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By Rachel Cohen Noebes – Staff Reporter , Atlanta Business Chronicle
Aug 11, 2025
 

Editor's note: This story is part of Atlanta Business Chronicle's first-ever Advancing Health & Life Sciences in Georgia special edition, highlighting industry leaders and the economic impact of these sectors throughout the state. The Chronicle will host an event on Aug. 14, and a special print takeover issue will be published Aug. 15. For related stories, please visit the digital special section on the Chronicle’s website.

More and more, American culture is embracing the idea that to treat the body, the mind can’t be ignored.

With the pandemic leading to a significant spike in anxiety and depression worldwide, according to the World Health Organization, long-held stigmas around the topic of treatment for mental illness are slowly starting to break down.

However, there are still steep barriers when it comes to finding aid, including a lack of resources. In a November 2024 report, the federal Health Resources and Services Administration projected unmet needs for behavioral health providers, including adult psychiatrists, marriage and family therapists, addiction counselors, and more, into 2037. As of last August, more than one third of the U.S. population — 122 million people — lived in what the report described as a mental health professional shortage area.

Gaps are being filled in a society screaming for resources through different practices that sit outside the realm of traditional health care. In Atlanta, these include a third space where city dwellers can go to unwind and unplug, a luxury postpartum treatment center that focuses on the mother’s wellbeing and a holistic practice where patients are treated as the experts on themselves.

Atlanta Business Chronicle spoke with Dr. Cristina Del Toro Badessa of Artisan Beauté in Buckhead; Brittany Starobin, founder and CEO of Haven Postnatal Retreat in Midtown; and Brandon Chubb, co-owner of wellness spa Do Not Disturb in Old Fourth Ward, about the importance of balancing physical and mental wellbeing.

Artisan Beauté offers holistic medical services

When Badessa, a board-certified emergency medicine doctor, moved to Atlanta in 2019, she started practicing at Piedmont Atlanta Hospital in the emergency room

At the same time, she sought out the top spot in the city for her personal beauty treatments, such as facials and botox. Badessa said she received a “unanimous” response to go to Artisan Beauté, a luxury med spa that also offers plastic surgery services.

“I loved the ER … [but] I was seeing so many people at this stage where I felt like I could have helped them more if I saw them before,” she said.

Badessa told the Chronicle she was “activated” by what was happening in the longevity and wellness spaces, so when she had the chance to change careers, she went back to her primary passion, which she described as "helping people live their best and healthiest and ideally longest life.”

Badessa said that while we're living longer, we’re not necessarily living better.

She joined with Dr. Diane Alexander, the founder of Artisan, to start a wellness practice within the company offering holistic medical services in 2023. She is a proponent of IV infusions to boost immunity, cognitive function and beauty, and she is trained in peptide therapy and bioidentical hormone replacement therapy.

Badessa said she sees her patients as “seekers,” or questioners, who are looking for more than to be told their labs look fine, even though they are facing a personal health dilemma — or in some cases, crisis.

When it comes to the different ways in which medicine is approached, including mental health, Badessa recalled a lecture from her time in college to illustrate the traditional Western medical system. One sentence of a slide was devoted to lifestyle management, and the next 45 minutes of the lecture focused on prescription treatment.

“I practice from a place of, ‘I'm the expert on the science.’ We continue to evolve, we continue to learn and I continue to learn, as well," she said. "But the patient, you are the expert on your body, and you are the expert on your lived experience. And I don't ever pretend to know exactly what's going to be best for you. This is a partnership."

She added, “I think Western medical education doesn't really equip doctors to be holistic, to ask questions, to be seekers. It teaches us to sort of look for a quick fix and a pill.

"But then also society — unfortunately, we want an answer. We want it, and we want it now.”

Haven Postnatal Retreat focuses on postpartum depression

Starobin created Haven not simply out of desire, but out of what she saw as desperate need.

Haven specializes in postpartum care for mothers and their newborn babies.

While the founder is quick to acknowledge that the retreat is a luxury — it's located within the Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta — she believes that in order to reach back out to the communities she wants to help, this is the way to prove that the model works.

Having gone through postpartum depression with all three of her children, describing the experience as “gut-wrenching” and “isolating,” Starobin saw for herself that “there's not a system in place where we have adequate and proper postpartum care.”

Inside the lounge area of Haven Postnatal Retreat at the Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta
Courtesy of Haven

“I think Covid exacerbated the mental health epidemic," she said. "I think a lot of people think that with a maternal mortality crisis, it's just during birth, but there are women committing suicide afterwards because they don't feel as though they're being seen, they're being heard; they feel like they're on that island by themselves.

"They feel like they cannot speak out, because every time they do, they’re met with, ‘Maybe you're not strong enough,’ or, ‘Well, you're the one who wanted the kids.’”

Starobin said she feels society lacks a sense of community, and hopes that Haven can help new mothers, whether they come for half a day or several nights, find solidarity with others.

“We always say, 'Everyone wants to hold the baby, but nobody wants to hold the mom,'" she said. "Here, we're holding the mom."

Do Not Disturb lets people unplug from overstimulation

Chubb, a former professional athlete, founded restorative and recovery wellness studio Do Not Disturb with his brother, Bradley, a fellow ex-NFL player, in 2024.

Located within Ponce City Market, Do Not Disturb offers saunas, cold plunges, massages and more.

The 2,730-square-foot space is meant as a place to recharge both mentally and physically and is founded on the principle that properly restoring the mind and body is essential to reaching one’s greatest potential, no matter an individual’s goals.

Chubb felt that especially in this day and age, when people are so overstimulated, providing a place to unplug is essential.

A private room at Do Not Disturb.
Forrestt Lane

“A place like Do Not Deserve is intentional because we give you that time to really put that switch on, figuratively, before you have to go and tackle the next big challenge in front of the screen, whether it’s a phone, desktop, television or however you’re experiencing it,” Chubb said.

“We want to be the catalyst to mitigate the overstimulation of our day to day,” he said, adding that unlike other studios in the wellness space, customers won’t find music pumping through speakers or screens in the sauna, because he doesn’t find that to be “restorative.”

Chubb feels Do Not Disturb is filling a gap in the market. He was accustomed to these services while playing sports at the college and professional levels, but he couldn’t find anywhere to receive them in the Atlanta area.

“I don't think there's anything else in Atlanta that does what we do, the way we do it and brings in the Atlanta community in such an inclusive way,” he said.

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