Episode 83 Why Doula Burnout Happens and What Actually Keeps You Going

Episode Time Stamps

00:00 Consulting with physical therapists

06:16 Discussing tax organization habits

09:26 Creating efficient business workflows

11:06 Choosing the right backup contract

16:05 Insurance payment challenges in the US

17:41 Managing work hours and travel time

20:54 Setting boundaries as a doula

26:00 Pet care communication struggles

26:51 Balancing work with family life

31:57 Balancing work and personal life

35:16 Avoiding burnout with scheduled breaks

36:52 Supporting new doulas in the field

39:52 Self-care and refilling your cup

Key Takeaways

1. Sustainability covers more than rates and call schedules. Most conversations about sustainability stop at money and time off. We see it as a physical, mental, emotional, and financial picture that has to hold together. If one piece slips, the rest gets harder.

2. Your body is part of your business. Both of us have added physical therapists to our regular care because attending births stresses muscle groups that no gym workout touches. Isometric work, hands-on therapy, and learning what your body actually needs goes beyond stretching after a long shift. If your body breaks, your practice goes with it.

3. The boring administrative habits keep you in business. Tracking expenses, logging mileage, organizing receipts. None of it is the part of doula work anyone romanticizes, but it is what keeps tax season from being a meltdown. Building a monthly admin rhythm now means no panic at year end. We both rely on consistent systems because trying to remember what a January gas station purchase was for in April never works.

4. Pair the admin work with something you actually enjoy. Habit pairing is what keeps the boring tasks from getting skipped. Hillary pairs her monthly bookkeeping with reviewing website analytics because she loves data. Find your version. The goal is to stop relying on willpower for the parts of the business you would rather avoid.

5. Backup planning is a sustainability decision. Picking backups, knowing your backup contracts, and normalizing the handoff conversation early all reduce the anxiety of “what if I cannot make it.” Clients with specific needs like Tricare or strong preferences make backup planning more complex, not less necessary. Build the backup network before you need it.

6. Boundaries are a long game, not a worksheet. The boundaries that keep you in this work for years come from experience, not from a course. We have both learned the hard way which dates we will guard no matter what. Having the conversation with a client about a graduation, a milestone, or a planned trip is the actual sustainability skill.

7. Do not wait for an empty cup to refill it. Self-care does not earn its place in your week by you hitting burnout first. Hillary uses a car maintenance metaphor in the episode. You do not drive until the engine breaks down and then service it. You service it on a schedule. Same idea for the people doing this work.

Mentioned in This Episode

Dubsado

17hats

Doula Business Facebook Group (via Doula Business)

Read the Full Transcript

This transcript was auto-generated from the audio and lightly cleaned. Speaker names are not labeled. Read it as a rough record of the conversation, not a verbatim quote source.

[00:00]
Second button. Hey, Hillary. Hi, Robin. So today we're going to talk about sustainable career. Listen, what does that even mean to you? First of all, let's start there. I, I feel like everyone is like, sustainable doula career. Like, let's, it's like such a buzz thing that people talk about and I want to be specific. Sustainable means you can continue doing it for years as a career. Right. And you know, sustainable in all the ways. Right. Like it's gonna sustain your pocketbook. It's just like you can pay your bills, you can sleep at night, you, you know, I don't know, like what else. I think all of those things are important for a career. I, like you continue developing mental, emotional, physical health. Right. Because physically I'm not the same doula legitimately anymore. And I actually was just talking about that part of sustainability with one of my brand new doulas on my team because she went to a birth and she was just like, I was unprepared for how fear. Physically sore and exhausted I am.

[01:26]
I was like, yeah, that's. It is a much more physical job as a birth doula than people think about. A lot of. Also side note, as a postpartum doula, because sometimes you're like consoling a baby so that the parents can get some sleep and they just want to scream in your ear the whole time and their altimeter is going off and you can't sit down for hours. They cry when they drop below. So many. Yeah. And you have to hold them in a very specific position and it's not comfortable. No, not that one. Yeah, exactly. So I. It is a physically demanding job such that. Yeah, over, over time that, that becomes challenging. So, yeah. I quickly added physical therapists to my list of people who helped me, you know, say stay sustainable and you know, just kind of talking to them, like one good hour with them where I'm like, hey, here's a we weird things I do with my body. You know, I know that these are muscles that I could exercise, but none of the typical exercises are cutting it. Like, what do I need to do?

[02:35]
And so like learning how to do, you know, isometric holds to prep for those. You know, it's funny, all my muscles fire. All I have to do is that my muscles, like we're on, we're ready, like how to do that. Like, so the sustainability of your body is definitely part of it. So I like the fact that you've got this big picture sustainable. I think when a lot of people think about it, they think about the Call schedule and the money are the two big things. And you absolutely have to be able to live and have your work as well as make enough money to make it worth being away from your family or other things that you would want to do. And I would say one of the big mistakes I see in thinking about sustainability is looking to doulas who've been doing the work for, you know, three, four plus years.

[03:36]
And. Right. Once you hit a recertification cycle, like a lot of doulas will, to get your recertification hours will often add something to what they do. And so new jewelers sometimes think, I need to be a blank, a blank, a blank and a blank. Right. Like, I need to do all the things right away. And that is actually spreading yourself really thin. Like, you can build your doula business, you know, postpartum doula birth doula, like, whatever that is. Right. But now you're also trying to build your childbirth education business and your lactation business. And. Right. Like, it's like, build this one and then realize that other doulas have added it on. And one of the benefits of waiting is that you can then get a feel for your community.

[04:23]
And you're not adding something because it's a shiny object, right. And it fascinates you in the moment, but you're adding something because you're like, I see a need in my community. Right. And then that's going to mean there is work for you. So it's less of a build on that second whatever it is. Now do you know, like I always tell people, do 10 bursts before you do another training. I try my. I try not to make it seem like it's going to be three years where you can do another training because they're excited to learn for sure. But put your hands on some clients, right? Whether that be postpartum clients or lactation clients or birth clients. Right. And kind of see. And then where do you feel like you need extra education? Like, what would be helpful to you in your business as opposed to a random add on?

[05:15]
Well, and I think you hit the nail on the head right there because I. What most people don't want to learn more about and what they really should spend more time learning about is the business side of things. Because it's not sexy. It's not. It's not sexy to figure out how to like, categorize your expenses for, like, we're recording this not long after tax day, so maybe that's just on my brain, but for. That's not sexy. That's not really like a fun new move you get to do with your clients that, that it. But that is going to help build your business to be much more sustainable and make you like less stressed if you understand all of that stuff a lot more. That was a hard truth. I had to come to Doula that like, oh yeah, wait a second, this business part is actually really important.

[06:12]
I'm going to be a business owner. I need to really do this well. And I was having that exact same thought because yesterday in like the Doula business Facebook group that I, you know, run, I said, you know, hey, right, it's April 15th, like happy tax day to all you self employed people out here, you know. And I said okay, so what are you telling yourself today that you are going to do differently for next year? Right. And normally that is some version of track my mileage better. Right. Look at my receipts. It's easy to think I'm always going to remember what this, you know, 1:00am gas station store purchase was like in December or January or March or April when you're looking at, you're like I have no idea what did I buy, right. And I can't find the receipt like all the things. And so it's like I said this some like somebody said some, they said some version of that. I said, so have you put a date on your calendar to do this every month? And the response was I don't have time for that. And I thinking you don't not have time for that. Right, right. You know me, I have always said like I really, I try to take one crappy day and do the bunch of like there's like a handful of business things that just like literally have to be done and make my life better at the end of the year. And I'm just so happy I do it. But I literally hate that one day I just like plot through it and put some like music on that I that'll make me happier. You do some, you do some kind of habit pairing, right? I actually do mine on the first of the month and I love data. I don't think that is a secret.

[08:04]
So it's like I do that when I also like look at my website stats and my conversion stats for Internet views to hires and Right. And I'm figuring that out for the month and then maybe the quarter, you know, four times a year. And so I'm pairing it with something that I do enjoy. So I actually found myself looking forward to it. And by the time I'm in the rhythm, by the time I Hit that. Like, I literally have a check sheet. Here are the things that I do. And by the time I get to that, I'm like, oh, right, it's just another thing to do. Oh, I have nine things I forgot to categorize. Now I do use a business banking system. I use found and it allows me to auto categorize. Right. Like FedEx office is almost always printed materials, right. And so it gets, it automatically gets that. But if there's. So that has saved me some of that. So I literally usually only have a handful and it might be like a subscription to something or a professional development thing that I've done. So I can pretty easily do that. And so a setting up the systems that are. That run behind the scenes to help me. But also that habit pairing has made it a little bit easier for me to get that stuff done. But that, that structure is so important to the sustainability, which is the bottom line of all this. Whatever structure is you need, whether that be structured for how to do the business part, whether it be the structure of, you know, this is the workflow from when somebody contacts me. The next step is this is how I give the contract. Like all of those pieces.

[09:43]
Not having to put the physical, mental and emotional energy into reinventing the wheel every time. And the first few times you do it, it's going to be different. And you might ask other people, well, how do you do it? And the weird thing is going to be that people do it all sorts of ways. So I always tell people it's okay if somebody else does it differently. It may not be the right way for you. What could you learn from that? Which sometimes the lesson is, I hate this, right? Like, I remember everybody loved Dubsado and I was like, I felt so overwhelmed. And then I paid all this money for someone to like build it up for me. And then I was like, I flipping hate this. Yeah, it, yeah, if the system doesn't work for you, it doesn't work for you. And some of them especially like a client management system like Dubsado dual auto 17 hats, like there are a bunch of different ones.

[10:41]
If it doesn't work for you, it doesn't work for you. That can feel like a really large like price tag sometimes. So that's I think a challenge for sustainability. But again, the important for figuring out like, okay, what can I automate? And making sure, like, how am I going to make my life as my, my professional life a little easier? Who's that Backup? Listen, right? And as you do this longer that gets to Be honestly more complicated question. Sometimes you have easier answers to it. But, you know, we've talked about this in other podcasts where if I've got a client who has tricare, I need to make sure the backup is also good.

[11:28]
Like, also tricare. So in some ways it's a little more complicated. But you have a backup contract. You know how to work with a backup, and so it feels less intimidating. So thinking about, like, who are your backups? And one of the things that I always tell people is, right, if you don't. If you really don't have anybody in the area who could be a backup, like, make your own backup, right? Go find somebody. Maybe it's one of your first few clients. You're like, you would be an amazing doula. Like, go get the training and be my backup. Right? I. And. And for me, it has. I don't know about. For you, but for me, it becomes challenging because people literally hire me because I'm the most experienced doula, and then no. And they'll ask like, okay, well, do they have a similar level experience?

[12:20]
No, actually, that. That's not possible. That no one has been doing it as long as I have been anymore. I'm sure that's the same as you in your area. And sometimes I get sick. Sometimes, you know, things happen. My uncle dies. Like, my husband wins a free vacation, and I'm going, that's a yearly thing. You need to stop acting like that's a surprise. It's really not a yearly thing. But. But I mean, like, the. But those kinds of getting sick absolutely happens. And so because it turns out I'm also human, so. So, like, I, you know, I gotta talk to you have to, like, think about how you're gonna speak to your clients about it like that. Um, like, yes. And would. And I also side note, know doulas who.

[13:14]
Their clients refuse backup because they specifically hired them as the most experience. And, like, that's all of their conversation. But I'm like, wow, like, if I can't have you, I'm having no one. Okay. Ego boost. Sure. Yeah. Well, like, I feel more frustrated than ego boost by that same same. But part of that is also the caseload. Like, there is a livable caseload and then there is the, like, hero doula. All right. Like, I'm gonna save everybody. And 100. I totally have fallen into that. Like, as I was the only doula around, right. I really felt the weight of there is no one if it's not me. But also, how many births can I reasonably Do.

[14:08]
And you know, with no backup, like when we talk about all the things that make caseload easier. Right. And so I will say that, you know, if you are charging a sustainable rate for you, which we'll talk about. Right. But if you're charging a sustainable rate, you've got your systems, whether that be your family system, like what goes on, your work system, if you have other work that you do. Right. If you have all these other systems in place. Right. I'm finding that most people who consider themselves full time doulas are doing somewhere between four and six births a month. And you birth doulas like as a postpartum doula. Postpartum doula is completely different. But I'm saying birth doulas like that, four to six.

[14:54]
And you know, knowing you have that backup can be helpful because what if all of them had two day laborers? Right, right. Twelve days that you. Yeah. Three of them are in labor at the same time. Yeah. So like all the things that can happen. But then you hear people, you know, like my, you know, it was not uncommon for me to do 12 bursts a month in a very large geographic area. But that's literally all I did. A, I was younger, B, my husband was a stay at home husband. Right. He like took care of the kids, so I didn't have to worry. Like, it was just like when I left, I was like, bye, see ya. Got married to a long haul doula. Right, Right. My wife is like gone. And so kind of thinking about what does that. Sustainability. Now some people are taking six clients and emotionally and mentally and physically, that is too much. But their rate is so low that that's what they need.

[15:56]
They might be a little bit better, like bumping their rate up a little bit and dropping the number of clients. So that's the kind of calculus that people have to do for themselves. Well, and I, I know we'll talk about this at some point, but I think some of what's really challenging right now here in the US is is that as we are seeing like insurance and Medicaid come on board, they're now telling us how much we're allowed to get paid. And that is some of those rates, like I won't, I won't work for that little amount of money. And of course that right now that's still a decision. Right. That people are making, like, am I going to take private pay or insurance? And it's a challenge for sustainability. Like I absolutely cannot be making $800 a birth. That's how much I was charging in 2014 and it wasn't enough then.

[16:53]
So, so what would a postpartum doula tell me A little bit about what that looks like in terms of case management for a postpartum doula. So I think it depends on how, how many hours your clients are wanting. Right. So I have CL wanting some clients who are wanting, you know, four to eight hour shifts at, of at their house. For the record, I, and we've talked about this, I don't do overnight care. That's not in my ability right now. Frankly, as a 47 year old woman, I cannot just know. And anyway, that's a whole other discussion we can have about like postpartum versus newborn care specialist versus night nurse.

[17:39]
However. So if I have a client who is wanting, you know, 40 hours of work a week, I'm only having that one client right now. But if otherwise, a lot of times what I end up doing is I'll have, you know, four different clients that are all wanting, you know, 10, like eight to 10 hours of work a week. And so like I'm driving around. The other part of the postpartum that I think I, I wasn't prepared for when I first got started was the travel time and how that actually cuts into my day. And so my days end up being a little bit longer. Even if I'm only working eight hours. It's like, okay, that's actually in the home versus if I'm driving 30 minutes to someone's house.

[18:28]
Right, exactly. So it's actually a little bit longer. So, so that, that's a, it looks a lot different than a birth doula, I will say. And the challenge for me, and I'm sure you've experienced this, is like okay, when I'm on call for a client, for a birthday with clients and then I'm also serving postpartum families at the same time, like then it becomes that extra piece of. I need to let all those postpartum families know if I'm scheduled to do a shift in there. Like, and what does that actually look like contract wise? And anyway, I didn't want to get in the weeds on that. But so the, the long answer is, or the short answer of all of that, sorry, is it's complicated. Yeah, well, but, but that's a piece that you get to work out individually. And so while we talk about all the like negative of being a business owner, that is one of the perks is that you decide what that's going to look like. Are you going to take a couple of 10 hour clients or are you going to like go for the 40 hour?

[19:28]
Yeah. So that. And, and what is your travel range? What's your travel range? Do you charge a mileage fee? Are you like, I know some doulas that actually like get paid for the hour that they're driving. Like, they are using that as part of it. So like, that's a thing that people do. It's not something I do in my pract. I don't know if you want to pay me to listen to my audiobook. I don't feel like that's fair. So, yeah, it's a little challenging. And again, getting back to that heroic piece, even when you're the only doula and they don't have anyone else to choose from, that doesn't mean you have to take all of those clients either. So I want to use that, that to bring up boundaries are a big part about making this work sustainable and. Right. We did a whole thing on boundaries. We obviously, we obviously believe in boundaries. And I certainly learned it the hard way. You know, I, I was really young when I became a doula and I didn't have a lot of life. Now, you couldn't have told me that at the time, right? She knew everything. I knew everything. I was 18, right. You know, and to be fair, I was a very mature 18 year old. Sure. But like a mature 18 year old is still not a 36 year old. Right.

[20:54]
And, and I'm not saying if you're 18 and you're doing this, you're not going to make great decisions, but it's just your life experience is different and it's easier to set those boundaries when you've broken them before and live the consequences of it. And so it's like understanding, like if somebody, and I don't know that I would have listened, but if somebody had said, right, hey, you know, like you just said, you don't have to do all these births. Like, I would have at least thought about it. Maybe not to their face. I might have told them no to their face, then thought like, is there something there? But, but just sort of like that's why talking to other doulas who work differently than you is a really good idea. Because while what they do may not work exactly for you, like there might be some little nugget in there that could change that sustainability piece. And we talk a lot more about this on the business end, but there's also the practice end as well. And that's also why my contract keeps getting longer.

[22:02]
But the other piece of this Is that, you know, the personal piece. Right. We have to have a life other than our work. Listen, I had. My husband had to have what he would call a come to Jesus talk with me. At one point. It was just like, listen, I love you, and I love that you love what you're doing. This is not working for us. We need to figure this out. Still married, still love him, still do dueling. We figured out how to make it work for us. But, you know, living that on call life, especially with a husband who didn't like to plan ahead, was really, really, really challenging. And, you know, that took a huge adjustment. And I know I've had doulas come on to the team who've been like, oh, my husband got this, like, last. These last minute concert tickets. Cool. Let's talk about.

[23:02]
Well, let's talk about what it looks like. If you really want to go, what. What needs to happen, I can help you make that happen if that's what you want. It's going to cost you money because that's how we handle that kind of emergency backup. And, you know, here are all the phone calls you need to be making and conversations you need to be having. So. But that took a whole lot of adjustment. There are also only so many times you can tell your friends if I'm at a birth. Right. Like, I. I learned to stop saying it because I'd be like, we know, Robin. Yes, exactly. You'll be there unless you're at a birth. You know, so now it's just a surprise from that birth. But they're never mad because I'm like, that's the thing. It really doesn't happen that often. It was just like my fear of missing out.

[23:50]
But also. Right. Like, somebody gave me a sticker that says, right, I work so my cats can have this nice life. Something like that. Like, I work to buy my cat toys. Your cats do have a very nice life. Right. And so it's like, I could probably do an entire podcast episode on things I've done to keep the pets from, like, destroying the house. Right. As a doula, you know, my husband's dog. Right. We're gonna. We're gonna trash on my husband's dog first. Right. Oh, I love him dog. Right. Big dog. Liam Barker. Like, literally ate the walls. Yeah. Like, chewed through walls.

[24:37]
And because she was a bored puppy, if we couldn't get her out. And Walker. Right. So if he's at work and I'm at work and the kids are at school, who's gonna want the dog? You Know, well, but I'm also thinking about people who don't have kids. Right. Because this is not just work. Like some, some people are single, you know, live by themselves. You know, that's where I found like, could you pay the neighborhood high schooler to walk the dog after school? Could you pay for a service like Rover, right. To come walk the dog. Like, there are things that you could do. We had another dog who's no longer with us, Georgia, AKA Trash Puppy. Georgia was really smart and would eat anything. She literally would take Amazon boxes and drag them behind the couch and open them. And if it were food, she would eat it. And if it wasn't, she just left the box there.

[25:28]
But then we had cats and so we tried to do like automated, like gravity feeders that would just feed out, you know, that way if I didn't make it home, like, the cats weren't, you know, oh, I'm starving. It's been three hours since I've eaten. Right, Right. But then George was like, free smorgasbord. This is awesome. And the cats are still like, we're starving. And George is like, oh, my tummy hurts. I ate too many cat food. Right. So then we had to buy baby gates with cat doors. Right. And like, so we like, talk to me. Hit me up if you want all the products that you can get to make your pets lives easier if you're on call. And I will say, like, it has also helped me because I've seen some of the biggest knockdown drag out fights in labor over, oh my gosh, somebody is not letting Rover out while we are here.

[26:20]
Right. Like, did you, did you call Grandma? I didn't call Grandma. Who's letting the dog out? Right. So who let the dogs out? I did not realize it was because there was a whole song about it. And I didn't realize it was going to be as big of a thing as it is. But it's Grandma. Grandma's good answer. But Rover, like, whatever that is, like making that plan, even if it is just lay down pee pads, lock the dog in a room where there is like easily cleanable floors. Yeah. The problem, I'll say is that doesn't work so well with toddlers. No, you can't do that with a toddler. For sure. Sure. And I think that that's one of the pieces of sustainability that, like, over the long term, you know, when I got into this work, I did have a toddler and a kindergartener. And so my ability to leave and what it would cost me to Leave in multiple avenues, right? Not just money, but, like, emotional labor. All of that, it changed between then and now. Right now I have two teenagers who I can run out the door at any moment.

[27:24]
They can literally drive themselves wherever they need to. Take a look on Find Me to see where you are. Right. Life360. Where's Mom? I know. I got that text. Are you a Baptist for birth? Legitimately? There have been so many times where my oldest child has left her softball bag in my car and they've had to drive to the hospital to come get it out of the trunk. Has been a thing. Not a thing anymore. It lives in her car. Yay. Well, and I also, right. Like, I didn't have any children. And then I, you know, I've had children of varying ages throughout the years. And, you know, the joke was my one son was born at home and breastfed in every hospital in the city. Right. My husband would bring him. Like, pumping didn't work for me for. I mean, again, it was a long time ago. We didn't have some of the nice pumps we have now. Right. And so my husband would just bring him to me to feed him. And again, also just a pager.

[28:21]
And so sometimes he'd be asked by the nurse to wait in the waiting room because they were pushing from when he called. And I said, yeah, it's fine. And he shows up and, yeah, I can't help you right now. Yeah. Like, so that's not sustainable for everybody, right? And there are times where you dip in and out of this work where you take pauses and that's okay, too. That doesn't make you not a doula. It doesn't make you a bad deal. It makes you a great doula that you were listening to the rhythm of your life and what that looks like. And sometimes that's figuring out. Like, our friend Erica Lane likes to talk about, like, she loves Christmas. She points out her daughter's name is Noel. Right? Like, she sell. Like, I think here it is April. I think her Christmas tree came down last month, Right? Like, so maybe month of December off. Because she doesn't even want to risk it. And so. Right. That's important to her. We have other people who are like, I need my birthday off, and it's in the contract. Like, I am not working on this date. You will get my backup. Like, I'm available any other day, but not on my birthday. I'm. I'm laughing because of what I was doing on my 40th birthday at birth. I legitimately was at A birth at a home birth. She gave birth while sitting on my lap. It was pretty badass, not going to lie. Oh, I think I just changed our rating because I said, Hillary, I go bleep that out. Literally, I said, I even said, best birthday ever. And her husband looked at me and was like, I need a new job.

[29:54]
Well, and, and I think that personal piece, one of the things that I see. And, and I will say I think it's a mistake. I don't know that everybody would categorize this as a mistake, but I think it's a mistake to take the. Oh my gosh, that is. I'm so sorry that I have to go to a birth. Like you like making these overly broad excuses and like making it sound really bad to your family, particularly children and younger children. I want to say I'm so excited I get to go to a birth today. And you know, literally on my kids birthday, I'm like, you're gonna have a birthday, buddy. Isn't this awesome? And I taught my kids to be really excited because it was pizza night when mom went to birth, right? They knew they were gonna get pizza. So they're like, are you going to birth today? And I'm like, no. Why? Oh, I just kind of hope we can have pizza for dinner. Right? Like so, okay. But also, so we both have partners that work corporate jobs, right?

[30:48]
They don't apologize to work when they have to go to work. Mine doesn't anyway. He doesn't, he's like, no, we got to pay the bills. I'm going to go to work. Do you guys enjoy, you know, eating food? Because we're going to do that same thing, right? And I don't, I don't apologize about it. And I do also get really excited. Our friend Abby always talks about how like, they get a birthday dinner afterwards. I'm sure her kids are going to be growing up excited about that. But maybe I should have done the pizza thing, man. They would have been. Well, and, and here's the thing. You know, there were times where things like book club, like, I was like, I am happy to be the host, but not at my house, right? If somebody else will host it, like, I will do all the things that I could easily pass off if for some reason I wasn't there, right? When it came to matching, like, I'll pick the book, I'll come up with the questions. I'll, you know, I will, you know, now I could doordash you some treats if I didn't get to make them or you know, know, more likely send my husband with the treats, like, whatever it is, but like, you still have to go to book club or whatever that is in your life. You have to keep doing your life. And I think that was one of the, the harder lessons for me to learn was number one, I have to just keep doing my life because. And just realizing, like, sometimes I'm just gonna have to leave and that's okay. And also like figuring out what are the I don't want to miss events sense and what am I going to be very transparent with my clients about? No, I will not miss my daughter's graduate high school graduation. Like, that is a very important date, for example. And some of them are going to be understanding about that and some of them actually aren't.

[32:36]
And having those hard conversations, like, I hear you, I understand. And I am also, I'm also just a person who gets to have important events too. You know, pregnant pregnancy does crazy things to people's brain sometimes. So. Yeah. So we've talked a little bit about some of the pieces that we think are key to sustainability. I would like to ask you, what do you think are the myths? What is not sustainability? What is not sustainability is. I mean, I think, think just because you, I don't know, just pushing through everything, that's probably, I mean, that's not sustainability.

[33:28]
Not. And, and also not. And being like afraid to collaborate, I think. And that works at multiple different levels. Right. So I think, you know, not being willing to. Just saying, like putting everything on hold for your job has been like, I, well, I can, I can't commit to that because it's only, I have to do this doula work that's not sustainable either. You know, you can't lean your way into a sustainable career. Sorry for my Cheryl Sanbert dis. But like, like, you can't, you have to. It's a balancing act, right? It's. It's learning. My, my therapist always likes to say, like, you have to figure out which balls are rubber and which balls are glass. Yes. Right.

[34:16]
Yeah. What can you drop and come back and catch it after it bounces? Right. And what. So like sometimes that means pausing on taking birth clients because you're only going to take postpartum clients because you need to have a set schedule because you are newly single parent, for example. Right. Or sometimes that means also just pausing in general. And that doesn't mean you're walking away forever. That's also okay because you just had a baby and you know, you aren't comfortable nursing in A hospital or you go from six to three client. Like sometimes it's not even stopping, but slowing that pace. Yeah. And I think, you know, so many people, you know, think like if you're shifting gears, you can't shift back. And I, that's, I think that's a myth, a huge myth. Yeah. Your car goes 30 and your car goes 60.

[35:20]
One of the things that, that I would say that sometimes I see is this whole like they think it's sustainable if you push all the way. Sort of what you're saying. But like you go into, you're at burnout and then you take a break and then you come back and you go into your burnt out and then you take a break, right? It's like, like do some scheduled maintenance. Do not drive until you're broken down. You know, and so when you think of like to continue with the car metaphor, like all the things that I do to keep my car running, I know way more about cars because I'm a doula then I think I would have known if I had any other job. Right. Because it's like if I am driving a distance and in the middle of the night, like I need to, I want to make sure my tires aren't going to blow.

[36:05]
Right. I want to make sure I rotate my tires. I want to make sure I get my old change, like all those things. Things. But you know, I think that I see a lot of doulas who are like, oh, it's okay, I'll just fix it when I'm broken. Right. Like once I hit that burnout. And I think that we need to learn to a try to prevent that burnout. Know that we can't always, like sometimes it sneaks up on us. But to recognize what some of those signs are and to say, oh, hey, like I need to, you know, I need to slow this down. What could I hand off? What balls are rubber versus which ones are glass? Class so that we are able to continue in this work. Because you're not going to do too many cycles of burnout rest, burnout rest before you're like, this is for the birds. Okay. I so and I also, and I want to acknowledge when you are a brand new doula looking for your first three clients and you are just gung ho, you're so excited. It is very hard to even think that you're ever going to get burned out and, and think about systems to put into place. Because that is hard. And as two fairly experienced doulas, I, I don't know about you But I. Every time I see a new doula, like, come into my area, I. I'm like, awesome. How can I support you?

[37:30]
And I'm like, patiently, like, okay, are you gonna stick around? Are you going to be able to do this work? And I really, like, I. I want more doulas because we need more doulas to serve more families. I cannot serve everybody. And so I. I'm always just. I'm, like, holding my breath when I see these new doulas because I want them to be successful. I really, really do. And. And I see their enthusiasm, and I want them to. To be sustainable. So, like, it's. There's this tension between. I want to do all the things, and you actually can't do all the things well. And I also want to say, right, I've been very vocal about this. Like, even with all the things that I have in place and all the other things that I do, right. I wound up hitting burnout. And, you know, by the time I realized I was like, oops. I really did have to power through two weeks. There really weren't a lot of things that I could pass off because I was so far into it. And, you know, thankfully, I did have a big break and, like, a big, like, thing planned where I was doing nothing. And so I was able to come back more quickly from it than I think I could have. And so even knowing all the things, you can accidentally wind up there, right? So it's. It's like, I know this from experience both earlier on in my career, working to prevent it and doing a pretty fairly good job of it, you know, up until, you know, know, last fall. And my biggest symptom that I experienced was I realized that I was not as empathetic as I wanted to be. Like, I would hear myself think things or say things. I'd be like, oh, that is not the kind of. The burnout rage is so very real. Yeah. And I was like, I'm gonna put myself in time out, right? And my daughter be like, I really want to talk about this. And I'm like, no, you do not want to talk to me about this. This right now. You are not gonna like my answer. You need to leave me. I felt like the Incredible Hulk.

[39:29]
No, just leave me alone. Right? Like, and. And, you know, like, right. I. I barely. Like, I barely made it through that. And so I really. I really feel like we need to talk about the sustainability more. And you're right. Like, as a. As a newer doula, it is difficult to look and say, oh, I could never be burned out. Birthday's so awesome. I get this high. Yes. I. I get that birth high. I do. I. I get that high of leaving a postpartum cl. Right. I did something really great to help a family today, but you only have so much to give, and you can't pour from an empty cup. And one of the phrases that I heard last year that really stuck with me is, you know, everyone hears you can't pour from an empty cup.

[40:14]
But. And I. I wish I could tell you who said it, but it was that you don't have to wait until the cup is empty to refill it. And that has been my guiding principle. It's so true. So planning for sustainability is that filling your cup before it's empty. Please do that also. Yeah, and no amount of, like, massages is gonna. I do love a good bubble bath, but it is. It is superficial. It is a nice thing to do. Occasionally it's temporary. Occasionally. I know. You're a bubble bath fiend. No, I probably. Probably once a month. My bathtub is a little glittery gold right now.

[41:02]
You do enjoy a good bath bomb. This too. I do. I do love a good bath bomb. But what I want you to think about, like, if you take away one thing from this podcast, is that sustainability is really a set of decisions that you make today to protect you for tomorrow. Yeah, exactly. Each of those small things, whether it be how you're going to run a client flow to how many events you're going to do, how many clients you're going to take, the fact that you're committing to that book club, that Bible study. Right. Whatever it is that you're going. Nonprofit board, whatever. Non profit board. Yeah, sorry. Right. Like, you know, and taking care of yourself. Right. Like, what are you going to do for yourself every month, Month beyond just a bubble bath.

[41:54]
Right. Like, yes, get yourself a bath bomb, a new book, but also play with your pets, hang out with your people. Right. Do those things that make your real life human. And you're gonna build. You're gonna build. Go yell at a hockey game. Go. Sorry, that's me. Recently. Right. Go. Yeller is also really into hockey right now. So another one of our. Okay, I did not know that about Ann. Now I'm really excited. I'm gonna have to message her. Grand place Hockey. So, yeah, nice. Yeah, go yell at a hockey game. Go. Like, belly laugh with your people at trivia night. Like, whatever is your thing. Don't Doom scroll. Doom scroll is not helpless. Oh, well, thank you for having this conversation, Hillary. And thank you for being part of my personal sustainability plan. Same. Ditto, ditto, ditto.