Sleep, work and balance with Kelly Geoghegan
In this blog post, I chat to Kelly Geoghegan, a Maternity Nurse, EMT & Registered Paediatric Sleep Consultant about work and sleep. Two very important aspects of our day to day that are often hugely impacted when we become parents. As a burnout prevention coach I often come back to baseline physical health over and over again - are we sleeping, are we moving, are we nourishing ourselves - and the connection between that and our mental and emotional states. A number of my clients negotiating careers, confidence, boundaries, promotion, money and visibility are also living with broken nights, guilt, resentment and exhaustion.
We discuss the following
common challenges working parents face
what might help to play the long game
an alternative focus to "crying it out"
workplace changes around support for employees
what Kelly turns to in keeping herself healthy and well
3 tips for keeping calm in Christmas chaos (equally applicable to babies and adults :))
Prefer to listen to the full podcast? Click here Sleep, Work, and Sharing the Load
This conversation with Kelly is not so much from the point of view of being a working parent and in the juggle, but from the point of view of supporting working parents. Kelly is a sleep consultant and a maternity nurse who has specialised in supporting parents of young children, so newborn to six years old, with their routines and sleeping habits.
We know that sleep has so much impact on our physical health and mental health. So working within the field of burnout prevention, I see baseline foundational health as key when we start to want to create change. I work all the time with people who are in career transition or other changes within their life and when we don't have sleep, all of that is so much harder.
I was delighted to have this conversation with Kelly. If you are a parent who has young children and are looking for some help, some support, some tips, some strategies, you will find this conversation full of little snippets and sparks to create change in your life.
And if you're an older human who maybe has children who are out of the house or teenagers, or you're out of this phase, there's still so many similarities to how we can create routine and structure and help for our children and how we can maintain our own nervous system. So I was laughing as I was in this conversation with Kelly, because so much of this is relevant for me.
I hope you enjoy it. The conversation is about 35 minutes long. Let's get listening.
Kelly, it is so lovely to have you here in this series of conversations about juggling work, juggling family, juggling self, so many of the women that I work with around burnout prevention and leadership. Parenting at the same time, sometimes transitioning from being on maternity leave, coming back into the workspace. Sometimes negotiating hormonal changes and small children, sometimes juggling just life and wanting to cry because you're so tired and you can't see the end of the day.
You come to us speaking as a sleep coach for children. Which I'm so curious about. Tell us everything about yourself and the work that you do.
My name is Kelly Geoghegan. I'm a maternity nurse. I'm an emergency medical technician and I've been in childcare for over 25 years. I specialised in pediatric sleep consultancy. So I was blessed for many, many years. I traveled around the world with celebrities, VIPs on private jets and super yachts, and I helped those children front onto routines and also helped juggle time zones. So a very much hands on experience.
Now with Sleepy Stars, my company, I help parents who wish to navigate the mystery that is sleep, but also to help them from very early on to gently guide their child towards good sleep so that they don't hit the wall of exhaustion. Sometimes people come to me when they've already hit the wall, but many of my return clients are like, Hey, don't wait until this child is 16 months to help them sleep. How do we start? I've got programs for all different types of situations and one on one consultancy as well.
I think something that we often forget to come back to is baseline physical health. There's so much at the moment where we talk about mental health and we are creating space around that. One thing that I come back to over and over again with my clients is, are you sleeping? Are you eating good food? Are you moving your body? And so having that time to rest, digest and move forward is so important when we're juggling work and family.
What do you see as the biggest challenges for working parents, working mothers, that come to you.
I think a lot of working mothers, especially in the U.S. and South Africa, where we have a lot of clients, they go back to work when the child is four months old. When that child is hitting a massive developmental leap. But also I feel moms in general, we try to be perfectionists. We try to control everything and we can't. I say, don't look for perfection. It doesn't exist. Look for good on a regular basis.
Yes, sleep is so important, but not only for the parents, for the child, for their immune system, for their brain development. Some people would take the attitude of like, you're being selfish, you should feed on demand and, co sleep and all the rest. Whereas parents are like, I tried that. I tried co sleeping. I tried feed on demand. None of us are getting any sleep.
Child is like a wasp in the day, the parents are snapping at each other over the little things, nobody under the roof is happy. So when I work with families, they go [00:05:00] from multiple wakes at night, unreliable days, to good days and good nights.
The child is happier and the parents are happy. And there's nothing wrong with that. But I do find that moms in particular, dads are great, but moms in particular, they're not. They go back to doing a job they used to do on maybe 8 to 10 hours, unbroken sleep to maybe four to six hours of very broken sleep.
It's the same person going back, but not with the same energy. You've got brain fog. I had a woman a while ago and she said, Kelly, I drove into work this morning. I got here. I can't remember driving in. That's dangerous in my opinion. I do feel like we try and manage it all and are reluctant to ask for help.
You want to be a hero. You want to say, I can do this. Children don't come with instruction manuals. And you're not given that much information when you leave the hospital, you rely on your friends or Google or something. Then you end up more confused than you were before you even started asking questions.
So that's my thing. I try and simplify things, put them in terms that parents who haven't worked in childcare can relate to and help guide them on their way.
You make such an interesting point about when we are going back to work. So you're saying four months is really early when we think about South Africa, US norms and the expectations that we're putting on ourselves to be continuing at the same capacity that we were, but with much less foundational health or time to rest or time to think or time to focus, or even just time by ourselves.
I feel like this motto of ‘look for good’ over and over again, could be something we could start printing on t shirts? Can we soften our view of it's got to be perfect. I've got to be perfect.
It's got to all look like the way it does on Pinterest too. Can we make it consistently adequate over and over again? And can we rest into that?
What helps maybe remove some of the pressure on how do I do this the best way? So what helps soften almost the mindset piece around supporting your child through sleep?
A little bit of preparation and know, not what's just happening now, but what's happening down the line, what to expect. So you're not caught off guard. You're like, ‘Ooh, I didn't know’.
On my, let's get started talks, for example, they help guide parents from newborn all the way up to four months old.
If I educate them in this is going to happen at this time. Expect this to happen. It's not a shock to the system. And as you said, these moms are going back to work and they're trying to do what they normally do, but in the back of their mind, they're like, I have a human being to be caring for, as well.
They've got that on top of what they used to have as well. Things that we can do from very early on is gently guiding a baby towards routine, being aware of things that are unsustainable going forward. For example, ‘Hey, I jump on a yoga ball for five minutes a to get my baby to sleep.’
Okay. But as they get towards four months, you could be doing that every two hours at night at nine months, you could be doing it every 45 minutes at nighttime because it could be at every single sleep cycle. So when you advise them of that, they're like, Oh, well, what else can I do?
If we can make the days complimentary to the nights, there's less support needed at nighttime for baby because baby is getting the sleep they need in the day.
And they're not over tired at nighttime. But also if you're handing baby over to a nanny or to a daycare centre and you have a structure and a routine, they're not gonna follow it to the tea, but if in general they're hitting close to the foundations that you've already laid, everyone's happier.
The people who are minding the child are happier. Your baby's happier. You're happier. And again, you don't have a little tired monkey handed to you at half five after a really busy day in work. Starting early on and just being aware of what, why are you doing the big nap from one o'clock to three o'clock in the middle of the day?
Because that nap's going to stay there till they're three years old. That nap means you have the difference between, a tired little child at half five when they're 12 months, 16 months, 18 months, or a delighted half wife in the evening. When you educate parents, they kind of go, well, that makes so much sense. That's something I want to work towards and achieve.
It is very doable. Every single thing that I teach my parents on the talks that I do, I've done hundreds of times myself flying around the world. Do it. Is it easy? No. Is it worth it? Yes. It requires almost more energy to create the change.
When you're in that place of, I'm so exhausted, I can't do another thing. Then mastering up the energy for change. And I see this over and over again, whether it is, delegating at work or creating structures, starting an exercise routine, or even changing your thinking or making a decision.
When you feel like you're at the end, you feel like I can't do anything differently. This frame of. What's sustainable? What are you going to be doing a year from now, two years from now? How can you carry this on is so helpful. And it sounds like really building that out of like, okay, maybe it's working now. And you're barely holding it together. But extrapolate that by a couple of months. And you're still doing it or you're on that yoga ball, like every 45 minutes. My body, my whole body just feels exhausted thinking about that.
I always say to parents, okay, you're exhausted right now. You had a really bad night last night. I'm going to have you exhausted with a plan. If you have a plan, if you have a finish line, the light at the end of the tunnel, they're ‘We can do this’. Right now, nothing has been achieved. You're in survival mode. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to get you moving in the right direction.
It's going to be hard. There's going to be rocking. There's going to be walking. There's going to be a lot of effort required. It's not just going to happen by itself, but if you put the effort in, then you're able to sit down and have a glass of wine with each other at seven o'clock in the evening, then you have a happy little child that wakes up in the morning.
Think of the long term benefits. It's short term, it is hard work. I've done it loads of times. I support parents through it all the time, but then on the other side, you know, I'm getting a wall full of thank you cards. I see when they come out the other side, they never think they will, but when they do, they're like, that was, that was tough, but that was worth it.
Not talking sleep training. I'm just talking about helping to set the body clock, the circadian rhythm so that the child gets the sleep that they need during the days and the nights.
You talked about if you have a plan for yourself and potentially people in your support network, one of the things that's come up over and over again with the women that I work with is when they're co parenting and co earning.
Co working with their partner. There's often a support circle. Maybe it's daycare, maybe it's a parent, maybe it's multiple people, a nanny, and then a parent, and then a partner, and then a this, and then that. And one thing that I see women struggle with over and over again is speaking up for what they need, right?
Speaking up for what they want. So having a plan that you want to implement and then saying to the daycare or the nanny or the childcare provider or your mother, whatever it is. Please do this. I can imagine that would be challenging. What is your experience around that piece?
I tell the parents to take ownership themselves, for them to set the foundations and then, because it's their child.
And then hand over and say, look, this is the work we've done. Please respect it. Please help us support this. Now, again, the person, granny will try their best. They're not going to do it the way exactly you'd like it. That's okay. The same with the daycare and the nanny, but as long as it's close to what you're doing, but I do say to the parents, this is you guys, you have to take ownership of this and then we can hand over to the nanny or the daycare that way. My motto, it's all over my website, all over anything that I give to parents, I always say It's okay to ask for help.
Years ago you had your mom next door, your sister down the road, your friend here. Now our families are spread all around the world and we don't have the support that we need. We don't have the experienced kind of person who had six children in Ireland or 10. That's able to say, Oh, you do this when this happens.
I think they're very confused. They're going to osteopaths, they're going here, there, everywhere, because they're desperate. Why wait until you're desperate to ask for help, ask for help, in the beginning, if you're not too sure.
We were talking about this phenomenon in the world right now of kind of influences or people calling themselves things and maybe not having a depth and breadth of expertise in it and how, when we are confused ourselves and we're turning to the internet for solutions, it's quite difficult to find people that are referred or maybe have years of experience and some accreditation behind them.
What is your advice? If people are looking for somebody to work with and they're not sure who to trust and they're seeing all sorts of advice out there of buy this thing, do this thing, take this one pill, whatever it is.
I would say there's never a quick fix. If someone promises you a fix, a quick fix, like that they would be a multimillionaire. I definitely say do your research. Look at the Google reviews. I'm blessed that in most of my clients come by word of mouth. So I don't advertise my one to one services. We open the waiting list four times a year, we get. 600 to 700 people within minutes applying for a one to one.
I don't advertise. It's because I helped their friend or their sister or someone, and they come from all over the world. That's why I created my online talks to try and help more. Cause I can only help so many people, but look into the experience of the person.
I'm a maternity nurse. I've walked the floors with reflux. Babies, colic babies been there, done that. If someone's saying, Hey, you know, I'm a sleep expert and they've done a two month online course, they paid 4000 euro for it and they have no childcare experience, no hands on experience. Like most weekends I'm in people's houses, sleep training from not sleep training, I'm doing maternity nights.
I've hands on experience as well. It's not like, Oh, back in the day I did this, it's still very relevant. There are other women who do what I do, but they might not like the approach that that person takes. So be happy with their experience and also their approach.
My approach is the body clock, the circadian rhythm. That is my approach. Sleep training is the absolute last resort. And sleep training has this kind of bad rep that you close the door and you walk out and leave the child crying. That is not how I work. Yes, sometimes when we do sleep training, there's a little bit of crying.
The parents are in and out, in and out, in and out, in and out the room to show them I'm still here, but sleep time, I'm still here, but sleep time. But we don't do it as a first go to. We do it because we've tried all the other things first. And often just the routine alone will fix the issues. If it doesn't, it will improve the issues.
And then we sleep train any remaining issues, but just do your research because when you're tired of 4am and you're Googling baby sleep help, and you find someone that's a good price, you know, 300 quid. And they're going to help me get the sleep that I need. They may not have the experience. They may be able to do the black and white, but if there's any grey areas like reflux or breastfeeding issues, they may not be able to guide the parents in the way that they really need. You should, if you're going to help them, help them 100%. Don't give them half the recipe of the cake. Give them the full recipe of the cake or don't help them at all.
It's making me think in a way back to the skill that we learn or don't learn around what do I want? And do I give myself permission to ask questions and take my time and be discerning? Do I ask for references? Do I say what's your approach and does it match with mine? Or am I taken aback or anything will do or just exhausted in myself or you're the expert that I give all the power over to you.
So really good advice there to think about experience client referrals. Can I speak to past clients. I would recommend anyone looking for a professional to do that. And does the approach match with mine because there are lots of different approaches and it might not be the same one for you. Two things I want to ask you about. Number one, you've talked about working with individuals who are maybe coming back to a workplace after maternity leave, what about workplaces? I know that we talked offline about supporting HR people and culture workplace organisations to think about the impact of sleep on their employees that are taking time off to have children. Tell us more about the work that you do there.
I think there's more and more interest in this area. Companies are recognising that parents are coming back exhausted, taking loads of sick days, having accidents at work, having to go home because the child is sick and the child's not sleeping well, their immune system's going to be affected as well.
It's a very much a knock on effect in all areas, as well as mental health. A lot of companies are trying to help mental health, but this is a big part of that sleep and supporting parents in this new journey. So it's fantastic that the companies are recognising this and they bring me in to do workshops.
I can, do a survey and say, what would you really like me to speak about, and I try and hit the maximum so they get the maximum benefit. Or they do online workshops. Parents in Ireland, maternity leave is usually nine months. Some women take 12 months, but I like when I get a message going, I did one of your course, I really enjoyed my maternity leave and I'm ready to go back, you know, so that they enjoyed that.
And I think that's what that space is supposed to be about. Get to know yourself as a new parent, get to know your child and go back and resume your work on that. Rested and ready to rock and roll, not trying to juggle everything because you're going to drop the ball somewhere. So something will happen.
More and more companies are helping and supporting their parents in this area. And I think that's fantastic. Sometimes they bring me in on a one to one, sometimes it's a workshop, but, it's just nice that they're recognising not only the benefits for the parents, but for the children that these parents have had.
If there are any HR people and culture people listening to this right now, I'm going to drop Kelly's website down below. You can reach out to her to book something for your own organization. And Kelly, the other thing that I was thinking about as you were talking about working weekends, pacing the night floors, rocking the babies with reflux, being in people's homes over the weekend is. How do you keep yourself healthy and well as an entrepreneur who's probably working shifts and unpredictable hours?
I've worked shift work in the ambulance, in healthcare for a long time and also working with children. And I go through waves of like, I'm so healthy. This is amazing. And I'm running and I'm trained for half marathons and then it will just boom, hit me and I'm living on sugar, sugary drink, sugary snacks. I'm just surviving on sugar and I don't feel great, you know?
And if I don't feel great, I'm not as enthusiastic as I am. I kind of have to like snap out of it myself. I'll go for a hike, I'll go for a run and try and work out. Definitely after a couple of weeks of doing intensive nights, I do hit a low, I'm not super nanny.
I'm not Mary Poppins. I do hit a wall and I go, Whoa, I kind of need to slow down a little bit here. I try and get outdoors. I'm a very outdoor person. Even when I work with families, when I'm doing maternity work away, I love to wear the child in the sling and go for a walk and say, Hey, we're going for a little mini hike for the morning nap or a walk.
I try when I'm away and it's in my written clients, I don't care if you live in a palace and there's bodyguards, I'm taking your child for a walk because I need fresh air. I also encourage them that their child is going to be a flexible sleeper, be able to sleep in airports or cafes or whatever.
And they're like, yeah, go for it. I do try and find that balance. I actually find it easier when I'm working away than I'm here by myself because I'm up in the warehouse. I'm doing webinars. I'm supporting clients. I'm constantly got a phone stuck to my hand. I am getting better trying to find a work life balance, but I do now and again. I catch myself and I say, this is not healthy and I don't ever want to get to the point where I resent my job.
I love my job, but there's a lot of high level support and empathy involved. I'm supporting all these people, who's supporting me? I do have to take a step out. I do have to recognise it because years and years ago I was quite unwell and I think I burnt myself out to be honest, so I don't want to ever let that happen again.
But when you're an empath like me and you're just trying to help so many people at one time, not realising that all of your energy is going elsewhere, but I do love my job. Now I take on slightly less clients to allow Wednesdays and Sundays to go for my run, I don't care if it's snowing outside, they're my days that I go out.
I think so many people listening are going to be able to relate both to the trickiness of balancing the work and the life. I don't want to say that because we're alive when we're at work. You know, the different things that we have going on and where do I find and protect the time to move my body, to get out into nature.
And that feeling of caring, of pouring into others and of enjoying that to some extent, but at some moments having an empty feeling of, I'm drained. Who's looking after me? Can someone just give me a snack and tuck me into bed and creating time and space for that. So it sounds like you've carved out two days where you try and protect that, keep it clear and nature and movement. It sounds like anchors within that to be able to come back to calm.
Yeah, I'm blessed that I have that. I'm blessed that I recognise that. And I also have an amazing team where they know me and I'm just like, I got to switch off the phone for a couple of hours. They know how, I could be working nights, late and early and all sorts of things.
They are all very supportive in that. And I'm good at delegating other things, not the parent support, but the warehouse and the stock and the store and different things. So I can delegate those things. But when it comes to supporting the parents, it's such a delicate area that I don't want to hand that over.
I know I've made that way myself, but I don't ever want someone to take over from me. Accidentally or if they're rude or snappy, or something's taken up by a hormonal tired mom, that's not such and such from Sleepy Stars, that's Sleepy Stars. That's what I've built. So I'm going to protect it.
So useful to think about what are the pieces that I can get support with and that I can delegate with? And what are the pieces that I actually feel really strongly about? And how do I protect my energy enough to do that? It sounds like you've started these online courses to be able to reach different people so that they can get a taste of that, they can start implementing that, and then you've got the different ranges of services.
One thing I was thinking about as you were talking about travel, so we're recording this in late November, the festive period going on ‘holiday’ with small children is just I don't want to swear, but it doesn't feel like a relaxing vacation and a hammock with people bringing you cocktails. What is your advice for people who are going to be traveling?
Different routines, different spaces, different timing, lots of family. What can we be doing in that time to protect our sleep as parents and caregivers?
So my advice would be, first of all, if you have a strong routine and a good bedtime routine, your child is going to be a more flexible sleeper. Now, if there's big time zone difference, there's things that we can do for that.
But if it's just popping over to granny's house on the other side of the country or visiting friends and you're more or less on the same time zone. I would always say, try to get there early to familiarise yourself with the setup. Your child's not going to go, Hey, this is not my bed.
A dark room is a dark room and a flat mattress is a flat mattress. As long as you bring a couple of storybooks, bring their little comforter teddy, you are consistent in that. At Christmas, Christmas is a very special time. We were locked in for a long time. So, I encourage parents to make the most of it.
And if it wobbles over Christmas, if things wobble, just as you get back home, try and tighten things up again. But things like, when your child is coming towards bedtime and you're in a house full of relatives, cousins, aunties, everyone's like pulling out the baby. Maybe you normally start your bedtime routine at 6:30. I would say, take them away at maybe 6:10 to wind them down from all that energy, the lights, the noise, the music, the craziness, so that they can just find out. Cause they're not used to having so many people in their face late in the evening at the witching hour. Say goodnight to granny, say goodnight to auntie, say goodnight to uncle, Ben,
And take them away just to let their brain kind of wind down a little bit because they could be overstimulated or overtired. They're still getting to see their relatives, but you're just aware you're protecting them from over tiredness. So a symptom of over tiredness is multiple wakeups before midnight and a very early start the next day because they went to bed in an overtired state.
We want to try and protect them from that, but do enjoy your holidays. When it comes to travel and time zones, bringing your comfort teddy, two or three storybooks that they're familiar with and having a lovely long bedtime routine. I arrived into Barbados at four in the morning with Novak Djokovic, and I say his name because I did a online talk with them.
I don't usually mention the families that I work with, but we arrived at four in the morning. We were completely delayed. We flew private and everything. And the mom comes into the villa and she says, What are you doing? I said, I'm running the bath. And she said, you know, it's 4am local time. I said, yeah, I don't know what else to do.
I said, I don't know who fed what on the plane. I don't know who slept what on the plane. So we're just going to run the bath. She was like, okay. The baby was around 14 weeks at the time. After the bath handed her to mama. Gave her a breastfeed, took the two and a half year old out, give them a story. And the two of them were asleep like that. Cause they knew after my bath, after my stories, after my songs, I go to sleep. And I woke them up at half seven the next morning. I was exhausted. They were fine.
A lot of my clients that I work with, we could be in different hotels I'd be ringing my mom when I'd be traveling the world with these families. And I'd say, hi mom, where are you? I said, I'm in Paris. She goes, I thought you were in Dubai. Oh, yeah, that was yesterday. I'd be jumping these children from time zone to time zone to time zone. And there was a lot of epic fails along the way. No book told me how to do this. There was a lot of live and learn, and then I figured it out. But a strong routine really helped me figure it out.
Strong routine, some reminders of familiarity, it sounds like, and then also having those moments of coming to calm, right? Removing myself from the crazy, the music, the lights. I feel like those are such great pieces of guidance for any human. I know I've been at conferences and I just need to go upstairs and just lie flat down on my bed for a while and remove myself from the hubbub.
Thank you for sharing those. Anything else when you think about ideas to implement for working parents that you think are useful when it comes to sleeping and children and good health?
I think one of the big things for working parents is learning to share the load with daddy. So moms, again, you're fantastic.
Dads are brilliant, but we moms tend to kind of take full ownership, especially when the child is breastfed. Let daddy be familiar with the bedtime routine. So you can go to yoga on a Tuesday, go for a walk on a sunny evening, and daddy can do bedtime because we actually get emails from dads at like 3, 4am in the morning going, hi, really need help with my child’s sleep. He's waking up multiple times at night and I can't go near him. He won't go to dad, he can't be resettled by dad, but dad was never invited into that area. So they closed the door before even realising that that was an issue.
Another thing that I would say to parents, vary it up, so sometimes mom could give a breastfeed before the bath and dad could put Baba down.
Sometimes dad could do the bath and mama can put Baba down. So again, you're sharing the load, but keeping that door open. So, when you go back to work, you're like, Oh, darling, I've had a really tough day. Could you do a bath time? You know, where if, if you don't have that door open, you're like, right, I'll be back down in two hours.
So especially when you return back to work. Thinking of those things early on, before you go back to work, open that door. I know we all want to enjoy it and keep it to ourselves, but just think of the bigger picture and it's less stressful, not only for you, but for your child as well.
I've got so many thoughts around that one of them is around the system of maternity leave and paternity leave. Because we almost are setting women up for being the primary responsibility holder within that when we are giving as systems, a system of giving. To have that time and saying, Oh fathers, men get X amount, what two days, five days, two weeks.
It's a ridiculous amount of time. And then we're kind of stuck in between the, they need to sleep or they need their rest or whatever it is. And here I am. And then I'm starting to feel resentful or now we're favouring one over the other. So it's such great advice to come back to how can we share that from the beginning?
How can we see that as a responsibility for both of us? And really practice that because it sounds like you're saying, how can we vary it up so that there's that potential for me to not be there or for somebody to help when I'm sick or for somebody to do it differently. And for that to happen, we need a willing partner.
We need to trust that it can be done a different way and still work. And we need some kind of patience and standing back, of handing it over and taking ourselves out of the picture. Which I think is difficult for some moms when I say, okay, let dad have a go at bedtime tonight. And I know that they're nearby and they're hearing that it's not going as smoothly as maybe when they would do it.
But if you don't let dad figure it out, he's never going to figure it out. And also daddy's not the bad cop here. You don't go in and save the day. He's not hurting your child. He's just trying to figure out his new way. So give them a chance, like I'm just back from South Africa and we'd 700 attendees at my talks, absolutely blessed that they were there, but I love seeing so many dads there.
The dads are there. They're taking notes, they're on board from the get go, because again, they realised that the mom's gone back to work at four months old. You went to a child's four months old. I love to see that. And you do then with the older age groups. When I kind of mentioned these things, you can see the sneaky little elbow and the knowledge, you're doing bad times, because they maybe weren't doing it from very early on.
So again, education and just making people kind of wise of these things. So to avoid issues later on and avoid the arguments later on as well. And to allow the loveliness of being able to put your child to sleep. Isn't it so touching that you're saying. I have these men reaching out to me saying, how can I help?
I want to be able to do this. I want to do it differently and to be involved and to be attending the meetings and taking notes. That makes me feel all warm inside. Anything else that you feel like is important before we close? We do see a lot more men at the corporate workshops as well. So maybe the daddy works for the corporation.
So he goes in to do the talk and you see them with the notepad, like it's the most serious meeting because he's been sent in there saying now you come home with this information, so it is great. They're trying to do a full time job as well, but maybe they've got worry inside or they're having broken night's sleep as well.
So again, it's kind of like a team thing. No one loses out when the family has good night's sleep. There's no losers there. It's the overall picture of a happy family and work life balance. Very difficult to achieve, but again, don't look for perfection. Look for good on a regular basis. That should keep everyone in a good mood the majority of the time.
Thank you so much for sharing. And I think this kind of vision of closing of how do we share in that responsibility, how do we equip ourselves as much as possible? How do we, and I think also breaking down this image of, I think a lot of us maybe have this all or nothing around sleep. If we're looking at sleep, then it means that we're going to have to do scary things or things we're not willing to do or things that feel cruel to our children.
So I love the way you talked us through different aspects, different approaches. How are we using our days? How are we using our naps? Are we getting outside? What can we tweak them? And I feel like, again, Thinking about adults, there's so much that we can do in other areas that then enhance our agility, our focus, our ability to rest.
Really interesting to think about that from a child's point of view as well. Thank you for the time. It was lovely to have you here.
Work with me - 1:1 coaching details
Want to find out more about sleep support and working with Kelly or providing support to your teams and organisations? You can see her website here and get in touch: Sleepy Stars