Adding Sleep Consulting to your Doula Business with Allison Coleman

 

Allison is “mom” to four fabulous people, now grown. She is running an active Postpartum Doula agency in Austin Texas, working as an independent birth & postpartum doula in Asheville NC, and running a fabulous postpartum doula certification program called ABG doula training. Allison believes that parents can have an easier and happier start with support. She has been blessed to be able to offer support to families in a variety of ways since 1998. Allison Coleman

Allison opened Austin Baby Guru (ABG) in 2011 because she found that working as a postpartum doula fed her soul. She was excited to discover that it could also support her family. Allison Coleman 

In 2017, Allison opened the ABG Postpartum Doula Training to help others find the joy and satisfaction she had found in doula work.

This year, Allison has enrolled in Center for Pediatric Sleep Management in preparation for adding sleep coaching to her doula business.

 

 

 

Links:

Website: ABG Postpartum Doula Training
Instagram: @abg_pp_doula_training

 

If you would like to learn more about the Becoming a Sleep Consultant, please join our free Facebook Group or check out our CPSM Website.

Book a free discovery call to learn how you can become a Certified Sleep Consultant here.

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Transcript: 

Intro: Welcome to Becoming a Sleep Consultant! I’m your host Jayne Havens, a certified sleep consultant and founder of both Snooze Fest by Jayne Havens and Center for Pediatric Sleep Management.

On this podcast, I’ll be discussing the business side of sleep consulting. You’ll have an insider’s view on launching, growing, and even scaling a sleep consulting business. This is not a podcast about sleep training. This is a podcast about business building and entrepreneurship.

Allison is mom to four fabulous people, now grown. She is running an active postpartum doula agency in Austin Texas, working as an independent birth and postpartum doula in Asheville North Carolina, and running a fabulous postpartum doula certification program called the ABG Doula Training. Allison believes that parents can have an easier and happier start with support. She has been blessed to be able to offer support to families in a variety of ways since 1998.

Allison opened Austin Baby Guru (ABG) in 2011 because she found that working as a postpartum doula fed her soul. She was excited to discover that it also could support her family. In 2017, Allison opened the ABG Postpartum Doula Training to help others find the joy and satisfaction she had found in doula work. This year, Allison has enrolled in Center for Pediatric Sleep Management in preparation for adding sleep consulting to her doula business.

Jayne Havens: Allison, welcome to the Becoming a Sleep Consultant podcast. I’m so excited you’re here with me today.

Allison Coleman: I’m excited, too.

Jayne Havens: Before we get started, tell everyone a little bit about you. Share your story. Tell us what you’re up to. Give us a rundown.

Allison Coleman: I’m a mom of four people. They’re all grown up now. But I spent years just immersed in parenting. And then when I started to explore as a single parent what I could do for work, I first trained as a birth doula. I did that for a while. I trained with a midwife. It’s really hard to be on call with four small children and be a single parent. I ultimately settled into postpartum doula work because I realized it was something I could schedule. And the more I did it, the more I realized it totally fed my soul. I love watching parents figure out that they’ve got this, that they don’t need me as scaffolding.

I gradually moved into doula training. I still work as a birth and postpartum doula, but I started a postpartum doula certification program. It’s the ABG Postpartum Doula Training. I started it because a couple of the doulas that were working with me ended up running their own agency.

Great. I was really supportive of that. I figured the more of us that are doing a great job, the more work there is. And they would find a friend or a neighbor and call me and say, “Hey Allison, can you train this person to work for us?” And so we did that, and it just kind of spiraled into an official program. I put it online the year the pandemic hit, like a month before the pandemic hit. What crazy timing. And it’s been successful. It’s a slow build, but everybody that goes through it feels really good about their ability to be able to support families and build a business.

I run a postpartum doula agency in Austin, Texas. I’m living outside of Asheville and working as a birth and postpartum doula. The hurricane hit here in the middle of the mountains. It’s like a crazy thing. And so I was talking to you about, you know, what else do I do? And I figured it was a good time to add in getting certified as a sleep coach or a sleep trainer. I haven’t figured out exactly what term to use for that. Because so many families are looking for support in that, and that’s something that I don’t have to market just here or just in family’s homes.

Jayne Havens: I feel like you’re a lifelong grower and learner. Is that right about you?

Allison Coleman: Absolutely. I have horrible ADD. And instead of letting it take over my life in a bad way, I really just use it to bring all the different things together. And it’s important to me to help other people while still having a priority of meeting my own needs and making the money I need to support my life.

Jayne Havens: So I checked right before we hopped on for this interview, and I saw that you are 48% through the course at the time of this recording. I think you’ve been at it for about three, three and a half weeks, which is great progress. I’m wondering, are you enjoying the learning process, and how are you juggling the online course with everything else that you do for your existing busy business?

Allison Coleman: So a couple of different things. One, I had already been trying out an app called Speechify with my dual training, because several of my students have dyslexia or different type of ways of learning that they were looking for alternatives. And so a lot of the written stuff in your program, I’ve been running through it. Which means that when I’m not watching a video of you talking or one of the group discussions, I can still be walking around my house with earbuds on listening to the program.

Jayne Havens: I love hearing about tools like this because I actually didn’t know that that existed, and people ask me all the time if you can listen to the course instead of reading it. Actually, I know that Apple products have an accessibility app that allows you to listen to something that’s written. So if you have an iPhone, or an iPad, or an Apple computer, it is possible. But I didn’t know of something similar with Android or other products. So what is it called again?

Allison Coleman: Speechify.

Jayne Havens: Speechify.

Allison Coleman: I think the full program is like $130 a year, but there’s like smaller parts of the program that you can do for free.

Jayne Havens: Okay. I love that.

Allison Coleman: And I didn’t know about it until one of my students said, “Hey, I’m using this.” And she had had great success with it, so I figured I would try it. Because I am very bad at just sitting in one place and focusing on one thing, it really helps me get through the program to be able to listen to it while I do different things.

Jayne Havens: Okay. So you’re multitasking, which I am the type to do that too. When I take discovery calls with parents, I’m often folding laundry, or I’m putting stuff away. And sleep consultants who take my course have asked me, “Well, aren’t you taking notes?” And it’s like yeah, sometimes. I’m always like close to my kitchen table.

Allison Coleman: You can do that at the kitchen counter or on top of the washing machine.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, exactly. So I’ll have all my laundry set out, and I’ll be folding laundry. I have my little notepad, and I quickly jot down the child’s name and any little details. But yeah, I like to multitask when I’m working as well. And I think that that works for a lot of people. So I’m glad to hear that that works for you. Are you dedicating a certain amount of time to it daily or weekly, or is it just sort of wherever you can fit it in in the nooks and crannies of your day?

Allison Coleman: Not really. I mean, I have a lot of nooks and crannies right now because I had just moved a few months before the hurricane hit. I’m in between in-person clients. So I do a lot, but it’s in little bitty bites, you know. I have a phone call with a client, or I answer text messages from a doula, or I go in and edit something in the training. But none of it is an eight-to-five thing.

Jayne Havens: How do you see sleep consulting services benefiting the community that you already serve? How do you plan to integrate this service into your already thriving business?

Allison Coleman: A couple of different ways. As a postpartum doula, I specialize in supporting families anywhere from 3 to 16 weeks generally. During that time, I’ve always tried to set them up with sleep conditioning. Most of the babies that I work with are sleeping seven or eight hours by the time I’m done working with them. But we know, so often, once families are doing it on their own and running the rest of their life, that kid hits a four-month sleep regression, or they get to six months and they’re ready to start crawling or sitting up. Their brain just kind of explodes, and they work it all out during the night. It’s really hard for parents to stay in a routine to keep supporting that sleep.

And so, so often, I will have clients call me back when their baby is five, six, eight months old and go. I just talked to somebody the other day that I helped 18 months ago. She’s like, “My baby is in my bed. I’m happy with that right now, but I already know that in six months or so, my goal is to get that baby sleeping on their own and to night wean them, and I’ll be calling you back then.” And up till now I have always said, “Great. I have a great referral list of sleep specialists that I can refer you to.”

So as a postpartum doula, I see it as a way of expanding my knowledge, which helps even in that first three or four months. I was surprised how much you talk about the science of sleep and how even as a sleep specialist you can support families in the beginning without moving into what’s traditionally thought of as sleep training. But it’s that really prepping the baby for learning on their own and prepping the parents not to screw it up. Not really the best way to say it. But prepping them for not getting in the way of their babies learning it on their own.

Because I think, as parents, we all do that. You know, we want to make everything right for our kids, so we try to assist them through stuff that they can learn themselves if we stay out of the way. And I think that’s kind of what that early time is about. But I also find that it’s a way as a postpartum doula of extending how long you can work with someone. You can take a break from being in their home and be able to layer it in among your other clients that you moved on to, but still be able to be there to have continuation of care for clients who are in a different place in their parenting journey.

Jayne Havens: Do you see any specific challenges come up over and over again among moms with regard to sleep?

Allison Coleman: I think there’s a couple of things really early that I definitely see. Most of my clients breastfeed. I don’t care how they feed their babies, but most of them do. And in that first week to 15 days when baby is still regaining birth weight and you’re still getting your milk well-established, they are told over and over, “If your baby cries, they need to eat,” which is fine. I mean, the goal is to put weight back on them.

What I found is, no one ever tells them once they regain birth weight, it’s okay to step back a little and to give them some space to figure out sleep. I’ve had a lot of people that I’ve worked with that call me when their baby is two months old and the baby is still waking up to eat anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half, one to two sleep cycles. Because they’ve never learned that when they hit that restless stage in between sleep cycles, they’re safe just to fall back asleep. They still think they need to eat to go back to sleep. You can’t expect a parent to know it if nobody ever tells them. So I think that’s the first one.

Then I think that we have this huge disconnect between parents who have different parenting styles. You have the attachment parents who their whole goal is to be very child-led and bond and da, da, da, da, da, da. Then you have parents who really believe that they need to be in control and set the framework for their baby to grow in. Neither one is right or wrong. They’re just different parenting styles. But I think, so often, people get so hung up in how they want a parent that they lose that middle ground. And I really feel like somewhere in there, you figure out that babies are born really wise, and they’re pretty good at telling you what they need.

That’s not always meaning that you have to go in and rescue them immediately. Sometimes that’s letting you know that they’re frustrated and they need to work through something. You can just hold that space for them just leaving them crying forever. Like I said, that’s early babies. Because that’s primarily what I work with right now. I do tell parents that — usually, after I’m done with them somewhere around six, seven, eight months old, that shifts. You have to step back again, and that’s okay. You can still be there for them. You can still love them. You can still meet all their needs, but you don’t have to trade your well-being and your sleep. And you’re taking care of yourself in order to make your baby okay.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, I think that’s really wise advice. When you were mentioning the two different types of parenting styles that are seemingly somewhat on opposite ends of the spectrum, what I notice about parents, regardless of what end of the spectrum they’re on — sometimes parents do fall in the middle — is that when you cling so hard to some sort of identity as a parent, sometimes it makes it harder to actually just trust your intuition. Because you’re so committed to your parenting style, that you’re not listening to what your baby is telling you and actually making decisions based on observing and physically paying attention to what’s going on.

You’re just like, “I’m this type of parent, so I’m going to do it this way” rather than listening to your baby who you maybe are assuming is saying, “I need to nurse to sleep. But really, they’re just saying, “I’m tired, and I wish I was asleep.” And if parents actually would just tune into their children rather than being so tightly wound with their own self-proclaimed parenting style, they may actually adapt and fall somewhere in the middle in a way that might feel more sustainable long term.

Allison Coleman: And tuning into themselves. I mean, I think we get so much societal noise of what it should look like to parent, particularly once you start putting labels on it. That it’s really hard for parents to sit with, “This is what my baby is showing me. This is what I feel about it. This is what I need,” and find that balance in there. I think all of our goals really should be providing scaffolding for parents to be able to do it on their own. I mean, even as a sleep consultant, you can go in and help change baby’s patterns.

But if you’re not helping the parents understand how to keep supporting that when you’re not there, then the first time the kid has a cold or an upset stomach and wakes up during the night and realizes that their parent responds differently, the whole pattern changes.

Jayne Havens: How do you navigate the stigma around sleep training in your postpartum doula career? Because I feel like there are a lot of strong opinions around sleep training, whether it’s right or wrong, whether parents should do it or shouldn’t do it. As somebody who’s guiding parents through the early stages of motherhood or parenthood, how are you navigating these difficult conversations with parents who may have preconceived notions around something that aren’t exactly in line with reality?

Allison Coleman: I think that a lot of it is language and that preconceived idea. But I think that as someone who is supporting parents in teaching their children to sleep, we also have to stay out of preconceived ideas because we’re people, too. I mean, we all have our own ideas about what works and what’s right and wrong.

For me, personally, my biggest thing is getting to what the parent’s goal is. And I look at sleep training very much like I look at breastfeeding versus formula feeding, or bottle feeding, or combo feeding. It’s not a right or wrong. It’s, what’s your goal? And if your goal is that, most parents will tell me, “My goal is that my baby is healthy and happy.” Great. Can we add a goal that you’re also healthy and happy? Then where’s that balance in there?

If you’re happy putting your baby in your bed and breastfeeding all night and sleeping together, great. Then we should probably talk when you’re ready to move to a different stage. Because that’s working for you. But if it’s not working for you and your goal is to be able to sleep and get your kid to sleep, then let’s work towards that, you know. Just like when parents tell me their goal is to breastfeed, but they’re hating it. It’s like, well, what can we change to make it work for you? And if none of it is working for you, you still can be a great parent and change the goal. We’re allowed to do that.

Jayne Havens: Yes, we are.

Allison Coleman: So I think it’s about getting clear about the goals. And when you know what their goal is, you can use language that doesn’t automatically trigger them. There are a lot of parents that I would never use the term sleep training with them, but they’d be totally fine with coaching them through sleep support. I think it’s because there was such a big thing like when the Ferber method first came out. It’s really, really effective with a lot of kids. It’s really hard for a lot of parents. And so it became this huge divide, and it became the definition of what sleep training was.

From what I understand, even Ferber kind of changed up how they approached that over time. But that initial reaction stuck. And so I tell parents that, in the beginning, we do sleep conditioning. Kids want to sleep. Everybody wants to sleep. They just have to figure out how to make it work with their bodies, you know. And it’s not a right or wrong. It’s what works for your baby, what works for your family, what keeps you healthy and functioning, and taking the steps to get there.

Jayne Havens: I think you’re right that it’s really important to use language that aligns with our client’s parenting style. I think that that’s really key. Because parents, as you said, have a lot of preconceived notions around what sleep training looks like, what it sounds like, what it means. And really, if we can articulate effectively to parents that really what we’re doing is we’re just teaching children how to fall asleep in a new way — there are varying ways to do that and varying levels of support that’s offered to the baby or the child during that process — really, if we work to shift the narrative and to modify the verbiage we use when we’re talking about this, I think that that is — you’re right. It’s highly effective.

It just breaks my heart. To me, the way that I see it is like there’s so much mom shaming. It’s like mom-on-mom meanness and drama. And it’s not just about sleep training. It’s about a lot of things. It’s about breastfeeding versus bottle feeding. It’s about being a stay-at-home mom or putting your child in daycare. There are so many things that we as parents have a lot of guilt around. That really, I think if everybody would just be kinder to one another about the choices that we’re making as parents. As you said, you can breastfeed. You can bottle feed. It’s fine either way.

Like, you do you. If it’s working for you, that’s great. If it’s not working for you, let’s look at how we can make a shift so that everybody is happy. I think that that is the mindset that all parents should be living in. Specifically, I think mothers need to be sharing that with other mothers rather than the alternative, which is a whole lot of criticism and shaming. That just makes everybody feel like garbage. It’s heartbreaking to me.

Allison Coleman: Well, I think as professions that work with people in that perinatal period, building up to having a baby in that first year afterwards, if we recognize that one of the hardest things about parenting is that when we have kids, we live in a really cultural norm. All of the shoulds are cultural. Babies are born at a very biological norm level, and it’s really hard to live in our world and just meet them where they’re at. And you can’t just immediately expect them to jump where you’re at. There’s not really a right or wrong in where families find what is the best fit for their family in that range.

And so we take the judgment out of it. Parents get so much judgment on everything. They get it from each other, but they also get it from social media. They get it from even doctors. There’s just a lot of preconceived ideas about how it should be. And I think if we take that judgment out of it and help parents figure out what their goals are and how they want to parent, we can do a lot to give them the tools to get there.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, as somebody like you who is doing really hands-on work, like when you’re supporting mom’s postpartum, you’re physically there. You are teaching them, I would imagine, how to swaddle a baby and physically showing them and showing them how to pace feed a baby, right? All of these things are very hands-on. Do you plan to offer virtual support when you finished your sleep consultant training?

Allison Coleman: Absolutely. That is like my primary goal for adding it in. And I do have some experience with that. Because while I’m a postpartum doula, my thing that I thrive on is working over nights. I love working over nights. It works for my body. It’s what I like to do. But I offer because my theory in how I do postpartum care is, I create a circle of care around the families I work with. I leave them notes. I send them videos. Because your brain only works so much at 4 AM while you’re nursing.

So I showed them these things, but then I also will send them a video or write out directions. I encourage them to shoot me a text during the day if they have questions. And so I really see sleep training as something I can approach in that same sort of way. And I also feel like sleep training isn’t as effective in homes. I know people who go in and do it in person. I think that’s great, but it’s only half of it.

Jayne Havens: I agree with you.

Allison Coleman: Because even before I went through your program, I could go in with a six or eight-month-old baby and get them sleeping through the night. But I guarantee you. That baby is smart enough that when I leave and someone else walks in the room if they have a wake up — because no matter how perfectly they sleep, there are going to be nights that occasionally they wake up — if that parent doesn’t know how to continue to support that, baby’s whole goal in their life is to learn how to manipulate their world enough to be successful adults. I mean, as adults, we manipulate our world all the time. Manipulation is not a bad thing.

Parents need to realize they are the practice field for that, and they get to decide what they go along with and what they don’t. But a smart baby is going to go, “Oh, mom. You’re not Allison,” and fall into totally different habits. So even if I was doing in-person sleep training, parents would need that support during the day without me being in the room in order to grow forward from that.

And so I would like to be in a position that if they have a baby over a few months old, that I can send them a written plan and I can talk them through the difficulties. I can give them reassurance of what they’re doing right and encourage them to keep doing that while still tweaking the things that aren’t quite working. I already do that as a postpartum doula, but I don’t have the verbiage and the tools to be able to support older babies. I certainly don’t have the verbiage and tools to support toddlers.

Jayne Havens: You will soon.

Allison Coleman: And people still need that. So I’m enjoying that part of the program especially.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, you’re on your way. You’re on your way. Because this podcast is all about business building and entrepreneurship, I’m wondering if you would be willing to share something that maybe feels hard for you when it comes to growing a business. Then of course, maybe you could share something that feels like it comes more easily to you as well.

Allison Coleman: Sure. Talking to people about what I do, that’s easy. I love what I do. It totally feeds my soul. I see all of the value in it, both working with parents and teaching people who want to support parents. The harder thing for me has always been marketing. I’m seeing that a lot more now that I moved, even when I wrote my doula training. We cover a lot about business building and marketing. I brought in other people to help me with that, to get their perspective. I took things I had learned along the way. I mean, you know how that goes.

Jayne Havens: Totally.

Allison Coleman: But then I moved to another state where nobody knows me, and I realized I didn’t know how much I coasted on having a really good reputation in Austin.

Because in Asheville, nobody knows who I am. I’m really good at what I do, but that’s pointless if nobody knows that you do it. So I really had to go back into what do I teach brand new students in terms of, how do they get their name out there? How do they make connections? How do they build a network in a supportive community? How do you get those referrals when you haven’t had clients yet? So that has been a good and bad thing about moving. I mean, it’s difficult for me. But I also think it’s made me a better trainer because I’m having to go back and do what I train other people to do.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, I think that that’s a really valuable perspective. And I would argue. The fact that your strength is that you love to talk about what you do, and you’re really good at articulating your value and how you really can get in there and support families at the highest level, that works to your advantage. Because then really, the only missing piece of the puzzle is finding those people to talk to.

Allison Coleman: It’s totally reach. It’s reach. I could get on a stage in front of 150 people and just talk because I know what I love to do. And it’s contagious. People realize I love to do it. And when I let them know that I raised four kids as a single mom, they realized the value of it as a business. Because not everybody is having to fully support their household doing the business. But they could, you know. It’s the reach part.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, you’ll get there. I have no doubt. You’ll rebuild, and I can already see you’re well on your way. Can you tell everybody a little bit about your training program, and how people can connect with you if they want to become a postpartum doula?

Allison Coleman: Sure. So my program is the ABG Postpartum Doula Certification Program. It’s easiest to find on Facebook or Instagram that way. The website is abgdoulatraining.com.

It is a really comprehensive postpartum program. Because I have history as a birth doula and a postpartum doula, I looked at whether or not I wanted to have an all-inclusive program. Some of those are really popular. I decided that so many of the doulas that I had retrained in postpartum had already been through other programs. They kept coming back to me saying that what they loved about my program was that we covered it so comprehensively, that they felt like they could step into a family’s home and know what to do to be able to support a family. And so I decided just to focus on postpartum.

The program is fully accessible online. I do occasionally do a hybrid program where someone will set up a group training, and I will go to them and do a weekend workshop. We’ll cover the first four modules, which gets them ready to work as a doula. Then they finish out the program online for the actual certification. To get them ready to work as a doula, we go over working in a family’s home, infant safety, CPR, newborn care, and infant feeding. Because those are like the core basics, right?

To finish out online, they will go through working with multiples, working with different family styles, grief and loss. Because I tell people, I don’t run a loss program. But you work with families long enough. You are working with families who are working through a previous loss with a rainbow baby, or you may have a client who has a loss. You need to know how to hold that space while that family gets through that.

We go through a diversity and inclusion module, none of which I wrote because I’m not the person to write that. But I brought in a couple of my doula students who wrote about racial bias in the birth world. I’m working with an acupuncturist in Austin. We created a short training on the 30-day sitting month, the Asian postpartum approach. I worked with Moss Froom to do trans and queer parenting. And so I like pulling in other people that have other world views and skill sets so that my students are ready to work with a whole variety of clients. The training is self-paced. They can take as long as they need. Sometimes that’s a harder thing for people because they don’t have that push to get done.

Jayne Havens: Yep, I know about that.

Allison Coleman: Yeah, but sometimes life interferes. I mean, you have an older parent that you end up taking care of, or a child that has a special need that really takes your attention for a while, or maybe you need to get a nine-to-five job and it slows you down.

You can still come back and jump back in. But most people will finish my program in two to three months. And it’s a good investment if what they want to do is support families. My program is under $800. I don’t require ongoing recertification fees. So it’s just basically the cost of the training and the cost of any books they decide to buy. Then across the country, postpartum doulas make anywhere from $30 to $75 an hour. So it’s a quick return on what you invest in it.

We have a really supportive program. There’s lots of mentoring between other graduates and myself, and it’s something we’re known for. So overall, it’s a great program. And because so many current clients are working with the supplemental fertility insurance programs — Carrot, Maven and there’s a couple of others — ABG is one of the trainings that they’ll accept. So it’s another thing that I tell people. Not everybody is going to want to work with that. But if they do, it helps them there too.

Jayne Havens: That’s fantastic. It sounds like you are really doing a whole lot of impressive things in your business, and you should be incredibly proud. And I’m so grateful that our worlds collided. I think we’ve known each other for years now online, but we finally got to meet. What was it, about a year ago at this point?

Allison Coleman: At the birth retreat in Florida.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, which was really fantastic.

Allison Coleman: Which I’m going back to in January.

Jayne Havens: I’m going to be there, too. I’m going to be there too, so we will have a reunion. I just think it’s so special that — you probably feel this way too — I have all these people that I’ve met online in Facebook groups or connected with on Instagram or whatever, and they’re just like people that I know from the internet. But then they come into your world in a more meaningful way, whether that you actually meet them at the birth worker retreat, or they start recommending your program.

They didn’t even take your program, but they just trust that you’re doing a good job. Or one day, they decide to enroll in your program. And all of a sudden, you have all of these people that are your friends, your co-workers.

Allison Coleman: All these connections in your world.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, and so that’s what I feel about you. I love that we’ve known each other “for several years” but finally got to meet in person. And now our businesses are a little bit more intertwined and growing alongside one another. I love that I get to watch you sort of pivot and grow, and I love that you’re a part of my universe. I just wish you all the success. And I know that just the way you had a booming business in Texas even with the move, you’re going to build it right back up again. I wish you all the success in the world.

Allison Coleman: Thank you. And I love how supportive your program is.

Jayne Havens: Thank you.

Allison Coleman: I mean, your Facebook group that goes with the training is so active, and the students are so supportive of each other. That’s such a great gift as part of a training, you know.

Jayne Havens: Thank you. Thank you. I feel like it takes a lot of hard work to facilitate a collaborative community, one where people truly believe that there’s enough room for all of us. One thing you said earlier in our conversation, you said something about the doulas were doing a great job and then that was good for the industry. I feel that way about sleep consultants. The more sleep consultants that are out there doing good work, that’s better for our industry. That’s not that there’s too much competition. That’s a good thing.

The more parents that are out there hiring postpartum doulas and having a good experience, the more parents that are out there hiring sleep consultants and having a good experience, that normalizes this type of support. Just the way everybody doesn’t bat an eye about buying an $850 stroller because they know that those strollers are great, we want people to feel that way about postpartum doulas. We want people to feel that way about sleep consultants. And the more of us that get out there and do good work, the better for our industry. I really do think that that positions all of us to grow.

Allison Coleman: I think that is probably one of the backbones of how I feel about training doulas. When I first started — my mother is an internet marketer — my mother was like, “Oh, you’re training your competition. You shouldn’t do that.” Because all my training was local in the beginning. And I shared with her my view of it. I really believe that the more of us that are doing great work, the more parents are talking about the great work, and the more people are looking for postpartum doulas, or sleep trainers, or whichever service you offer.

The flip side of that is, as a doula, or as a sleep trainer, it doesn’t serve you to take all of the clients. One, you have no time for your real life. Two, you’re not the best fit for everyone. No matter how good you are, you’re never going to be the best for everyone. And not all of those clients are enjoyable to work with if you’re not the best fit for them. It doesn’t mean they don’t deserve a great sleep trainer or a great postpartum doula. But you can refer them to someone else and still make an impression on their lives.

I’ve had clients — because I’ve done this a long time. I’ve had clients that I’ve interviewed with that I’ve told them, “I’m not the best fit for you. But I really think if you talk to so and so, you would totally mesh with them.” And I’ve had those clients refer other people to me.

Jayne Havens: Same, yeah.

Allison Coleman: Because they realize that the whole reason I wasn’t the best fit for them might be the reason why I’m a perfect fit for their sister, or their cousin, or their next door neighbor. People don’t realize that until they experience it. I think it’s such a good thing. Because the competition, particularly female-dominated careers, is often ridiculous. We do better when we all support each other. There’s more work when we all support each other.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, let’s wrap it up with that abundance mindset, because I think that that’s really a great note to leave everybody on. Truly, as you’re thinking about — most people who are listening to this podcast, I think they’re thinking about becoming a sleep consultant, or maybe they’re getting into the idea of serving families postpartum in some capacity. And really, I think it’s such an important mindset shift to really accept that we are all stronger together and that we rise by lifting others.

Supporting somebody else’s business does not harm your own. I think both postpartum support and sleep consulting, they’re both sort of newer, up-and-coming fields. I think a lot of new parents 5 or 10 years ago had never even heard of a postpartum doula or didn’t even know that sleep consultants existed. And so it’s really up to us to educate parents and to help them realize that there are a lot of options out there for everybody and to find the right fit for you. Yeah, I love referring out in my business. I do it all the time for my own mental health, for my own time management, for all the things.

Allison Coleman: Yeah, it’s part of that self-care for yourself and care for the parents as a community.

Jayne Havens: Yeah, well, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom today. I wish you all the best, and I can’t wait to see you shine.

Allison Coleman: Thank you.

Outro: Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Becoming a Sleep Consultant Podcast. If you enjoyed today’s episode, it would mean so much to me if you would rate, review, and subscribe. When you rate, review, and subscribe, this helps the podcast reach a greater audience. I am so grateful for your support.

If you would like to learn more about how you can become a certified sleep consultant, head over to my Facebook Group, Becoming a Sleep Consultant or to my website thecpsm.com. Thanks so much, and I hope you will tune in for the next episode.