and low in the jitters in the crash that you get from coffee in general.
That's what oand is helping with. overall, her health has changed immensely in those years, postpartum, since she finally found the answer. So I'm excited because her passion for helping others has turned into a problem solving solution with coffee. Something that we have is part of our day to day, day in and day out.
And I can't wait for you to hear not just Kelly's story, but her heart behind creating this, her heart for the wellness of moms and women around the world. And. What's come of this. I mean, personally, I'm a huge fan of a dash coffee now after drinking it for a few weeks, because I have noticed the benefits and I [00:03:00] genuinely enjoy it.
So let's get into this conversation. I cannot wait for you to get to know Kelly, to get to know this brand and hopefully try it for yourself because it, it is awesome. And you will love a dash coffee. As much as I do, maybe if you're lucky, but it will really transform the way that you experience your day to day and keep you from getting those jitters, those highs and those lows, those crashes that we usually feel because we're just not putting stuff in our body, that's helping, but a dash is out to fix that one cup of coffee at a time.
So let's go listen in.
Hey, mama. Welcome to the tough love mom podcast. I know you're here because you're ready to get consistent and finally lose that weight. And you're not afraid of a little tough love, you know, what to do to lose weight. But following through on those things feels impossible. You wish you could just feel like you're strong, confident self again, and want to be a good example for your little ones, but you get thrown off by mom [00:04:00] guilt and the unpredictability of motherhood.
It's frustrat. Taking on your journey. Postpartum is hard, but it's not impossible. Hey, I'm Liz and I've been where you are. I gained a lot of weight in my pregnancies, 90 pounds, and then 60 pounds. I needed to lose that weight to take control of my health. And honestly just wanted to feel like myself again.
With the sustainable approach to weight loss, simple consistency in working on my mindset. I lost it all in just over a year, both times. And I'm here to help you do the same. I believe that we have an ingrained ability to figure out what we need to do, make it happen and do it in a way that OS the world.
If you're ready to stop falling off the wagon, create solid routine and healthy habits and finally feel your best inside. And. All while enjoying D nuggets on your salad, you are in the right place. We're about to transform your journey. My friend get pumped up. It is tough. Love time.
Welcome Kelly. I'm [00:05:00] so, so excited that you're here on the tough love mom podcast today. Hi Liz. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to talk to the whole community and share a little bit about a dash. Yeah, well, first off, before we get into dash and everyth. Tell us about you and your family and what spurred you on to create a dash coffee and.
Where you're at today based on that whole story, like give the backstory for all the moms. Yeah. So it's a long, it's a long one. So, um, we can kind of go back to the beginning. So I grew up playing sports, like really into fitness, but not really into like nutrition and wellness. So I played soccer from the time I was three until still play once a week now, um, 30.
Two years later. So, um, have been a lifelong soccer player played throughout, um, elementary school, middle school, high school college. And then I played with a semi-professional team afterwards. So soccer had always been a very huge part of my life. And fitness was a huge part of my life, but never really [00:06:00] got into like health, nutrition, anything of that until I got older.
So, um, I'm a mom of one son. His name is Brady. Um, and I like to say the company. My second baby, because a lot of my experiences becoming a mom a first time mom, and a lot of the struggles are what led me down the path to starting a company and kind of venting off on my own. So really it goes back to, I had my son in 2017.
I had a really great pregnancy was super easy. I was lucky in that way. I didn't deal with a lot of, um, didn't deal with any like prenatal, depression, anxiety, anything like that. Didn't really have a lot of morning sickness, any of the, the tough stuff. And a lot of people go through pregnancy. Healthy kind of throughout.
That was when my, I would say nutrition journey kind of started when I was pregnant. I really wanted to, I started looking into what was best for fueling my body and making sure that I was doing everything I could to help prepare my son to, to have a happy, healthy birth and live a happy, healthy life. So definitely was taking care of my nutrition when I was [00:07:00] pregnant.
I would spend a lot of time. Did that all the way through my pregnancy, um, mostly walking and, you know, just kind of fit staying within my routine. Um, and then I did have a somewhat traumatic birth labor experience. So, um, I was dealing with some high blood pressure at the end of my pregnancy and was going in to see my doctor.
On my 39 week appointment, I go in with my mom, cuz I'm from Chicago originally. And it was some by some God re you know, God foresee reason that it was like 55 degrees on February 16th and 2017.
Wow. Was so nice. So my husband decided to go. Golfing with my dad that day, cuz it was like, oh babies, you know, coming soon, this is the first time we are gonna be able to like golf. Once the baby comes I'll it'll be crazy. So we're not, you know, I won't have time this spring to do a lot of stuff. So my dad and my husband go out golfing.
My mom comes with me to my doctor's appointment and we get there. My blood pressure is really high. I'm actually in labor already, which I didn't even know like my [00:08:00] water hadn't broke or anything like that, but I was already, my contractions were pretty close and me being a first time, mom, just thinking.
You know, Braxton Hicks again, you know, where I'm close to the end. So I get to, to my doctor and she sends me straight to the hospital. Um, so my mom comes with me. My husband meets me over at the hospital and I was just having a lot of trouble in labor progressing. So they gave me Pitocin and didn't really help me.
Didn't help me progress at all. I never got past like a couple centimeters dilated and throughout the night, my son's heart re. Feet and heart rate was kind of all over the place. Um, it was a little concerning to some of the doctors, especially my OB GYN when she came in. So we decided to have an emergency C-section after about 20 hours of labor because I wasn't progressing at all.
So I was not really prepared at all. Um, and had a little bit of difficulties with the anesthesiologist and the anesthesia, um, for me coming out of it. So coming into. You know, my, my labor was a little traumatic, a little [00:09:00] scary wasn't prepared for, you know, a C-section an emergency C-section, especially after having such like an easy, we don't wanna call it easy, but my, my pregnancy was, was relatively easy compared to a lot of people that have a lot of difficulties throughout it.
So. That kind of was the first start. And then it led into my son was having a lot of trouble latching and breastfeeding was really difficult for me. And that was really kind of the start of the journey. The first couple months were pretty difficult. I was feeling run down, tired, very stressed. And a lot of the feelings that I was having were really elevated because I was diagnosed with postpartum depression.
Um, and as well as for me, what was worse was the postpartum anxiety. So I dealt with a ton. I like to say, like intrusive thoughts in terms of postpartum anxiety. Um, and how that manifested with me was, you know, a lot of thoughts worrying about my son's health and safety. So I would wake up many times throughout the night, even though I was breastfeeding, I would wake up, you know, on the hour, every half hour.
[00:10:00] Scared and would go check on him to make sure he was breathing. And that continued not just kind of the first couple months of his life, that kind of went through the first year of his whole life, where I wasn't sleeping very well. I was constantly worried that something was gonna happen to him that, you know, I would be walking down the stairs or going to the car and I would have these images of me, you know, like dropping him when I'm walking on the stairs or getting in a car accident with him.
So a lot of. Over intrusive thoughts, which led to some more of the OCD, like tendencies that people get postpartum. So always checking the windows a million times, checking the doors to make sure that they're locked at night. So a lot of things kind of just related to stress and anxiety that continued to wear on me throughout the first year of my son's life.
So for me, I struggled a lot because I saw a therapist. I saw a psychia, a psychiatrist. I saw my primary care physician, my OB GYN. I was trying. Find all the ways to make myself feel better again. Um, and didn't get a lot of help in terms of finding what I, what was [00:11:00] going on with me. So all my labs were coming back really normal.
I had lost all the baby weight really easily. I looked like I was doing well and healthy, especially if you looked at my labs, but the way I felt I knew something was wrong. Yeah. So that was kind of. You know, what I was dealing with from the second, my son was born to about 12 or 13 months where I was looking at more of like a traditional route and trying to find the answer and using medication, um, with a therapist and a psychologist to make sure that I was able to be a mom and still be able to function every day while I was working and, and being a mom at the same time.
And after about a year, I really credit it to my husband because he was the one that was like, you need to see someone to see if there's some other type of help that you can get, because you're just still so anxious. So worried, so tired. And it just, I know a lot of people say that's normal postpartum, but it's not like you're not the same, same person that you were before.
So yeah. A lot of people say like, it's really common, but it doesn't mean it's normal or okay. [00:12:00] Exactly. To always be functioning that way. Exactly. And it's interesting, you were saying the worry and the anxiety was causing you to wake up and then you're sleepless and you're exhausted. And that just like, it's like a cycle that compounded it was, yeah, it was kind of like, I'd say the cycle continued for about 12 months, 13 months.
And that's when I first started looking at like functional medicine and holistic practitioners. So I started diving in kind of. You know, web MD, internet, internet solution, where it all, all starts, um, 20 17, 20 18. So podcasts were pretty starting to be really big around that time. So mm-hmm, started looking more into podcasts and finding a few people in the health and nutrition space, focusing around mental health that I thought.
You know, were really great. And that was really the first time I'd looked at like a functional medicine doctor or an integrative practitioner was through a lot of these doctors or functional practitioners that had their own podcast. So I found one that really specialized in women's health and women's hormone health in Chicago.
And that was when I took my first leap into holistic health. So I went to see [00:13:00] her. A lot of the journey really starts there is. I knew nothing really about adaptogens, about functional medicine, traditional Chinese medicine, or a elevated practices until I met with that doctor. And she, she ran labs right away.
Um, I don't know if any of the mom was on or anyone in your group has ever had a Dutch test, but a Dutch test is one that's. It's a really great test for you. If you're getting blood work, everything's coming back normal and you mm-hmm work with a functional practitioner. A lot of them will recommend that.
So we did that test first and what it came. Yeah, your blood work may look normal on the scale of normal. But if you look at the Dutch test and your cortisol, your cortisol is completely off. You're bottomed out every single morning, like lowest can be. And then your cortisol starts getting higher throughout the daytime.
And at the end of the night, when it should be its lowest, mine was its highest. So. Yeah, a lot of that was you explain them real quick, what the Dutch test is. Yeah. So the Dutch test is, uh, a test that your either your doctor or your functional medicine doctor, integrative practitioner can recommend for you.
So it's [00:14:00] a 48 hour test, and instead of blood work, you do saliva. So you take it four times throughout the day where you get a swab, um, and you'll swab yourself. First thing, when you wake. Um, before you eat any food for lunchtime. So it's about, you know, like four hours between before you have dinner and then right before bed, and there is a fifth swab.
Like if you're someone who wakes up in the middle of the night, you should swab yourself then too, to see what your levels are. And you do that for 48 hours. So two days in a row, and what they will do is you send that lab off. There's a, a lab that all the Dutch tests gets test through. That information will go to your doctor who ordered the prescription for the Dutch test, and then they'll review the results with you.
So the main, the main focus of the Dutch test is to look at like hormone health, adrenal health, and cortisol levels. So, yeah, and get like a full picture over the course of few days versus a one time. Here's where you're at. Exactly. And you know, you're, you can't drink alcohol, you can't have caffeine when you're doing it.
Just kind of like your normal day without any [00:15:00] stimulants in there or depressants in order to get the full picture of like where your body's functioning at its normal level. So if you are struggling with like libido energy, Fatigue, anything like that, and your tests are coming back normal, like a Dutch test.
I can't recommend doing a Dutch test enough because that was really the key that unlocked to like, it finally made sense to me of why I was feeling so terrible and so tired all the time, because you know, your court is all supposed to be it peak, right? When you wake up and bottomed out when you're going to bed.
Um, and I was on that opposite curve. So that was leading to. Me being stressed at night, not being able to sleep, feeling exhausted and tired every morning. And it was just a, a cycle over and over. And I couldn't get it under control until I had the information and, you know, an advocate with my doctor to help me work on that.
So, yeah, that's kind of the, the long story of how we got to that point of where I was working on with, with a functional practitioner on improving my mental and physical [00:16:00] wellbeing through being empower. Through information. So that test was kind of the big starting point of where we started looking at.
Okay. What are you doing every day? You know, what's your work life balance what's going on with you and your husband, your relationship. How are you feeling as a mom? What are you eating? Do you exercise at all? Like, what are, what's your whole overall picture? And that's kind of what she helped me look at.
Looking at it. I thought like, oh, I'm, I'm doing great. Like, you know, I'm, I'm working. I have a great job. I like my job. Our relationship is, is good. I mean, we're new parents or never, you're a little more tired and stressed than normal, but you know, there's no major like stressors on me in terms of my relationship.
So the stress that I was putting on myself was what was making me have all these issues. So yeah, we looked at trying to practice. Breath work, looking at my diet, trying to incorporate less processed foods and more whole foods. And I'm not great at meditation. For me. I'm not someone that likes, I've got a monkey mind.
I can't like [00:17:00] sit still. You have me. So for me, my meditation is walking. So like I started doing 20 or 30 minute walks every single day where. I was either taking my son or going by myself and focusing on just kind of relaxing. And those were the first steps that we took there and incorporated supplements into it.
So yeah, she worked on the holistic picture and the supplement part is where I found adaptions. Yeah. So I had a, um, we'll say it was a prescription that she put together. From she's an herbalist as well. So it was ashwaganda Ola and Maka were the three adaptogens that she used in my prescription that I used first, which are all known to help with stress, anxiety, balancing cortisol, and hormone levels.
And that was the first time I had ever tried adaptogens. And after working with her for about six months in taking everything took me about a year, and I finally felt normal, like not just normal, actually good. But yeah, that was really how I got to the point of. Learning about adaptogens and learning about holistic [00:18:00] medicine.
And that was when I took myself and like went down the rabbit hole where I started getting, you know, I started getting functional medicine texts and started learning more about it, started researching more listening to more podcasts and really looking just like, how can I, I feel so great and, and incorporating all these wellness practices and incorporating adaptogens into my life.
And I wanna continue that. So that really started in, in 2018. You had a lot of foundational pieces that your practitioner helped put in place and made sure we're like part of your lifestyle. Yeah. Probably coinciding with adding in these adaptogens. Um, I think a lot of the times, especially nowadays where like in this information age, there's so much to learn so many podcasts, right?
So many books. Yeah. One herbs and all of that adapted in super foods. All these things need to be. Treaded carefully because they are very powerful in great ways, but like someone who really knows them should be guiding you through that. Correct. But it can [00:19:00] be really tempting when they're on the shelf at sprouts or whole foods to grab a bag and start using it.
So how would you encourage a mom to. Navigate that if they're like, I'm struggling with this. And that sounds like a great solution. I mean, yeah, it's kind of a quick fix, right? If you don't get those other foundational health pieces, your mind, your body, your nutrition in place first. Right? Exactly. So I think that is the biggest thing for us that we're trying to do at adapt.
And as a company is that adaptogens or supplements or functional ingredients are a great tool to have in your wellness tool belt, but they are not. They are not a cure. All you need to have, need to look at the whole picture about how you're moving your body, how you're taking care of yourself, what you're eating, and those things are just as important.
And these are just a way for you to assist in that. But I think any quick fix that you can do, whether it's supplements, diet, anything like that, that's like a quick fix to get you a short term game. Short term game is maybe not the best thing for you, long term or the most sustainable. Yeah. So for. What we're really [00:20:00] looking at.
And what we try to do is we wanna make sustainable convenient choices for everybody to make it easier to take care of your health in the long term. So it is exciting, I think, to like see more information. There's a lot of stuff out there, but I think, you know, do as much as much research you can from credible sources.
So make sure these people, you know, make sure it's an MD or naturopathic doctor, an integrative practitioner, someone that has the credibility. And honestly the schooling that can help you that can help guide you through it because it is very unregulated when it comes to the supplement industry in the us.
Yeah. Like the FDA doesn't, um, regulate many of our supplements. So there's a lot of things in there that we, that may be good for us, but there's some things that may not be great for us either. There are fillers or stuff like that, that. That they need in order to hit a price point and to make sure that it fits within guidelines.
But for me, I think the most important thing is the adaptogens. Maybe they would've helped a little, but if I wasn't doing the other things, I don't know how much of an impact they would've made or [00:21:00] how long term I'd be able to sustain my health and wellness journey. Yeah. So I think that's kind of the biggest.
Advice that I have for people, especially people are struggling is it's not just one. This is one piece to the puzzle, but you've gotta look overall at what's going on in your entire life and the way that you're taking care of yourself overall, to make sure that you're not ignoring something that could be a root cause of the issue.
Cause that's. When we're looking at at wellness, especially, it's like, what, what is the root cause that's causing you to these symptoms? How is it it's manifesting itself in a certain way, whether that's fatigue, weight, gain, not able to lose weight, but there's, there's always gotta be something that is at the root cause of it.
So I think looking at the overall picture is the, the best way, maybe not the easiest way, but the best way to get yourself healed and, and long term. I know that's big for you too, is like long term consistency where you can actually feel better and yeah. And live a life. That's. Full of health. Yeah, totally.
So you like that first year when you were trying to figure it out, getting [00:22:00] support from the traditional route, which has so many benefits too, but it wasn't quite working for you. What were some of the things you were trying? What were things that did help a little bit, but what was that inclination? What came to mind when you're like, this is just not, was there something that was just not working, you were like, yeah.
I feel like I'm trying all the things, like what was telling you something was still off. Cause it's hard to notice that when you're in the thick of motherhood and you know, trying to survive day to day. Yeah. It can be hard to actually recognize. There's still something majorly off and I need to address it.
Yeah. We can like, just brush that under the rug so easily. Yeah. So what did you notice was going on? And I think that was, I was kind of brushing it under the rug a little bit and so easy to as mom. Yeah. Especially you're, you know, you're so happy to be a mom and so happy to like, have brought life into this world.
And you're so in love with your child that you're like, I'm not unhappy. I, you know, I don't want people to think that I. Unhappy or ungrateful or not so excited to become a mom. And so I like some shame around that was like not, you know, my husband knew how much I was [00:23:00] struggling, but I don't think a lot of other people really did because I kind of kept that close to myself and didn't want to put out the perception, especially if you have, you know, I've had friends that have struggled with infertility and didn't want to put, you know, I didn't want them to make them feel bad while I was like, oh, I'm a new mom.
And it was me to have a baby and to get pregnant and, and. Are struggling so much and I'm here complaining about it. So I think a lot of that was worrying about other people as well. But the biggest indicator to me was like I was taking medication. I had a prescription for Zoloft. Um, when I was dealing with really, you know, really in the thick of postpartum depression.
And I took that for about a year, honestly, and for me, I'd never really struggled with any mental health or anxiety issues or anything before postpartum. So for me, it was something that like, I. Definitely needed at the time. It really helped me, but I just didn't feel exactly like myself while I was taking it.
So that was like the biggest indicator to me was just listening to my body. And as, as I started to dive more into health and wellness, I was, I think, [00:24:00] starting to listen to my body more. Cause I think a lot of us, you know, you wake up every day. A lot of you do the same thing. It's a little monotonous. And if you feel bad yesterday and you feel bad today, it's kind of just the norm, right?
Sometimes it's the slow progression to that. And then you're just like, this is how I feel. And you don't realize that you feel bad until you start feeling better. So I think I was just starting to listen to the, my body more and listen to cues. And it did really help, you know, seeing my functional doctor.
And she was like, are you tired every day when you wake up? And I'm like, Yes, I am exhausted if I go to bed at 8:00 PM and sleep all night, even though I, I wasn't sleeping all night at that time, I was waking up several times, but even if I go to bed and I'm in bed from 8:00 PM until 7:00 AM, 8:00 AM the next day I wake up and I'm still as tired as I was the second, my head hit the pillow.
So that was, I think the biggest indicator to me was I'm never not tired. And that. Doesn't seem normal, especially when, you know, my son was sleeping through the night he was done [00:25:00] breastfeeding. At that point, it was one of those things where you're like, you kind of waited for it to get better. You're like, oh, this is just, it.
I'm in the thick of it. I will it, once we're done doing this, like once he sleeps through the night, that's when I'll start sleeping through the night or once he sleeps through the night and stops breastfeeding, then I'll be able to relax a little bit more. And so as those. Came and came to an end. It was like, okay, it's not, it's not really getting any better.
It's still the same thing. So there needs to be in here that I'm, I'm not seeing, or that the doctors I'm seeing aren't seeing, so maybe I can, you know, find help somewhere else. So that was, I think the biggest indicator for me was, was sleep honestly. Yeah. And we could normalize that so much. Oh, I'm just a mom now.
I'm always tired. I don't sleep deep. Like it just won't work when it's so foundational. So tell us the story of how a dash has created. So you're, you've been seeing this practitioner, you're getting your habits in place. You're starting to take this blend, um, and you're putting it in your coffee, right?
Because you work. Yeah. When did you go back to work as a mom? So I, [00:26:00] I had 12 weeks, so I think, I think I. I had 12 weeks paid. And then I think I took two extra weeks yeah. Of PTO and stayed home. So it was about 14 weeks that I was off. It's not long, but thankfully a lot longer than some other, you know, some other people are.
Yeah. So I was blessed with that and, and that I, so were you relying a lot on like coffee to get through the day in your a hundred percent? Yeah. And I think. That was kind of personal connection to coffee and why I started with coffee, but also, yeah. You know, as moms and talking to other friends and other moms and other mom business owners, it's like coffee is a foundational part of our coffee is life coffee, coffee is life.
Um, it's the second most, which is surprising. I thought when I started doing research, I thought tea would be the most consumed beverage outside of water in the world. Um, but coffee's actually overtaken that. So coffee is the second consumed beverage throughout the world. So yeah, a lot of people are drinking coffee.
It's a very foundational part of especially like busy adults, their lives. So for me, I'm terrible at supplements. Like I'm terrible at 'em. I forget to take 'em I don't [00:27:00] really like swallowing pills. Like for me, they're just not great. And I know a lot of other people kind of struggle with that too. It's. I forget to take 'em or I'm taking 'em and I'm like, wow, this pill's huge.
Like, this is hard. Even when you hard pill to swallow, even when you're expecting and you're growing the human. And you're like, I know that it's so important for me to take this prenatal vitamin or this iron supplement. And you forget still, even though that's like the most important time in your. You know, logically you're like, I need to do this.
I need to do this. Not even for me, it's for someone else. So, yeah, totally. Yeah. So that was what led me instead of taking like a pill or capsule form, I used powders and I would put it in my coffee or smoothies. And when we. I got a promotion at work. Um, we were living in Chicago at the time and about a year, I guess.
Yeah. So the summer of 2019, um, I'd been put up for a promotion at work, which meant an interstate move. So my husband, my son and myself moved from Chicago down to Nashville and I was managing a market for a large winery at the time. So. I was going, and I'd only been to Tennessee a couple times, [00:28:00] always for a wedding or a bachelorette party in Nashville.
And I was like, oh, and you know, Nashville's great. It's really fun. It's beautiful. We'll be able to spend more time outdoors. But I had no idea like Tennessee, look at it on the map. You're like, oh, it's kind of a small state. It's very narrow. Like longitude wise. You're like, oh, it's tiny. You can drop. You can go from.
From Georgia up to Kentucky in like couple hours, it's a pretty thin state, but it is from Memphis over to Bristol, which is like on the border of Virginia over there, it's about like eight hour drive from like one half, one part of the state to the other. So I was spending tons of time on the road for this new job, especially being new in a market.
My job was to, to work with these, um, distributors in the different parts of the state and spend a lot of time with them. So when I moved to Tennessee, I had been taking care of my health and wellness and had been prioritizing it so much for the last year that it started to slip when I moved. And it was having a lot of trouble just keeping myself on a routine when I was in hotels or on the road and being rushing to a meeting.
And I would stop at like a truck stop because when you're on the highway, that's the easiest place to [00:29:00] stop. And I'm like, all right, I'll just grab something to mix my powders in. I was the crazy lady that did bring like the powders with me on the road. So I would, you know, pack 'em up in my little baggies and then they would sit in my front seat or whatever.
And I, you know, at the time, instead of making smoothies, like I had been in the morning or adding it to coffee, really, the only option was to add it or like Healthyish option that tasted decent was to add it into cold brew when I was on the road. So one day I was driving out to Knoxville and I had take I'd stopped at a gas station to, to pick up a cold brew.
So I was looking for something. Everything at this particular truck stopped and was just like either filled with sugar. They had like no black coffee there, cold brew, black coffee available. It was like a sweet cream one. So I had tons of sugar or I finally found stoke, which is one that's usually has like protein and has some better ingredients.
So I'm like, oh, pick up the stove. So I go over, I'm like, oh, it's got 10 grams of protein. That's awesome. And. I turn the label over and it's still like 20 grams of sugar in the bottle. So I'm like, this is just too difficult. This [00:30:00] is really hard. Like I shouldn't be having to bring every single thing from my house in order for me to stay healthy on the road.
And I know the benefits of not just taking supplements, but incorporating them into your routine and making your life easier. So that was, you know, I like to say the brand was born or the idea for the brand was born when my son was born, cuz that's what introduced me to functional medicine and wellness.
But the actual day the baby was born was when I was driving over to Knoxville and stopped at that gas station. I thought I'm already doing this. Why is no one else doing this seems pretty simple or like a simple solution in, in order to simplify your wellness by. Incorporating functional ingredients into products that you're using throughout the day.
So that was really kind of the moment it was born is I wanted to create a product that would improve people's lives through simplifying wellness, not adding any junk into their diet. So no added sugar is filler stabilizers, anything like that in order to make. Wellness more convenient and accessible [00:31:00] and tastes better, honestly, cuz a lot of the stuff that you'll get, if it is a functional product is we'll say it tastes functional.
Right? so, so that was really, you know, the whole goal. And my whole goal is to make sure that it's accessible to everybody where it's at price point, that's accessible, it's at a taste profile that's accessible because for me the biggest thing is to support my community and to support their overall wellness.
So that. The easiest way to get people to make changes is to add things into their lives that they're already doing. So there's just no friction. Absolutely. I'm sure there's lots of different types of motives around it, but you think about the typical coffee, like you said, at a gas station or at the drive through they're Cho full of sugar and unhealthy fats and all of these things that.
I mean, the reason I told you a lot of my followers and listeners know, I always crash after drinking coffee. I don't like drinking at black . Yeah, I never have. Um, I do like it and a lot of people don't no for a little, and there's a lot of [00:32:00] benefits to coffee itself. Like just pure black coffee, if it's produced well and grown in the right places.
And. You know, it's not like massively produced like most things these days. Yeah. But I would usually just in college, I would just put a couple Stevie packets in it. And even after that, I would still crash a little bit, like instead of just going back down to a normal energy level, I dip. Yeah. And then, you know, need another coffee or, yeah.
Just kind of struggle the rest of the day. And I got away from drinking coffee for a while, which was good for me, but I still like it and I enjoy it. Yeah. I don't wanna. I don't know. No, I was like, I still want coffee cuz I like it. And I went the other way of drinking stuff with a bunch of sugary creamers in it because I don't like it black.
I just don't. I want it a little bit sweet, but I don't, you know, one Stevie packet wasn't doing it for me. So it'd be, you know, those creamers that you'd buy at the store with all the sugar and all the syrups and all, and it was just. Hmm, it was, and I would really dip energy wise after that. Oh yeah. It's crazy.
What is out there? [00:33:00] And I mean, most of us that consume coffee do consume it that way and people don't realize it, but most of the time when you're having issues with weight, gain weight, loss, energy levels, it's because we're drinking not only our calories, but we're drinking stuff that is so not healthy for.
It's not just the food you put in, it's also the liquids you're putting in your body. And we don't realize that. Yeah. And I love that point and that's a big thing for us that we, my sister and I talk about a lot is that I think a lot of people now are used to looking at ingredients in their food products, because we have been conditioned.
There's a lot more information out there now about like added sugar and stuff, added seed oil, stuff like that. That can, that's really inflammatory. It can be a big deterrent to your health and you. I'm consumed when you're eating food. You're thinking about like, this is, this is tangible. It's something I'm putting in my mouth.
It's something like that I can tell. And I get full. There's a tactile thing to it. Mm-hmm when you're drinking stuff. A lot of times it's like a second or can it's a secondary thought or you overlook [00:34:00] it because. You know, you drink water it's you have to have liquids to sustain your life. And most people don't think like you don't feel full necessarily after having a Coke.
Maybe if you have like a 40, you know, one from, from the gas station, that's like, you know, seven, two ounces or something you'd feel full cause the amount of liquid, but like, you don't actually feel full most of the time, even if you're. Even if you're drinking a drink that has like tons of sugar and oils or, and syrups in there, it doesn't, it's not something your brain is necessarily computing because you're not breaking it down in the same way that you are when you're eating your food.
So for us, that is like a really big, important part of why we chose beverages a way, not just related to our story and making it convenient, but. The rise in sugar, sweetened beverages in our diet has been directly related and correlated to what's going on with the epidemic of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, you know, there's so much research and that has been done behind it.
Now that the average American is drinking around 500 calories. Per day, and that's not taking into account any of the [00:35:00] foods you eat, anything else that you're doing, but overall we're averaging 500 calories of sugar sweetened beverages per day. So that is like you said, when a lot of people think they're doing all the right things and they really disheartening, or you think you can't lose weight or there's something wrong with you?
A lot of times, I think beverage is the sneaky one that gets you, that you don't, you're not really paying attention to what's in. The calories in it, the ingredients in it and what that can be doing to your overall health. So for us beverage is like the, the easiest way that we can help improve the overall health of the country.
Yeah. So what's in a dash coffee. Can you go through the ingredients transparent, be like, well, if that's the issue, this is how we're addressing it. Exactly. So we try to keep the ingredients and the labels as clean as we can. And also where we can, we use small family owned or female owned farms, uh, that we work with.
So we use single origin, organic fair trade, certified cold brew coffee. That's coming from Columbia. We use [00:36:00] organic monk fruit. So monk fruit was our way of adding a touch of sweetness to balance out the bitterness of cold brew and also the bitterness of the herbs Inach as a low glycemic sweetener. So.
When it comes to natural sweeteners, Stevia, or Monkfruit are the top quality. They have the, the least impact on glycemic index. So we chose that purposefully as a way to balance it out, but not impact your, your blood sugar at all. And then we have a serving a functional dose of vegan. Ashwaganda ashwaganda I know we haven't really touched on that yet, but that is the main herb.
Um, we like to call her the queen of adaptogens. So Gans. To bring balance to your body and mind it works within your hormonal health, your HPA access and your cortisol levels to balance it out. So you're not feeling that spike you get from the caffeine and the crash theand helps you feel like a kick of the caffeine and none of the jitters are crash after.
And then besides we use a little bit of, um, green coffee beans to add a little bit of extra caffeine because in our manufacturing [00:37:00] process, we purposely bring the level of caffeine down for cold brew in order to work well with that Asda. So, okay. Typically you're at about two or 300 milligrams of cold of caffeine for cold brew.
And ours is at 110. Yeah. Okay. Cold brew has an insane amount of caffeine in it and people, it does. I didn't know that for a long time. Yeah. Cuz you just think it's like the same as a regular coffee, but you know, cold brew's soaking overnight for, you know, 12 to 24 hours for most of 'em. So you're extracting more caffeine out of the be and it's yeah.
They're they're typically they can be pretty high. So we purposely, while we're manufacturing, bring that caffeine level down. Okay. Pairing well with the overall feeling and benefit that we want you to get from the drink. We want you to feel the energy and feel uplifted, but not like a huge, huge spike and a huge crash after we want it to be balanced caffeination throughout your day.
Okay. You, you noted two terms that I wanna dive into real quick. Fair trade. So coffee, the coffee's fair trade. What does that mean? Yeah. So fair trade is a certification. That [00:38:00] means that the workers or the farmers, the people that are. Getting farming. The product for us are par are paid a fair wage. So there's a certification body that goes over and makes sure that the farm workers or any migrant workers that are coming in for it are getting paid a fair wage or a livable wage for that part of the world.
So every couple years they go back and they work with different farms to make sure that what the cost of living is what they're being paid is a fair wage for someone that is working that. Yeah, so important. And you also mentioned glycemic index and I'm sure there's listeners who know exactly what that is.
Cuz they dealt with gestational diabetes or yes. Gestational what not. Yeah. But talk about glycemic index too. And how that can play into your energy spike yeah. So glycemic index is a way, um, in, in the medical community that you look at your blood sugar, so there's certain things that will impact your blood sugar and spike it really high.
Or certain things that will give you like more balanced level that is not taking you or your body or your energy levels all over the place. So the glycemic index [00:39:00] is really just a rating of what impact that has on your blood sugar and how that impacts your energy level. So when you're eating something, especially something that's like really high in carbohydrates, and you're not pairing it with fat or fiber, anything like that carbs tend to spike your glycemic index higher than anything else.
If you are not balancing it out with other, you know, food combining and, and things where there's other nutrients that are balancing that out. Sugar is one that does the same thing, whether that's a natural sweetener or an unnatural sweetener, like OSE allulose sucrose, that sort of stuff. Those things tend to spike it really quickly as well, but the glycemic index and why that's important to most people, if you.
Either AB just testis, diabetes, regular, you know, type one type two diabetes, or just someone who's trying to manage their overall health and how they feel those spikes are. What makes you feel a lot of energy or makes you feel fatigued? So yeah, the way that the glycemic index impacts you is really directly related to how you're gonna be feeling throughout the [00:40:00] day.
Yeah. It's so important. And we don't realize that too. We'll go eat a couple slices of pizza and yeah, we feel really good for like an hour or two. And then. Done. And that's why it's cuz our glycemic index is all over the place instead of staying steady throughout the day. Exactly. And caffeine can kind of, you know, happen the same way now.
Um, I had a couple listeners ask about ashwaganda specifically around cuz they're all moms, pregnancy and breastfeeding. So cause some moms are very comfortable, like. Taking in caffeine during pregnancy. I'm one of them. Yeah. Yeah. Like a dash only has 110 milligrams of caffeine, which is so comforting to know the exact amount you're taking in.
Cause sometimes especially if we're getting something from a drive through or making it ourselves, we don't know how much caffeine's in it. So that's comforting. But talk about ashwaganda. Yeah. And I'm glad that you brought up the, like the caffeine and everything. So for us. On the front of our label, we put the amounts and the dosages of everything, because I think that's super important just because everyone should be empowered to take care of their own health.
Yeah. This is your own journey and you can't really [00:41:00] feel empowered if you don't know exactly what's going into it. So if you already take a supplement or you're someone that makes a coffee at home or has one and drive through, and you're not able to really know exactly like how much caffeine you're getting, how much sugar you got from that stuff for.
Processed food is, is a big culprit in, in a lot of people's health struggles. So since we have a package product, we wanna make sure that, you know, every single thing that's in it, the amount that's in it, and that you can feel empowered to know like, Hey, I can have this a dash because it has this amount of caffeine I'm pregnant.
So I can have 200 milligrams a day or recommended it around 200 day, you know, at the top end, the doctors say, so it's like, oh, I can have this and I can still feel fine. So for us, we chose ashwaganda. Adaptogens when you're classifying the herbs or talking about them are nonspecific. They, they treat nonspecific things in the body and they're non-toxic so you can have as much as you want.
there's no indicator of like, you could overdose on these sort of things. Yeah. Kinda like certain vitamins, like vitamin C, you can't really overdose on it because exactly like, you may [00:42:00] not need that much, but it's safe for you to consume. Okay. Of course for people in pregnancy or breastfeeding, we always say it's very important.
We are not doctors. We want you to talk to your physician and what is right for you. The only thing we like to, to highlight is that it is a night shade. It's in the night shade family. So if someone does have allergies to night shades or Hashimotos or something like that, they may be impacted. You know, it may not be something that they want to take before they talk to a doctor.
Again, if you have a chronic illness or something like that, that's something. Talk with your physician about beforehand, but it is definitely safe to take. I took it throughout all breastfeeding. It is a hundred percent, uh, safe to take while you're breastfeeding. It's never been studied on, on pregnant women.
So, you know, we don't recommend unfortunately like, like everything, right? Yeah. Um, they don't recommend it for anyone who is pregnant, but the dosage that we use safe for pregnancy, always number one, talk to your physician beforehand, especially any supplements you're taking throughout your pregnancy. The dosage that we have.[00:43:00]
Within the therapeutic therapeutic range, but we go at the very low end of it in order for you to be able to, if you already take a supplement or you already have something that you incorporate into your routine, we don't wanna mess with that at all, but we still want you to, to see the benefits. Yeah. So for the standard consumer who goes, this sounds like it's a product that.
Honestly would really serve me. I'm kind of just for like the listener to get full trans and I've shared this on my Instagram, but I like sweet creamy coffee and I could drink this plain straight out the can with no cream in it, no added sugars. I mean, and that, that is saying a lot for someone like me.
So that makes. That makes me so happy. it's really good. But, um, I think it's good to know that one you're super transparent about what's in it and that you're, you know, for the standard consumer, you don't have to go consult your local holistic health practitioner to say, can I drink this coffee? Is there enough?
Is a safe amount, like knowing that you've put that much legwork in to say, yeah, we know what the ranges are. That's safe. We're gonna take the lower [00:44:00] end. We're gonna lower the caffeine. Like it's it really is for the general population. That's intentional about their health, which is so needed. what are other women experiencing?
Cuz I mean, I'm the one person who crashes after coffee. Yeah. Not everyone feels that way. So what are some other benefits, other woman moms that you've heard from have experienced in your personal, like how's that help you too? Yeah, so I think the number one feedback like that we get from everybody and women all the time is I used to feel anxious or jittery when I would drink caffeine.
And now. Feel like I can enjoy this it's scopy. It tastes really great. And I feel like a sense of, you know, calm afterwards or just a balanced level of energy. That's the number one feedback that we always get is this tastes really good. And I don't feel like crap afterwards when I drink it, I get the energy and I'm not feeling that crash afterwards.
I feel a longer sustained level of what we'll call it, that caffeine high, but not super, not caffeine high, but that like, you know, caffeine. Benefit where you're, you're [00:45:00] feeling. Oh, the smells like, like the aromatics, the way I feel like just kind of that love that we all have for coffee without any of the negative after effects of it, where you're feeling, you know, down or low or anxious afterwards.
So that's been the number one feedback. For me, why I created the product and why I chose a can. And that sort of thing was, I know that most people are on the go, whether you're dropping your kids off at school or daycare or heading to the gym, or you're just out for the day running to target or whatever you're doing and you're on the road and you don't have time to like sit down and take your time and relax and enjoy.
Or maybe you do for your first coffee in the morning before everyone gets up. And then. The day starts and it's complete madness, right? So we wanted to create something that was available convenient for you on the go. So whether you're at a store and you pick it up there, or you take it from your house and you can bring it anywhere and then you'll get all those additional benefits and then just cut something out.
You can remove something from your routine that you already have in there. Say you have a supplement that you have to [00:46:00] take founda every day and you're forgetting about it, or, you know, forgot to get a reorder of it when you went to the store and you're just. it just removes the step from it. And that's the biggest benefit that we have is people talk about the effects of how they feel while they're drinking it immediately.
And then the long term effects cause Ogando, or, you know, any herbs or adaptogen supplements that you're taking the longer that you take them, the more efficacy that you'll get out of the be the more efficacious they become. So. You will start feeling the effects of herbs in particular, when you're looking at functional medicine within the first couple weeks, three to four weeks is when you'll start seeing like maximum benefit for it.
So you feel great in that moment and it's a balanced level of energy, but the long term effects of how it's helping you overall and not just. Your immediate feeling after drinking coffee, but the feeling that you're getting every day from the supplementation is the second major benefit that people feel from it.
Especially for people that drink it every day. Cuz we have a lot of customers that use it every single day. And those are the ones that people start with one [00:47:00] case a month. And then they're like, okay, well I need two cases a month now. And we have some people where we have to set it up and like get them one case a week cuz their husband's drinking it now too.
And stuff like that. So the benefits immediate are the ones that we hear about the most. but the people that have been with us the longest in our subscribers and, and consume a dash every day or every other day, whenever they're using it are the ones that talk about the long term sustained feeling of positive energy, of feeling, more relaxed in line, in a sense of calm.
Those are really the benefits that people talk about in the long term with yeah. With Ash, Uganda, and then Aash in. Yeah. I could even attest to that. Just hearing you say that, and me thinking about my experience, drinking it the past few weeks already, I'm like, yeah. I always had caffeine. First thing when I woke up around five 30 in the morning.
Yeah. But then I usually have caffeine again before having to work, like before going to workout, like at, at least. 100 hundred 50 milligrams of caffeine. Yeah. Whereas now I'm drinking a dash first thing in the morning. Yeah. Feeling honestly, like, I don't even need anything again before my workout around [00:48:00] nine or 10, so yeah.
Yeah. That says a lot. And I didn't even notice that until you said it, but it's definitely happening. So yeah. And that's really, our whole goal is to add positive benefit to your life and not take anything away from what you're already doing. . Yeah, exactly cool. Well, where can people find a dash? We're pretty new.
So, you know, the idea started back in 2020, but then we've been in business for just over a year now. So our headquarters are in Nashville and then my co-founder and sister lives in Charleston, South Carolina. So our biggest two markets are Nashville and Charleston, where you can find us locally in a lot of places, both of the, um, there.
We're at several places in the Southeast, throughout new Orleans, bowling, green, Kentucky, that sort of thing. So if you are looking like locally to find it somewhere and you live anywhere in the Southeast message us, and we'll tell you where otherwise the best place for everyone to get it. And the best price too is online on our website, which is drink a dash.com.
Perfect. And we have a code for anyone listening that wants to get some, you can use list 15 to [00:49:00] save 15% correct on your order. So, yep. And anything on our, our website, we have sampler packs, which are four packs. Cool. We have 12 packs and then we have ground coffees as well. So that'll be, that will work on anything.
Perfect. So you could even make it hot if you wanted to does that? Yeah. So yeah, we, we launched the ground coffee game changer. Yeah. We launched the ground coffee at the end of the year, or like, I guess fall of last year when we had a lot of people. We're from Chicago, originally, my sister and I, so we have a lot of like Chicago subscribers and.
In November, December in Chicago, like, you know, people aren't drinking as much cold coffee. Some people are actually still, but, but the majority of people may have a little more warm coffee. And us personally, like my brother-in-law, my sister's husband is Brazilian. He is like a coffee. Fanatic. Um, and I've like, coffee's such a ritual for me in the morning too.
Like, I'm, I'm like you, I like to wake up before everyone else in the house have a couple coffee spend some time, like, you know, looking my day, going over gratitude things like mm-hmm, , you know, looking at my journal, [00:50:00] saying my intentions for the day. So that is when I have the hot, the dash coffee in the morning.
And then. Anytime after that ritual is when I move into the cold coffee. I love that. I love that. Well, may have to get some ground stuff because we like hot coffee here, something. Yeah. And we have two different options for the ground coffee too. So Ash Pash cans, and then we have ashwaganda with the ground coffee.
We also have medicinal mushrooms, um, which aren't like CEPS. Uh, opposite, not opposite effect, but corsets are used, uh, when you're looking at adaptions like energy and uplifting, they're actually very good for pre-workout. It's like the number one adaptogen for exercise performance. Cool. Okay. Good to know.
I'm learning so much today. I love it. Yeah. Well, one question that I like to wrap everything up with between like being encouraged and seen as. With anxiety and just the postpartum struggles and not feeling it yourself and education side of stuff today, I feel like moms have been so served. So thank you for, thank you.
Thanks for having, not just being so transparent with your story and the business and the [00:51:00] product, but just sharing it all with you can tell, just talking to you that this is coming from the most genuine. Servant hearted place. And that goes a long way. Um, not just with moms and consumers, but with the impact that you will make.
So I'm excited to see where a dash goes and obviously to be a consumer of it. Cause this is so good. I put a little bit of coconut milk in, in the morning cuz I do like free, but it's perfect. So, um, one question I like to wrap up with is given these centers some tough love. Tough love is simply defined as love expressed in a straightforward manner, because you care about the person it's not beating around the Bush.
It's not sugar coating things, no pun intended, but just genuinely like being straightforward. So with that in mind, based on anything we've talked about today, what do you wanna leave these moms with? What tough love do you wanna give? 'em. I wanna say that how you feel and your health is totally up to you.
Um, you have the power to take care of yourself, to prioritize yourself and your health. Even as a mom [00:52:00] or a new mom or a pregnant mom, you have the opportunity and you should empower yourself to, to live your healthiest life. And the, the choice is up to you. So if you don't feel great, look at yourself and look at the ways that you can improve.
Yeah, and that doesn't have to be doing it by yourself. Right. It's educating yourself. It's seeking out resources, it's learning and that's really where it starts. That's so good. Thank you so much, Kelly, for coming on today. Yeah. Thank you so much. It was great to share the story and to chat more with you.
And I'm, I'm so excited to share a dash with everyone and hopefully I gave a little bit of help and help to your community. Yes, they will love it for sure. Thanks. I hope that you were not only encouraged and felt seen by Kelly's. I mean, Kelly's story is so many of our stories too, with postpartum and not feeling like ourselves, having those anxious thoughts, and I hope you felt seen, I hope you felt like, wow, that was my story too.
And I'm still struggling with it, or I still just don't feel like myself and I hope you feel [00:53:00] empowered. To go find some answers because we are capable, like, like Kelly said, we are the only ones in control of our health. We have the choice, we have the choice to make the change. We just have to go out and start doing things.
And the biggest piece of that is educating yourself and taking action. So however this hit home today, let Kelly know, go order some, a dash coffee, whether it's a four pack or a 12 pack, I'm telling you it will change the game for you. It is so good. I'm loving it. And I just wanna make sure. whatever it is that you're struggling with today, whether it's your energy levels or postpartum anxiety, or just not feeling like yourself as a mom, you are capable of doing something about it.
So just go, just go, start seeking out answers, start seeking out support or resources. Talk to your husband, talk to your mom, talk to someone nearby who might know what you're going through because you're not alone in. There are answers and resources out there. And, and you know, if coffee is part of your day today, maybe a dash is the solution.
One of the tools [00:54:00] to the solution that you need. So with that being said, go have a good Monday and go get after it this week before you go. Thank you for spending this time with me on the tough love mom podcast. If this episode encouraged you in any way, the number one way you can thank me is to leave a review, letting me know how this show has impacted you, then.
Send this episode to another mom friend, or take a screenshot, post it on social media and tag me so I can personally thank you for helping me on this journey to impact thousands of moms. I'm so grateful to be on this journey with the sister until next time. Get after it.
