Meet Claudia: Founder of Circe

In case you haven’t seen me yapping about this on Instagram, I’m on the autism spectrum. 

My journey to getting a diagnosis happened by accident, too, when I was in the midst of a mental health crisis. I was lucky enough to be seen by the right doctor who advocated for me—an experience I know is not common enough. 

So when I heard what Claudia Radu was building, I thought back to three years ago when I desperately would have benefited from her work..

Claudia is the founder of Circe: a subscription service helping neurodivergent women and women struggling with mental health access evidence-based supplements and support. Circe speaks to me, and I’m sure I am in good company here.

Can you tell me about Circe and the motivations behind your business?

A few things that led me to it. On the one hand, it comes from my sort of lifelong pursuit of good mental health. I would say it wasn’t really until my mid 20s that I discovered happiness and what true mental wellness is. I think a lot of people think about the baseline of mental health as the absence of mental illness, but I think we can push it a step further and think of it as the presence of contentness and happiness. This is where my personal mission comes from, and on the commercial side, it comes from my own experience of navigating the mental health care system. It is incredibly fragmented and there’s a lot of difficulty in getting information on counselling, medication, etc. There are amazing tools out there, but they’re not working together at the moment. 

Tell me about the origin of the name. 

I read about the history of how the legend of Circe had been portrayed because we know that in all oral traditions, the story can vary a bit. In ancient Greek mythology, sometimes she was this amazing woman to look up to. But in other variations, especially in Medieval and Renaissance Europe, she was this evil temptress to avoid. It’s this reclaiming of the story that really fed into it. I was recently told that in Jamaica, Circe is a medicinal plant used to alleviate PMS. So it all felt so right.✨

What has been your biggest fear, and how have you overcome it, or how are you overcoming it?

This is such a difficult question… My biggest fear is the responsibility I have towards our customers. Good leadership is serving your stakeholders, your community—I think especially in the field of health and mental health, in particular, the responsibility we hold towards our customers is significantly higher. I just want to make sure I do my absolute best to provide the best service and care possible. My biggest fear is I won’t do enough by them.

That’s a lot of responsibility to carry, and I relate to it in my own way as my business is also in a space of seeking to help people feel better, though from a different angle. It leaves me wondering, for my own benefit too, what you’re doing to keep that fear in check?

On a practical level, I am building out a medical advisory board to mitigate the unknown unknowns. On a personal level, I try to be honest with myself always and to practice transparency with the people in our team and community. 

What does being Dauntless mean to you? What does that look like?

For a very long time, I was insecure, and I had a fear of being seen. To me, being Dauntless is to accept yourself as you are, both the good qualities and the flaws, because we all have them. It is putting yourself out there in the world and understanding not everyone is going to like you, no matter how amazing you are.

A lot of my good friends, especially the women that I could never fault, have all said that exact thing at one point. It’s crazy that we keep telling ourselves “no one likes me.” Actually, our friends are telling us, “I really like you, or I wouldn’t have stuck around so long!”

This is my favourite question: How can people support you with Circe?

Funnily enough, I am launching my own newsletter. If you’d like to subscribe, it would be wonderful to have you along on my journey! I’m also looking for advisors and volunteers. If the mission resonated with you please send me a message.