At age five, Tabitha Britt would flip her green toy box upside down and pretend it was a news desk. By the time she was sixteen years old, she had her first job as a community reporter for The Shopper, an advertising magazine in Chesapeake, Virginia. Now, Britt is the Managing Editor for Mighty Scribes (an SEO/link-building company), a freelance writer, and the Founder, CEO, and Editor-in-Chief of DO YOU ENDO – an online magazine about Endometriosis. Endometriosis is a painful disorder in which tissue similar to the tissue that lines the inside of the uterus grows outside of the uterus, usually involving the ovaries, Fallopian Tubes, and the tissue lining the pelvic organs. DO YOU ENDO is a “bullshit-free online magazine for EndoBabes by EndoBabes”. How does she balance it all? “I try to spend my early morning hours working on DO YOU ENDO,” Britt explained, “then I switch into freelancing mode. After I’ve had dinner, I switch back.”
Britt’s been a dedicated, scrappy, and talented writer and entrepreneur since she was young. Britt started her journalism career in high school by launching her own digital newspaper, The Spartan Download. Then, having already created and run her own digital newspaper, she lobbied her way into a job at The Shopper. “I was only 16 at the time, but I begged and begged for a story,” Britt said. “The late Judi Tull then gave me an event preview. She told me if I could cover the event and hand it in on time, she’d pay me for my work and think about assigning me more stories. Needless to say, I quickly became their Community Reporter.” Britt’s entrepreneurial spirit persisted in undergrad, where she founded University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW)’s first fashion blog called Seahawk Chic, created a fashion beat paper for the university paper called The Seahawk, and worked with Kaitlyn Russell to help launch UNCW’s Her Campus Chapter. That’s right, Britt was a fellow managing editor for Her Campus! As if that wasn’t already enough, she also interned at WILMA, The Greater Wilmington Business Journal, and Hampton Roads Magazine.
After graduating from UNCW Britt decided to pursue her dream of moving to New York City. Britt said, “I left with two suitcases and a guitar to start my first graduate semester in the Fashion Studies program at Parsons…I initially decided to study fashion because I wanted to be a staff writer for Vogue. But after a year had passed, I felt like I was in the wrong program. While I wanted to write about fashion, I didn’t want to eat, breathe, and sleep the history of it.” She decided to do the Creative Publishing and Critical Journalism program at The New School for Social Research instead. Never one to be without writing work, she started working as the Web Editor for the Women’s Group at Bauer Xcel Media the following fall.
So what made the woman who’s covered everything decide to settle on DO YOU ENDO as the basis for her new publication? “I launched my magazine, because so many women out there feel alone,” she replied. “It took fourteen years for me to receive my diagnosis.” While Britt still loves writing about fashion, she doesn’t see herself as a fashion-focused reporter anytime in the future. Right now, DO YOU ENDO is her baby and she wants to see it flourish. The goal is for DO YOU ENDO to help everyone who has been affected by Endometriosis, “whether you’re a clueless husband, fiancé, boyfriend, or a frustrated woman wondering WTF is going on with your body, I want to help. This site (though new) will soon consist of a collection of articles, interviews, and studies dedicated to this dreadful condition that makes each month a living nightmare.” And maybe one day DO YOU ENDO can grow into a full-fledged magazine. “One day, I hope to offer my readers a print version and have an office in New York, but it’s going to take time,” Britt explained. “I’m currently creating relationships with brands like Saalt and Progyny to help spread the word.”
Britt finds writers for her magazine through an endometriosis support group on Facebook. Every single writer for DO YOU ENDO has been diagnosed with endometriosis and has their own story to tell.
So where does Britt draw her inspiration from for the magazines she’s started and the original articles she’s written? “Honestly,” Britt said, “I still really like flipping through Cosmo. I also read The Nation, Entrepreneur, Forbes, Vogue, Time Out New York, and The New York Times.” She also looks up to her friend, mentor, and Wall Street reporter for the New York Post, Kevin Dugan. “He’s always there for me, whether I need to ask a quick career question or vent about something that happened at work. Whenever I need to make a big career-related decision, he’s the first person I go to.”
While Britt is dedicated to DO YOU ENDO first and foremost, she still loves working with and for established papers. She loves contributing to 1 Granary and “I think my proudest moment as a writer was when I had a short piece published in The Nation.” When asked for her dream partnership magazine, Britt said, “If I could get an article published in Vogue or The New York Times, I think I’d be pretty satisfied with my life as a writer. But, if I’m being honest with myself, I’d be over the moon to secure a position at Her Campus as a managing editor or an executive editor.” So keep an eye out for this rising star in journalism, and make sure anyone you know who may be impacted by Endometriosis checks out DO YOU ENDO.