Octave

A close friend of mine was injured in a traumatic incident on his way to work in midtown Manhattan. He needed help. He tried to find a therapist. The search was so difficult that he gave up. He didn't try again for seven years. And during that time, he suffered deeply. This is why I founded Octave. No one should have to struggle alone for years. We should make it as easy as possible for people to find a great therapist. But ghost networks, or directories where most of the therapists aren’t actually available, stand in the way. They give the illusion of support, but leave people stranded instead. Ghost networks have been a known problem for years. It’s been shrugged off as an unrepairable repercussion of the system. That's finally changing. Recently New York's AG announced a $2.5M settlement with Emblem Health after finding 80% of their listed mental health providers were effectively unavailable. Eighty percent!! The fines are coming and the compliance clock ticks on. Fixing the infrastructure can get rid of ghost networks for good. Directories are static. Provider availability isn't. A clinician's schedule can go from wide open to full in under a week. No health plan wants to mislead their patients. They just lack the technology to keep up. The fix exists. Real-time scheduling APIs can turn a static directory into a live one. Several plans are already doing it. Beth Jacobson and I wrote about what's driving this shift and what plans can actually do about it in Becker's Healthcare. Link in the comments.

I'm just going to say it. The hardest part of being a new mom wasn't the sleep deprivation or the physical recovery. It was the loneliness. Even when I wasn't alone. We released a national survey today at Octave, and one number made me feel like, oh, someone finally said it. 96% of mothers who struggled in their first year cited emotional isolation as the key factor. Isolation. I was diagnosed with postpartum anxiety after both of my kids. And the guilt that came with it was its own thing. I had worked so hard to have these babies. Six IVF cycles. And I wasn't feeling the pure joy I naively expected. Saying it out loud felt ungrateful, like I had no right to struggle when this is exactly what I'd fought for. And then you can't even let the support in when it shows up. What nobody prepares you for is that the village can be right there, physically present, showing up, doing all the right things, and your hormones won't allow you to feel it. You're surrounded and still completely unreachable to yourself. That's not a mindset problem. That's not ingratitude. That's a medical reality that we still barely talk about. Nearly 4 in 10 partnered moms reported feeling frequently isolated. It's not about being alone. It's about feeling like the version of you that's struggling isn't allowed to exist out loud. We were promised a village. And even when we have one, we sometimes can't feel it. If you're a new mom, have been one, or love one, read what mothers are actually saying. Link in comments. It's so hard but know that we're out here.

The gap isn’t just emotional — it’s structural. We surveyed over 1,000 new moms in our latest State of Mind report. They told us they needed connection, support, and space to be human. Instead, they’re often met with isolation, invisible labor, and pressure to “do it all.” A few takeaways we can actually act on: ➡️ Support shouldn’t be reactive, it should be built into systems (at work AND at home). ➡️ “Let me know if you need anything” isn’t support... specific, proactive help is. ➡️ Division of labor isn’t just logistical, it directly impacts mental health. If we want better outcomes for mothers, we need to have a bigger conversation than congratulating "super moms" for everything they're holding together. We have to redesign the environments around balancing the responsibilities that come with parenthood (for all genders), normalize perinatal mental health care, and give moms space for their identities to evolve. Read the full report here: https://lnkd.in/gBPUxtmT

We are so grateful for our incredible team here at Octave 🤍

We’re seeing a cultural shift from self-improvement… to self-optimization. More routines. More tracking. More pressure to “maxx” every part of life. In this piece from Real Simple, Leigh Hall, therapist and Perinatal Mental Health Center of Excellence Lead here at Octave, shares why constantly trying to optimize yourself can quietly turn into perfectionism, and eventually, burnout. One takeaway that stood out: not every area of your life needs to become a project. At Octave, we think a lot about how easily wellness can become another performance metric. Sometimes the healthier choice isn’t doing more, it’s asking whether the habit is actually making your life feel better. A good check-in question: Is this helping me feel more grounded… or just more behind? Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gx_Z-dz9

When nearly 40% of people begin their mental health journey in health plan directories, the quality of that experience determines everything that follows. WiseMatch brings real-time matching and booking into health plan directories to turn a fragmented experience into something that actually works for patients, providers, and plans alike. We like to think of it as turning directories from static lists into dynamic pathways to care. Hear from our CEO, Sandeep Acharya (he/his), on why this requires industry-wide collaboration: https://lnkd.in/g_jijBFs

At 35, I found out I had almost no eggs left. I did not see it coming. Well actually… What’s hard to admit is that I felt as if I shouldn’t have been surprised. I knew the science. I knew fertility declines with age. I knew I wanted to be a mama. But I still kept saying after this next milestone, after this next promotion, after this next event. Next, next, next. Until I waited too long. I did three IUI cycles and six IVF cycles. And somewhere in the middle of all of it, I left my job. Sure, I couldn't keep up with every meeting AND every doctor's appointment. The physical side effects were real. But the mental overload was what broke me. I was stuck, so consumed by whether any of it was ever going to work and whether “mama” would ever be a title I could have, that I couldn't focus on anything else. What got me through was my therapist, my husband, and a community that showed up in ways I didn’t expect. My therapist kept reminding me: "If you want to be a mom, you will be a mom, in whatever way that ends up meaning." I held onto that sense of hope more than I can explain. I got lucky. Two embryos worked. I’m now sitting here deeply grateful as a mom of two. I recognize I’m saying this from a place of privilege. Not everyone has the resources or safety net I did. And it was still really damn hard. Being on the other side of the journey, I am thinking about every person in the thick of it right now. I see you and how hard it is to juggle everything life throws at you while putting everything you’ve got towards trying to become a parent. The infertility community is one you only know about once you’re in it. If you’re in it, we’re here for you. As a leader at Octave, a working mom, a friend, a coworker, I am here to have the conversation. During National Infertility Awareness Week, it felt like the time to start it by sharing my story. We talk a lot about “having it all” but we don’t talk about the quiet tradeoffs we make along the way. When you’re raising tiny humans, or trying to, tradeoffs will always be a part of it. Community and honest conversation should be too.

Grand gestures don’t build lasting bonds. Showing up consistently does. I recently spoke with Parade about the top habits of highly respected grandparents, and what we found is that the best relationships all have something in common: consistency. This is something I've learned from almost two decades of clinical practice, and thankfully, from my own life too. I see how my own parents show up for my son. They are there for moments big and small, and take a genuine interest in him as a kid and the person he is today. In my work at Octave, I hear how the presence of grandparents can help the well-being of the entire family unit. For the kid, grandparents can help that child build confidence, increase emotional intellence, and adopt family traditions that contribute to a sense of self.  Being present is the most important thing any person can give to another, and that is especially true for a grandparents relationship with their grandchildren. Read the full piece here: https://lnkd.in/gtcSCtPU

What songs would you add?