Our Story

Our Story — Talk That Shift
Our Story

More than a brand. It’s personal.

Talk That Shift was built from a belief I’ve carried for years: mental health should not be something we only talk about after somebody reaches a breaking point. We all have something going on. Sometimes the first shift is finally having the language to say what it is.

The shift is the conversation →
Alexis and her son
Real people.
Real conversations.
Real change.
Alexis and her son together
Hey, I’m Alexis.

Mental health was never just a topic for me.

Mental health has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. I come from a family where mental health diagnoses have shown up in a lot of different ways — schizophrenia, PTSD, depression, anxiety, OCD, and more.

I’ve seen what happens when people are hurting, when people don’t fully understand what they’re experiencing, and when families learn to survive around things nobody really knows how to talk about.

And in the Black community especially, I’ve seen how quickly mental health gets reduced to one idea: “That’s for crazy people.” Therapy is for crazy people. Medication is for crazy people. Talking about your feelings means something is wrong with you.

Meanwhile, people are grieving. Overwhelmed. Anxious. Burned out. Depressed. Carrying trauma. Functioning on empty. Showing up for everybody else while barely having enough left for themselves.

Sometimes the first step is simply having the words.

Why Talk That Shift?Because language gives us somewhere to start.

There’s something powerful about finally being able to say, “Oh. That’s what I’ve been feeling.” Not because a label fixes everything. But because language can help us recognize patterns, ask better questions, and stop treating every hard season like a personal failure.

I wanted to bring a serious conversation to the forefront without making it feel clinical or distant. Humor became part of that. There is nothing funny about struggling with your mental health — but humor can break tension. It can make somebody stop scrolling. Sometimes a shirt, a post, or one sentence makes somebody say, “Damn. That’s me.”

We’re not making light of mental health. We’re making it easier to talk about.

This started at home.

A mother. A son. A different conversation.

Alexis with her son as a baby
Where it started

Becoming his mom changed the assignment.

I knew I wanted to do some things differently. That meant thinking about the patterns we inherit — and the ones we choose not to pass down.

Alexis and her son when he was young
Growing up

I wanted him to have language for what he felt.

I wanted him to understand emotions instead of being taught to bury them, and to know that asking for help does not make him weak.

Alexis and her son during his childhood
Breaking cycles

The conversations became part of how we lived.

We talked about emotions, mental health, strength, and the things families sometimes avoid. I wanted different conversations to create a different foundation.

Alexis and her adult son today
Now

Today, we build together.

Talk That Shift also became a way to teach business, ownership, structure, and purpose — while building a platform that helps other people have these conversations too.

Education fuels the mission

Passion. Purpose. Progress.

My passion for mental health eventually became part of my education too. I earned my Bachelor’s degree in Psychology, and I’m currently pursuing my Master of Social Work at the University of Kentucky as I continue building toward clinical social work and deeper work in mental health, advocacy, and community support.

The education gives me tools. The lived experience gives me perspective. And the community keeps reminding me that mental health conversations have to make sense in the real world — not just in textbooks.

Talk That Shift is not about pretending a degree makes somebody the expert on everybody else’s life. It is about creating language, resources, and spaces that help people better understand their own.

Alexis and her son in a polished portrait
Different conversations can build stronger generations.
What Talk That Shift is becoming

More than apparel.

Talk That Shift started with apparel, but the vision has always been bigger than clothes.

We’re building a space for mental health awareness, reflection, education, resources, and real conversation — without turning every emotion into a diagnosis and without making people feel like something is wrong with them for being human.

That includes projects like What’s My Shift?, our guided check-in experience designed to help people slow down, identify what may be happening underneath the surface, and put language around what they may need next.

No judgment. No pretending we have your whole life figured out. Just another way to start the conversation.

Explore What’s My Shift? →
Alexis and her son
This was personal before it was a brand.
We want mental health to become something we can talk about before somebody reaches a breaking point.
Parents talking to their kids. Friends checking in without making it weird. Men having language for emotions they were taught to suppress. Families recognizing patterns they do not want to pass down.
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