As an OB/GYN in the Dallas area, Lyndsey Harper was surprised to see so many of her patients looking for help with sexual problems -- and at the lack of materials and information she had to share with them on the topics.
“Multiple patients would share with me things like, ‘I love my husband’ or ‘I love my partner, but I don’t care if we ever have sex again,’ and they were in a lot of distress about this. Some of them were worried about their relationship, others felt really sad at the loss of this part of their life. And they were looking to me for resources,” Harper told NTX Inno. “And the worst part of this story is I didn’t have the resources to give to them. I wasn’t trained in residency… on women’s sexual health, which is shocking to me as a woman, as a doctor.”
According to Harper, more than 38% of women will experience low sexual desire and nearly 49% will face some sort of sexual problem in their lifetimes. And while urologists are trained in men’s sexual wellness, similar knowledge is not part of the OB/GYN training.
So faced with the tough decision of leaving her patients, Harper began her journey as an entrepreneur, founding Dallas-based women’s sexual wellness app Rosy to bring tips and knowledge to the female masses.
“I’m sure someone has had this idea but the fact that no one’s ever executed on it is concerning and that’s what really made me take the leap from practicing OB/GYN to starting Rosy,” Harper said.
Rosy was launched on Valentine’s Day 2019 and has been rapidly gaining traction. Earlier this year the company landed a $1 million Seed Round from Social Starts and Joyance Partners, as well as individual investors James Beshara and Alex Snodgrass. In March, the startup was named one of the winners of the SoGal Global Pitch Competition in San Francisco, which focuses on female and diverse founders, which landed the company an additional $25,000. Rosy was also the champion of NTX Inno’s inaugural Tech Madness competition, which asked local founders to choose winners based on who they would invest in.
“The typical sort of mindset of a doctor about female sexual dysfunction is like opening Pandora’s Box,” Harper said.
Harper said women can experience sexual issues for a number of reasons, from mental health issues and past trauma to relationship issues and sex-negative education. To address the myriad issues, new members to Rosy are given an onboarding survey based on medical questionnaires to determine their sexual wellness score. Based on their responses, Rosy uses a multi-disciplinary approach based on medical and psychological best practices to offer customized educational videos, self-help psychology classes and erotic short stories. The sexual wellness quiz is given each month, so users can track their progress.
One of the newest additions to the Rosy app is a community chat that allows users to share their stories and journey. Harper said that through this feature and individual experiences shared, Rosy has been able to develop new specific programs, like sexuality after cancer, which could in turn help inform the medical and research communities on these issues.
"This issue has been under wraps for so long and I’m over it."
“We want women to know that we are a safe space. That they can come and have a soft landing and know that we will treat their experience with respect and that they can trust us to provide evidence based resources,” Harper said. “Women feel very embarrassed, isolated and ashamed about these problems because they think they’re the only ones suffering, that there must be something broken with them personally. The more conversations people have about this, the more they know that this can be something you encounter during life for a lot of women, so it doesn’t mean anything about you personally.”
While the coronavirus pandemic has had an effect on nearly every business, Harper said she doesn’t have too many concerns about being a young startup during these uncertain times. She said the company is using the time to cultivate its communication and organizational processes. In addition, she said that the imposed shelter-in-place orders are a great time to work on relationships, as families are spending more time together. Harper said one of the biggest impacts the virus has had on Rosy is that she is unable to be as involved with her five-member team, which recently grew with a new hire.
Looking ahead, Harper said the company plans to use its funding to build out content and features on the app, as well as focus on marketing.
“This issue has been under wraps for so long and I’m over it. So, I’m happy to dedicate all of my time and professional energy to just making a change where I feel like it hasn’t been done before,” Harper said. “As a company, if we are successful, then women no longer will feel embarrassment or shame about sexual issues and they will know that we’re the trusted, safe space to find those resources that they need.”
