Amber Discko often forgot to drink water and follow other healthy habits while working as a creative strategist for Hillary Clinton. The heavy workload and busy schedule during the 2016 presidential campaign put Discko's emotional and physical wellness on the sidelines.
"It was an incredible experience to work on it, but it was hard to balance my mental health with the stress of the campaign and dealing with the toxic news cycle," Discko told CNBC Make It.
Discko quickly learned how important it is to keep self-care tasks at top of mind. So Discko created Aloe Bud, a self-care check-in and reminders app. "What I needed were tools to reliably 'check-in' with myself—ones that wouldn't shame me if I forgot, but encourage me to stay accountable with gentle notifications," Discko wrote on the app's Kickstarter page. "Eventually I figured if I couldn't find the perfect tools for me, I would just build them." More than $50,000 was raised through the Kickstarter campaign, and the app launched for iOS this spring.
Aloe Bud users can set reminders for various everyday self-care tasks, such as to sleep, take vitamins and meditate. Users can also set reminders to take a moment to reflect on how the day is going and send themselves an encouraging note.
Discko hopes the app can be used to improve the workplace culture at organizations like hospitals, not-for-profits and schools. "Aloe is going to be at work. 2 offices have pledged and I'm going to be working with them. This is the future, burn out is not an option!" Discko tweeted.
