Juggling a thriving business while being a mama to two boys and helping families across the globe get much-needed sleep? That's just a typical day for Andria Gordon, Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant and owner of Have Baby. Must Sleep., a baby and child sleep training consultancy for parents with babies and children ages 4 months to 5 years old who want a custom sleep coaching experience centred around their family and lifestyle.
On this episode, Andria shares her incredible journey of balancing it all; her transition from a successful career in advertising to post-partum depression and anxiety to thriving sleep consultancy owner. She also discusses how her second child's autism diagnosis has affected her and the challenges new parents face in achieving good sleep hygiene. Andria's resilience and passion shine through in this episode and her story will definitely inspire you.
Learn more about Andria and Have Baby. Must Sleep.
Instagram - @andriasleep
Website - www.havebabymustsleep.com
SHAUNA GREY
www.simplifiedsavvy.com/
Instagram: @simplifiedsavvy & @thesavvyscooppod
YouTube: Simplified Savvy - The Savvy Scoop Podcast
Juggling a thriving business while being a mama to two boys and helping families across the globe get much-needed sleep? That's just a typical day for Andria Gordon, Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant and owner of Have Baby. Must Sleep., a baby and child sleep training consultancy for parents with babies and children ages 4 months to 5 years old who want a custom sleep coaching experience centred around their family and lifestyle.
On this episode, Andria shares her incredible journey of balancing it all; her transition from a successful career in advertising to post-partum depression and anxiety to thriving sleep consultancy owner. She also discusses how her second child's autism diagnosis has affected her and the challenges new parents face in achieving good sleep hygiene. Andria's resilience and passion shine through in this episode and her story will definitely inspire you.
Learn more about Andria and Have Baby. Must Sleep.
Instagram - @andriasleep
Website - www.havebabymustsleep.com
SHAUNA GREY
www.simplifiedsavvy.com/
Instagram: @simplifiedsavvy & @thesavvyscooppod
YouTube: Simplified Savvy - The Savvy Scoop Podcast
Welcome back to the Savvy Scoop podcast, where we give you the full scoop on all things living your best life. So if that's your jam, you are in the right place. New episodes drop every Wednesday for you to enjoy, as always. I am your host, shauna Gray. I'm a social media marketing and business mentor for surface-based small business owners looking for simple, sustainable strategies to market and grow their small business without the burnout. Oh my God, I got a short on that.
Speaker 1:That's getting too long. Okay, if you're a fan of the show, I would so appreciate you rating and giving it a review wherever you listen and you can also watch on YouTube Maybe you are and you can subscribe there too, so you never miss an episode. Okay, today's episode we have a very special guest, my dear, dear friend, andrea Gordon. She is a certified pediatric sleep consultant as well as the owner and founder of have Baby Must Sleep, a baby and child sleep training consultancy for parents with babies and children four months to five years old who want a custom sleep coaching experience centered around their family and lifestyle. She's a mom of two little boys and, as of today, she is happily married. I think we could all say that, as of today, as of today, we'll see you in tomorrow's ring.
Speaker 2:But things could change by the end of the day.
Speaker 1:This is why we get along. We just like do this kind of stuff back and forth, okay, so obviously I know you and your story, so let's tell the people your story. Let's start before you began your business, because you were working in a completely different industry. So tell us about that and what elements of that job you've been able to bring into your career as a baby and child sleep consultant.
Speaker 2:So I guess it's sort of twofold. So my previous career is advertising. I spent over 20 years in account service roles in digital marketing and ended up my last role as a very senior roles a group account director. So everything I did was around analysis and problem solving and working with clients and working with challenging clients. So all of those skills are always going to be transferable to anything that we can do. I think one of the big things for me that I noticed as a new mom was I was sleep obsessed, so I had my own experiences with not one, not two, not three, but four sleep consultants.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:Good, I know bragging rights right, not all with one child.
Speaker 2:just so we're clear here there were like separation between my two children, and it's not like the advice wasn't always good, but I often felt the experience lacking. I felt like it was very transactional, it was very cookie cutter and it's true that there is only so many ways to look at a sleep issue, but I felt like I was always chasing someone down. I was waiting days to get responses. My logs were being looked at. So I think the number one thing I brought is I treat my new business, which is a sleep consultancy, like it is the most important business, like my clients are VIPs, like they are my top clients each and every one of them and their service that way.
Speaker 1:I love that so much and you know that's how I run my business too. Like my clients are number one. I care so deeply. Maybe some would say too much about my clients, but that's why people stay with you, because if someone feels cared for, and especially in your line of work, I mean it's parents, and often it's new parents and they're so tired and there's so many emotions maybe some postpartum emotions too Like there's so many nuances to it that they have to like to just feel like a number. It's just not gonna work, it's not gonna be it. So I know that you I mean you have, however, million five star Google reviews, but there's a reason you have that many because you make these people, you solve their sleep issue, but you do so much more than that, right, and I know you make them all up.
Speaker 2:I love my families. I definitely make them laugh especially at night ones, when they're convinced that there will be no laughter but just crying. I'm like, no, I'm telling you guys, like we're gonna have as much fun as we can have sleep training and we do.
Speaker 1:Most of the time People don't believe it, but I know it's true and yeah, like I said, it's a testament. There's like two, like I said, 200, and you're at two, oh, way over 200 now. So yeah, I totally I love that. Like, really, you are really focused on the family and the holistic approach. So obviously you said you were having issues with your own children's sleep and so what led you out of advertising, which is complete, into made you decide okay, I want to do this now myself.
Speaker 2:So there was never a plan for me to leave advertising. This was going to be the career that I retired from. Truthfully, I love it, but I was good at it, so it worked. I was treated great. For the most part, I got good pay, you know good pay and I was like there's no reason to leave this.
Speaker 2:But then I was on maternity leave and anyone who knows me knows like I cannot sit still. I need to be busy, I need to be engaged, I need to be almost like on the verge of overworked in order to feel like good.
Speaker 1:I do know that about you, so when I go, yeah, so on mat leave.
Speaker 2:I was so bored, like don't get me wrong, I'm obsessed with my kids, but I am so much better for my children when I'm working. So five months into my mat leave, covid hit and I had wanted to go back to work early. My husband's like you can't go back to advertising, like you can't do that when you have a child like this young, get home and I'm like fine, not all of our American friends have that, you know, opportunity.
Speaker 1:Right, you know, I know.
Speaker 2:And it always been really fascinated by sleep and I saw like a very popular sleep consultant in the area looking for someone and she wasn't looking for experience. So I put my hat in the ring.
Speaker 1:She hired me and Karen was on my team, so I just threw my hat in the ring.
Speaker 2:I threw my hat in the ring. What I have to lose and I liked it. You know, at first I wasn't sure that was going to be anything, but I started to like really connect with families and I started to see like new mom Andrea from back in the day, in a lot of these people I was talking to.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I was seeing like postpartum anxiety and post-prime depression two things that I had and I really wanted to help these people. So it was really rewarding for me and I was getting good at it and I was getting busy so it was really going to just be my side hustle, sean. I like there was no plan to do this full time. And then I went back to work and, if we're being candid, my company said you know, your company actually looks a little bigger than you're telling us it is. I'm like it's not it's busy, but like it's just I've got Shawna. They never believe me. I'm like I have a social person, like I'm not doing this during office hours. And then they basically said you know you've got to make a choice. And I said you know what that and actually what's crazy is I am so conservative at times with making big decisions. I think within a minute I just sort of said if you're asking me to bet on me or bet on you, I'm betting on me. So I'm done here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so they forced you to bet on yourself.
Speaker 2:And they did not expect it. It did not go over great but Well, because they were gonna lose you and I'm you know.
Speaker 1:They didn't want to lose you, obviously because you're immensely talented at everything you touch, so I'm not surprised that they weren't happy about that. But they forced you to bet on yourself, which is amazing, and I mean, look at what you've done with it now. Now you have a team and but I think that you know, starting from so many of us, I feel like started our businesses on Matleaf. We, you know, we're just looking for the thing that was gonna make us happy, something.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And you know that's something you and I have in common was having the postpartum anxiety depression, and I don't did you ever have yours diagnosed? Because I sure didn't.
Speaker 2:but oh no, it took five or six months after Lenny, my first, was born for them to diagnose, because they said that my sleep deprivation was so bad that they were never certain if this was postpartum depression or that I was so sleep deprived that I wasn't able to regulate myself or my emotions, and it was like a little bit of column A and column B.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how can you distinguish the two? I think it's all that's part of. What can lead to it is the sleep deprivation.
Speaker 2:When sleep got better, the feelings didn't go away. So, yeah, definitely, you know. And with Nady, my second, like postpartum anxiety was very obvious right away. And it was diagnosed, I think, within a week. Oh, that was better, that's good that you bought.
Speaker 1:I did, I didn't. I just kept it all to myself and just like went along.
Speaker 2:I don't know how you did it.
Speaker 1:I don't know, even you know people after were like I had no idea you were so struggling. So I'm like I don't even know if I knew at the time, because I was just like this is what being a mom was and I didn't really have a lot of other people who just had babies to talk about it with. So I was like is this? This is just it. I'm just here in my robe, watching TV with a baby on me and crying because I it's the worst. Can't do anything else.
Speaker 2:Because I honestly think postpartum depression more than anxiety, because anxiety is talked about more now, but depression is one of these things that they make it look a certain way Like they always describe. You know depression is you don't want to do the things you used to do while you have a baby. You can't do those things.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:You don't want to get out of bed. You don't have that choice. So it looks very different for different people. And for me and I don't know if you can relate to this it wasn't that I didn't love my child, it was that I was mourning my past life and no one told me that was going to happen.
Speaker 1:It was terrible. That was exactly it. I was like everyone was like oh, I'm upset about the sleep deprivation, I'm upset about this and that. I'm like I am upset about having to not be, like not being able to keep my same routines. My routines are now based on somebody else and this is not like yeah, I can't do this. I'm just this now. I'm just this person who just looks after a baby. I like I got to go. I want to go to work.
Speaker 2:I want to like I don't know, it's just something else. Being a mom is the most incredible thing, but it's also one of the most thank thankless jobs.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, and it is a job at first until you get your rhythm and you figure it all out. But let's be honest, I mean I think we're all still figuring it out Totally.
Speaker 1:Kids are so different. Totally. And then you're like you know, two kids are like even your own two kids can be just totally different the seconds are always feisty.
Speaker 2:Nady's a vibe. As we know, nady is a vibe.
Speaker 1:Well, on that note, you know you do have a child with autism, so can you talk about that experience and how that has affected your career and your business and your life? I mean, I think it affects everything. So I know so many other parents would love to hear from you. Maybe they won't feel so alone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the autism diagnosis was like a big one. I sort of knew coming out of COVID that something wasn't feeling right, like my little guy went from counting and chatting and singing and playing to not responding to his name and not remembering how to count. So we got a diagnosis super young and I think you know I was okay with the it is likely this but when the diagnosis came that was it I honestly feel like I lost you in my life, like the magnitude of grieving that happens.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:While you're trying to figure out how to properly care and develop your child is beyond overwhelming. I mean, I'm two years into this journey and it still sometimes feels like it's the first day. Yeah, I think Nadie has just made me like a way better person. Like I always said that, like you know, before I had children I was like this executive. I was like they called me the velvet hammer, like I was very like, good at my job, very direct, but like I got done and I didn't have a ton of empathy of, I'm being told the honest.
Speaker 1:Like I was a manager before kids.
Speaker 2:I'm just like, oh, your kid's home is sick. I don't know what that is, that feels like an excuse.
Speaker 2:Right Like once I had Lenny, my first, my empathy crew. I became a better person Once I found out about Nadie. I think I became so freaking soft and it helps my business because I am so much more empathetic and compassionate to anything that they're going through. Their challenges are different, but I now fully understand what it's like to really feel challenged a lot. Whether your child's neurodiverse or not, a lot of the aspects that a four year old goes through are going to be common, whether they're autistic or not. So Nathan's four. He doesn't talk, but I love him with all my heart and he's absolutely the cutest thing, which is his saving grace.
Speaker 1:He is so cute.
Speaker 2:How does that affect your?
Speaker 1:sorry, go ahead. Yeah, no, go ahead. How does that affect your? How did it change things in how you run your business and your life? Or were you able you know, did you have to change how you work with clients, or were you able to continue with the same pace and everything that you were doing?
Speaker 2:I mean I think you know the answer like the pace didn't change. No, you know, it doesn't mean that like I'm not distracted some days and I don't use some of my free time to do the things I planned. And Nathan's life and development and all the therapy he's in takes up a big part of our lives now. But I have a really great partner, thankfully, who really shoulders a lot of it with me. But my business fulfills me and it makes me happy and helping people makes me happy and, to be honest, like most of my like actual heavy lifting is at night when he's asleep, so I'm able to do it all, but I'm still full speed ahead with this company and developing it and growing it.
Speaker 1:I know you are Like you said earlier. You are, when things aren't like, to the point of overwhelm. You're like where is everybody?
Speaker 2:I get so bored. Oh my God, I go crazy.
Speaker 1:So talk a little bit about more than sleep, because that offer, I think, is so special not something I've ever seen anywhere and I just think that it's incredible what you're, what you're building with it. So I would love you to just like talk more about it.
Speaker 2:So more than sleep is a collaborative offering between myself or one of the pediatric consultants on my team and I also have two incredible registered social workers who specialize in perinatal mental health. What I started to find is that I wanted to give clients more, and when I saw myself in some clients I could help them, but only to some extent, like I really feel that most people need a lot more support than just a sleep consultant can give, and not every case, but every time I get to work on more than sleep with someone, I'm like, yeah, this should be the only thing I'd offer. So Laura, who is a lead therapist who works with me and created this offering with me, was actually a former client and she had worked with children and children in traumatic situations and then she evolved her business and her practice into more of like the perinatal aspect. And Laura and I just started talking and right before she went on her second mat leave, I said, listen, this is what I'm thinking, what do you think? And she's like I think we need to do this.
Speaker 2:So as soon as she was ready, we started to put pen to paper and like map out how we could meet the needs and wrap around our clients together, so I work with her or Sarah, who is our other therapist, and my other consultants, of course too, and now clients who sign up with us and do this and work with us for two weeks or three. They get all the stuff you would get just with working with a sleep consultant, plus the additional support and oversight from the therapy team. That also helps me do my job better, because Laura or Sarah can call me and be, like Shana, struggling with this. So you have to be careful when you talk about. Feeding is a big topic of anxiety for new moms?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so they might say. They might say, like it took time for Shana to establish nursing, so be really careful in those feeding discussions and changing feeding around in respects to sleep. So they make me better at my job and, to be honest, when I'm feeling overwhelmed and depleted from Listen, some clients are. You know, they're in it deep and it's hard for me to see because I lived it, they'll help me also. Yeah, so I find our clients who go through that process are. They just feel so much better after and often they'll continue on the journey with the therapist they were working with, which is great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, oh, it's just, it's just so amazing and just really ties into the holistic family approach that I know is so important to you and I just think having that therapy aspect with the sleep training getting that together I mean like a miracle, like what kind of difference you would feel it feels good.
Speaker 2:It feels good. It's the most popular offering right now, for sure, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm not surprised. It's amazing. Well, on that note about parents, a question that came in was can you help a parent with their own sleep?
Speaker 2:I mean technically I can Like if I'm working with the family, like I'm not an adult sleep coach, but generally when I'm dealing with moms especially, and some dads but it's often moms who have a lot of sleep dysfunction when they're going through these early stages with their baby. I need to understand where it's coming from, right, are they anxious? Are they doom scrolling social all night? Are they still constantly Googling stuff? Or, like the worst one, are you staring at that baby monitor? And I'm like I tell all the moms I'm like it's not Netflix, guys, like nothing happens. It's the shittiest Netflix show you're ever going to watch. It's your baby sleeping. Stop looking at it. As long as they're safe, they're okay, and when you hear them, you'll go get them, or we'll react or we'll do what we need to do.
Speaker 2:But good sleep hygiene for new parents is really hard, because so many of them have come to me being so anxious about sleep that it feels impossible to sleep even when they're baby sleeping. So we do talk about things like ending screen time early, trying to establish a more predictable bedtime, not doing that doom stay scrolling, and like cutting off screens. I think I said that Some of them do need supplementation depending, and that's something they can talk to their physician or naturopath about. But we absolutely work on parents getting sleep and when I'm with families, I say to them one of the things that I used to hate hearing. But it's different now, because we're working on sleep. I'm like if your child is sleeping, there is no reason for you not to be, yeah, and if they're taking a killer nap, do you think you're folding the laundry? Can totally wait, I know that's your favorite laundry.
Speaker 1:You know I'll be like okay, no laundry.
Speaker 2:And you have to start implementing self-care measures, because most of us don't.
Speaker 1:I'm still not so sure. I'm still not creating the self-care aspect.
Speaker 2:Like I suck at it if I'm doing the self-care aspect, the revenge.
Speaker 1:bedtime was my big one. My kids would go to bed and I would be like till one in the morning just TV and phone, tv and phone. And I wondered why am I so sleep deprived the next day?
Speaker 2:Like it's just so awful, it's hard to let go when you've undergone some type of anxiety, depression or trauma around your child coming into this world. It really can affect people and how you had your child, meaning if they were born surrogacy or you went through a lot of miscarriages or you had IVF, we put our children on a whole different level and it's really hard, because they almost feel, like I work so hard to have this child, like how can I sacrifice?
Speaker 2:I have to sacrifice everything, including my sleep, to care for them. Yeah, so there's some complexities that come into why a parent might not be sleeping.
Speaker 1:Right, I think one of the best things I did was not get a video monitor.
Speaker 2:I had sound or the worst.
Speaker 1:Because I knew that I would just stare at it. All the time and again my husband was always like I mean, we can have the monitor, but it's not like our child is in another wing of the house, like they're. Like, I mean they're too big.
Speaker 2:I know I hate them. I'm like I'm going through three motor roll of video monitors in my first, I think, six, seven months of having Lennox.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, no, the audio only. I had it for both my kids and I was like, okay, this is good, this is good. I'm not watching, I can only hear. I think it was the best decision I made, and I mean I go to check on them and their sleep all the time. You know, still now going to just like everyone's good, okay, and then I can go to sleep. But same.
Speaker 1:Okay, one question too that somebody else asked and you just you, touched on it for a second. Do you ever recommend supplements like melatonin to your clients? I guess that would be adult or child.
Speaker 2:So I mean, obviously I can have more of a conversation with an adult around using supplementation like a melatonin. It's not really my area of expertise. I think whenever you introduce like magnesium, magnesium you can add and usually you can do so safely, unless you have heart medication or something else it could be an issue. You always talk to your doctor to make sure if there's any concerns about taking something like melatonin or magnesium. When we talk about children and supplementation, that is a physician discussion. It's not that there isn't an opportunity for melatonin to work, but it's often misused and I only tell a family to have that conversation when we've gone through sleep. Hygiene. Routines are nailed down, timing is appropriate, child's falling asleep independently, not napping too much or napping enough, and then one. It's been a week or two and I'm not seeing what I need to see and I think one of those things could help and I direct them to their physician.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you would With my recommendation Right, yeah, okay, okay, love that, so to finish us off, I have a few questions. I ask every guest, so what's one thing you do every day, or most days, that helps you to live your best life?
Speaker 2:Day drink? No, I don't day drink, I don't. I tell my clients too. If naps are bad, I read and not stuff of that business. So I'm a huge voracious reader and I, basically I start in a book pretty much every week or every four days, and I always read when I'm feeling stressed or I have time to myself. I always pick up my Kindle before I pick up my phone.
Speaker 1:That is so great. What a great tip I mean we could all learn from that I love reading. I love reading my books on my phone now because I thought maybe that would help me to like. But no, no, I've got to go back and get a separate device or just start getting, like, the actual hard copy because Kindles are great, because anything 100 books with you at all times.
Speaker 1:Mine died, so I think I'd need to just order a new one. Maybe that could be my Christmas present. Okay Best advice you've ever been given or advice you would give to your younger self.
Speaker 2:Hmm, I think it's that you just sometimes just have to take the lead and not everything's always going to be lined up. But like it's true, like nothing ventured, nothing gained. That's not really like what I always live by, but my husband was a big supporter of this and said like try doesn't work out, I'm fine, but like bet on yourself.
Speaker 2:Again, it's like betting on yourself and taking the risk. So I think for me it would be. It would have been like why didn't, why did you wait so long? You didn't love what you were doing, but you sat in that and were prepared to sit in it for another 30 years. Take the risk. You can always go back to the original path if the risk didn't feel right.
Speaker 1:I think so many people do that You're just like well, I'm whatever, I'm good at, it makes me money. I might be bored every day, but that's a really common thing. But yeah, when you actually think about every day, you're going to be bored. I mean, yeah, I can't do that. I couldn't do that either. Okay, and do you have a favorite quote?
Speaker 2:Yes, I don't know the exact. It's basically if you don't like the road you're going down, pave yourself a new one. Amazing. And you have Dolly Parton, but it's good. It's good she's amazing. She really is. I mean, I think some of the smartest people are just people who omits us, right, like not these scholars who come up with all their big thoughts. But it's true, you don't like what you're doing and like what's stopping you from going in another direction.
Speaker 1:And especially now. I mean really we have access to so much. I mean you, like you said before, you just give it a try, you never know like what could happen. I love that, Okay, so tell everyone how they can work with you right now, where they can find you.
Speaker 2:Okay, they can find me on. Instagram is definitely the best place. It's Andrea with an, I sleep, so you can find me there. You can find me at havebabymustsleepcom and grab a call with myself or someone on my team. All the calls are free and it's like a great opportunity to connect with us and get to know us and us to get to know you and let you know what can be achieved.
Speaker 1:Love that and I will have everything in my show notes so that everyone can find you. Thank you so so much for being here. It was so great to chat, all things, sleep and momma hood and all that good stuff. Thank you so much everyone for listening and I'll see you next week. Bye.