Today we welcome Jayne Havens, the founder of the Snooze Fest sleep training course and The Center for Pediatric Sleep Management™ sleep consultant certification program. Just like how Meagan’s birth experiences led her to become a doula and VBAC advocate, Jayne talks about how the knowledge she gained by teaching healthy sleep habits to her own children helped her create a passionate career.

Jayne answers Meagan’s questions about sleep consulting in general, how to help children feel safe in their bedrooms, ways to effectively communicate, developmental milestones in both babies and children that can affect sleep, how to become a sleep consultant, where to find them, and even earning potential from a career as a sleep consultant!

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Full Transcript under Episode Details 

02:24 Review of the Week

05:35 Jayne’s journey to sleep consulting

13:35 How can a sleep consultant help?

19:43 What to do when a child feels unsafe in their room

21:08 The life of a sleep consultant

25:17 Sleep consultant qualifications

30:36 Ages covered in Jayne’s course

36:00 How to find a sleep consultant

40:59 Cost to hire a sleep consultant and potential earnings as a sleep consultant

46:57 Where to find “Becoming a Sleep Consultant” 

Meagan: Hello, Women of Strength. It is Meagan and we have my friend, Jayne Havens on the podcast today. Hello, Jayne. 

Jayne: Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited to be here. 

Meagan: Thank you. Me too. We actually just met this year, 2024 in January and we met at a business doula retreat. Jayne is actually not a doula. She is a mom and a successful business owner. When we connected, I just felt so much that our stories related in different ways but very much in the same ways and I was like, “I want you on the podcast.” So today, we’re not sharing a VBAC birth story, but we’re sharing a business birth story and some tips on sleep and how to help your babies sleep because we know as mamas with newborn babies, we don’t get a lot of that sometimes and it doesn’t have to be that way. 

I’m so excited to have Jayne Havens who is a certified sleep consultant and runs her own sleep consulting practice, Snooze Fest by Jayne Havens and you also have a podcast. 

Jayne: I do. It’s called Becoming a Sleep Consultant. 

Meagan: Becoming a Sleep Consultant. As a new parent overwhelmed by exhaustion like I just said we all have with a newborn, Jayne found herself reading everything she could find in order to get her own son to sleep through the night. Now, if you are driving, don’t raise your hand because keep your hands on the wheel, but you can nod if you understand that sentence right there. I definitely was that with my son and my daughter and my first. I’ve had three and we have to figure it out and every baby is different. 

So friends, quickly after she mastered this, started asking her, “Help, please!” She started doing that and helping all of these moms and babies sleep better, feel better, and just live better. Jayne’s children were both fabulous sleepers and they began coming to her for that help because they saw it. 

We are so excited to have Jayne today. 

02:24 Review of the Week

Meagan: I do think that a Review of the Week is needed so I”m going to hurry and share a Review of the Week and then we will dive right into this amazing episode. 

Okay, so this review is from sarahgb and it says, “Full of knowledge, fun, and strength-filled stories.” It says, “First off, I would like to say that I am 16 years old and a doula in training and lover of anything pregnancy, birth, and baby related. This podcast is literally exactly what I have been looking for and wanting. I have been listening for a long time and cannot stop. I think I’ve listened to four or five episodes in one day.” 

Wow, that’s definitely some binge-listening. 

It says, “I love the variety of stories and listening to all of the Women of Strength share in their successes. I also love the few minutes at the end when Julie and Meagan give information, facts, and tips on certain pregnancy and birth topics related to the birth story. I have learned so much from listening to these birth stories and it helps me prepare for things I might come into contact with as a doula. I absolutely cannot wait to have my own kids and we will be listening to this podcast forever especially when I’m pregnant. I could say so much more, but Julie and Meagan, I am thankful for all of your hard work, sacrifice, and spirits as this has made all of this possible. 

“God has truly blessed y’all. By the way, I am going to take your VBAC course and when I graduate high school, I cannot wait.” 

I love that. That was a little while ago back when Julie and I were podcasting together, so hopefully, sarahgb, you are graduated and with us today. 

05:35 Jayne’s journey to sleep consulting

Meagan: All right, Ms. Jayne, how are you today? 

Jayne: I’m good. Thank you for having me again. I actually am just getting over sickness from last week so if my voice sounds a little weird, that’s why, but I feel fine and I’m excited to be here. 

Meagan: Good. Well, you sound great to me and I’m so excited that you are here. I wanted to start right off with your story. I mean, we are storytellers here on this podcast and I think that your story goes obviously so much into why we are here today. 

Jayne: Sure. So I am a wife and a mother. I live in Baltimore, Maryland with my husband and two kids. They are 7 and 11 now and I got into this journey of becoming a sleep consultant back really when my son was born. Prior to having children, I worked in catering sales. I was an event planner. I planned weddings, corporate holiday parties, and graduate celebrations. I worked nights, weekends, and holidays. I loved it, but it was really hard work. I always knew that it wasn’t going to be a great fit for me when I had kids one day. I wanted to be more present for them. 

I was raised by a stay-at-home mom so that’s all I ever knew. My life’s dream was to be a mom who is first in line in carpool with the best snacks. That’s the mom that I wanted to be with the station wagon. Remember station wagons? 

Meagan: Yes. I sure do. Oh my gosh. 

Jayne: I wanted to drive a station wagon and be first in the carpool line and have the best snacks and take my kids to tennis lessons and that be my life’s work. So I quit my job in catering when my son was born and I had four glorious years as a stay-at-home mom. My son was delightful and delicious and he was just perfect in every single way and then I had my daughter and she was a really tough baby. 

I can say this with love now because she is 7 and she’s amazing, but it was really, really hard when she was born especially because my son was just such an easy baby and he was so smiley and happy. Everything just worked out as it should. My daughter had a milk, soy, and protein intolerance and was colicky. She just literally cried. She cried and that was it. 

Meagan: That’s so hard. 

Jayne: It was so hard. It gave me a run for my money because I thought I was this amazing mom and I would look around at all of these other moms who had babies that were crying and I’m like, “What’s wrong with you? Why can’t you get it together?” Then I had one of my own and I was like, “Oh, now I get it.” 

It really put me in my place. I really didn’t enjoy motherhood the second time around if I’m being completely honest and transparent. So I was looking for an outlet. I needed something else to fulfill me because that stay-at-home mom life that I thrived on for four years was no longer serving me in the same way. 

My husband is a lawyer. At the time, he was traveling a lot for work. Everybody had gotten really used to me being the primary caregiver and the one who maintained the children and the house. None of us could really see that changing. 

Jayne: Going back to work in the traditional sense didn’t even seem like a possibility. I started thinking about, “What could I do from home? What could I do not even to make a ton of money but just to do something to keep me fulfilled and entertained and inspired?” I kept coming back to sleep consulting because I actually was really good at getting my own kids to sleep. 

I had sleep-trained my son when he was four months old. He took to it beautifully. It was really– as a first-time mom, he cried for 27 minutes and so did I. It was hard at the time, but he really took to it beautifully and it was life-changing. I understood very early on the value of having routine and order and rituals and a set expectation around what sleep could and should look like in my home for both my husband and I and for our children. 

The same thing with my daughter– as much as she cried during the day, she slept beautifully. The only time she wasn’t crying was when she was sleeping. 

Meagan: When she was sleeping at night. 

Jayne: Yeah. She was a beautiful sleeper, but when she was awake, she was crying. So I was really good at getting my own kids to sleep. For years, I was the friend who just helped other friends with their kids’ sleep. I didn’t have a formal process. I wasn’t formally trained. It was just like, I would get onto a call with them and give them advice and text message them some tips and I would help them. I would get them results. It was working. 

I did that for years. I helped friends, friends of friends, and eventually, I just decided, you know what? I’m going to get certified. It turns out there are courses online where you can get trained to do this and turned my hobby into a business. My intention was really just to dabble. I wasn’t looking to build an empire. I just wanted to be able to help families and if I could bring in a little bit of money to contribute to our family’s income, great. 

Very quickly, after launching my business, I realized that this wasn’t just going to be a little passion project, that this was going to be a very legitimate career. That was very exciting to me. It was thrilling. 

Jayne: Really, the timing worked out because as the business grew, my children were growing too. By that time, my son was in school full-day. My daughter was in at least part-time preschool, so I really had time to build my business. Each year, they spent more time in school and I could spend more time on my business. Really, we all grew together which was amazing. 

Not too long after that, I founded a center for pediatric sleep management which is an online sleep consultant certification course. The reason I decided to create my own is because I just felt like I could do it better and I did. I’m really committing to supporting my students at a really high level and not just teaching them how to sleep-train a baby or how to set boundaries with a three-year-old, but how to launch, grow, and scale a really successful business. I love taking women, and we actually have a tiny handful of men inside of our program too, but it’s largely women. I love taking these women through the entrepreneurial journey and helping them to realize that they are capable of doing things that are outside of their comfort zone and growing something that is entirely theirs that they can be really proud of. I think at this point, that actually even brings me more joy than sleep-training the babies if I’m being truthful. 

Meagan: Right? Well, to be able to see so many grow and flourish for their families and for themselves, there is something. I mean, as someone who trains doulas and even has doulas in my own group here in Utah, it’s so awesome to see that confidence. I remember back in the day before I started my journey, I didn’t have that confidence. To think about someone like you or my mentor being there for me, it’s priceless. It’s the most amazing thing and it’s really rewarding on the other end on your side to see that happen. 

Of course, in addition to helping people sleep and do better all around. 

Jayne: Yeah. Win-win. 

Meagan: Win-win. 

13:35 How can a sleep consultant help?

Meagan: Okay, so let’s talk a little bit more about what a sleep consultant does and looks like because personally, I was that mom who was sitting on the couch listening to my baby upstairs crying. This was my first and my husband was just holding and he was like, “You’ve got this. You’ve got this. Don’t move.” I’m like, “But!” I didn’t move and it worked out and it was great. I still even to this day feel like my kids are pretty good sleepers. It came with a lot of reading and stuff, but I had never even heard of a sleep consultant. 

My second was also really hard– always crying all the time. She also had milk and dairy and all of these things. It was really tough. So yeah. Can we talk about what that even looks like in general both from a mom’s standpoint and as someone who may be considering becoming a sleep consultant and adding that to their life? 

Jayne: Yeah, sure. I’ll tell you what it looks like for me to support families as a sleep consultant. I think one of the beautiful things about consulting whether it be sleep consulting or anything else is you actually get to create a business your way. The way I support families and the way my clients are supported by me might look entirely different than what others are doing. I don’t want to speak for anybody else, but what it looks like for me is families hire me because they are struggling in some capacity with their child’s sleep. 

This could be a four-month-old that’s still being nursed to sleep. It could be a four-year-old who wants a mom or a dad to lie next to them while they fall asleep at bedtime and then they’re up in the middle of the night wanting to come into their parents’ bed. It looks entirely different every single time. It’s the same, but it’s different. 

So what we do as sleep consultants or at least what I do is support parents through the process of teaching their child how to fall asleep and back to sleep independently. My personal approach, I like to describe as client-led which means I provide all of the age-appropriate options. I have no bias. I have no agenda. I have no dog in this fight other than I want to get my clients results and I feel really strongly that the best way to get my clients results is to support them through methods or techniques that most closely align with their parenting style and that feel safe and comfortable to them. 

If I were to show up and tell the mom of a four-month-old who is nursing him baby to sleep that they need to implement extinction which is also known as “cry it out” and come back in the morning, she might be really overwhelmed and intimidated by that and not feel like that’s the right way to approach the situation. Therefore, she wouldn’t implement it. She wouldn’t have success and then as a business owner, I also wouldn’t have success. 

So instead, if I show up and say, “You know what? If it makes you really anxious to just put your baby down and let her get herself to sleep, how about instead of nursing your baby to sleep, why don’t we just try rocking her to sleep and see how that goes? If that goes well, maybe you could have your spouse hold your baby to sleep tonight. Maybe we don’t even do so much rocking. We just hold her. If that goes well, then maybe you could put her down in the crib tonight and see how she does. If she starts fussing, give her some back rubs or belly jiggles and let’s see how that goes.” You can take baby steps. It doesn’t need to be 0 to 100. It can be, but it doesn’t need to be. 

But really, I pride myself on meeting families where they are and coaching them through methods that feel safe and comfortable to them and that’s how you get results. So that’s what it looks like for me. My clients get a written sleep plan that outlines age-appropriate daytime schedules, feeding and nap schedules, and bedtime routines. For older children, we talk about communication strategies. 

For a four-year-old who lacks the confidence to fall asleep independently, there should be a family meeting to discuss the changes that are going to be taking place and some role-playing and maybe getting onto a Facetime with their sleep coach– that’s me– and having a coaching session. I love talking to four-year-olds on Facetime. It’s so fun. Sometimes I send them videos. I give them a pep talk. I involve them in the process and get their buy-in and help them to understand that they are capable of this. 

Yes, it feels hard, but so does pooping on the potty and they learned how to do that and so does riding a scooter and they learned how to do that. Zipping their coat used to feel hard, but now they can zip their coat no problem. Falling asleep independently is just another thing on that list. It’s something that feels hard right now, but it’s not something that is outside of their capabilities so when we show them that they are capable and we empower them to try and then we set what I like to call a loving limit or a respectful boundary and we hold the line, they are really capable of achieving these new skills. 

I coach the parents through the process. I provide text message support. My role is to get them from point A to point B in a way that looks good for everybody. That’s what it looks like for me. 

Meagan: I love that. I love that you involve the individual who you are trying to help sleep with their parents. I know with my daughter, she had this weird thing. It was always around 2:00-3:00 AM. She would wake up and she wanted to be in my room. For us, we didn’t really want her in our room. We wanted her in her room. It took a while, but we talked about it with her eventually and she said she didn’t feel safe in her room. She just woke up in the middle of the night not feeling safe, but I was like, “What’s making you wake up?” There was such a journey there. 

So I love that you are involving the child, talking about change, and normalizing change because change can be really difficult especially for a four-year-old so I love that. I love that you talk about that. 

19:43 What to do when a child feels unsafe in their room

Jayne: Sure. Sure. A lot of things that parents do to make their children feel safe– the point that you brought up, a lot of parents, when children express that they don’t feel safe in their room, so then they bring them into the parents’ room, what they are actually doing, they are trying to make their child feel safe, but what they are actually doing is providing an accommodation that then exacerbated their anxiety because their room actually is safe. 

Meagan: It is. 

Jayne: There is nothing unsafe about the room, so when a child says, “My room feels scary or unsafe,” and you say, “Okay, come in my room. My room’s safe,” what you are implying is that their room isn’t safe. So really, the way over the hurdle is to hold the boundary because their room is not dangerous. It’s not unsafe. It’s not actually scary so by you showing them, “Actually, I wouldn’t leave you in a situation that is scary or dangerous,” that’s how you show them that the room is okay for them. 

Meagan: Yeah. We did. We talked about that. There was another situation, not even sleep-related where she connected it. She ws nervous for us to leave her at this place– it was a dance thing. I was like, “Remember, I would never put you somewhere that I didn’t feel was safe for you.” She was like, “Oh yeah.” She went in there and danced. I love that you talk about that. 

21:08 The life of a sleep consultant

Meagan: Okay, so now we know what it looks like from a sleep consultant to what we would be getting, but what does it look like to be a sleep consultant and how could a lot of parents who may be going through similar situations like you and I again, like different journeys– sleep consultant and doula/VBAC podcaster– but I really did. I went through a very similar stage when I quit my job. I was a businesswoman. That’s what I did and that was my title. So then when I became “mom”, even though I wanted to be like you and be on the PTA board and all of the things, I had a little bit of a funk that I went through. I needed something and then I became a doula and it wasn’t that my purpose as a mom wasn’t enough, it was that I just wanted something more as well for me. 

Jayne: I think our society makes it really hard to admit that being a mother doesn’t feel like enough. We have to justify it by saying, “It’s not that being a mom wasn’t enough for me–”

Meagan: See? Like I just did. 

Jayne: Yeah, we all do it. I point it out because I think it’s really important for moms to acknowledge that it’s okay to want to have a career and to work and there’s all of this guilt around if you’re not giving 100% of your energy and your thought process and your entire aura and being to your children, that you’re not doing enough. I just really think that’s unfair. Now that I’ve lived on both sides of it, I was a stay-at-home mom for four years and I still consider myself to be a stay-at-home mom, but I’m a working mom, I actually think there are so many benefits to having your children see you work. 

Meagan: Okay, yes. We have talked about this recently, my husband and I. 

Jayne: Especially for our daughters, but it’s good for all of them. I think it’s really important. I love that my children see that I’m doing something that fulfills me, that I’m following my passion, that I’m using my brain, that I’m being creative, that I’m being resourceful, and that I’m juggling it all as best as I can. Yes, my son is 11 and he’s in that tween stage. He totally rolls his eyes at me when if he says something to me. He hasn’t said, “Excuse me.” Maybe I’m reading an email on my phone and he starts talking and I don’t hear him and then I realize I didn’t hear him and I say, “Wait, what did you say?” He definitely rolls his eyes like, “Ugh. She’s working. She’s not paying attention to me.” And that’s where the guilt comes from. 

Meagan: I know. 

Jayne: That’s where it comes from. He and I have had conversations about it recently. “I understand that you want to be heard all of the time. A simple ‘excuse me’ will help.” And then also, “Remember that me working leads to me being happier and then me being able to care for you better, and also, it affords our family to be able to do things that we otherwise wouldn’t be able to do if I wasn’t earning money and one day, I hope that you’ll make the choices that you think are right for your family.” These are complicated things to think about especially as our kids get older to have these conversations with them. 

Meagan: They are. 

Jayne: I think it’s a good, healthy thing for our kids to see us working. 

Meagan: I do too. Yeah. We also have some of those eye-rolls or things where I don’t hear and we actually just recently talked about timing. “If you see that I’m doing something, or responding to an email, I really am not just on Instagram scrolling. I really am working. Hold your thoughts because I really am so excited to hear it. Hold your thought or say, ‘Excuse me’ or ‘Mom, I have something to tell you.’” Right? I agree, though. I echo your message. 

25:17 Sleep consultant qualifications

Meagan: So yeah, okay. Let’s talk about sleep consultants and how this could be born potentially for anybody looking for what we wanted. 

Jayne: Yeah. I think this is a good fit for somebody who is either really passionate about healthy sleep hygiene in their own home and maybe feels compelled to help others whether you are staying at home with your young kids or maybe you already have a job that you are not passionate about, not that you need to leave your job and be a sleep consultant, but I’ve actually had many people tell me– teachers, nurses, occupational therapists, accountants– I’ve had them tell me that once they took our certification course and they got trained and they started working as a sleep consultant, they actually started hating their other jobs less because all of a sudden they have something that they are working on that they are passionate about and they’re excited about. It’s lighting them up and lifting them up and they can just accept their 9-5 as something that pays the bills and they have health insurance and a safety net. That’s fine. 

Then they can understand, “Okay. This is what my 9-5 offers me and this is what sleep consulting offers me.” It doesn’t have to be all or nothing, but I tend to think that a good fit is somebody who is either already really passionate about healthy sleep hygiene for their children or it’s somebody who is drowning with their own kids and desperate to learn more and would like to use this as an opportunity to figure out how to reign it in in their own household, then hopefully get it straight and feel empowered to help others. 

A lot of women have enrolled in our program for that exact reason where they were really struggling with their own children. They came to learn for their own family and then to help others. When that happens, we actually love to pair these people up with graduates from our program so support them as they are sleep consulting. I give them the accountability, the support, but also the education to make the change in their own home and then one day go off and help others. 

From a perspective of growing a business and entrepreneurship, I think that entrepreneurship is not for everybody, but it is, I’m sure you can relate, so inspiring and exciting and invigorating if you can just trust yourself enough to give it a shot. I just think it’s so fun to grow something. I don’t know. I’m sure you know. It really is. 

Meagan: It is. 

Jayne: It’s scary for a lot of people. A lot of women tell me, “I would love to be a sleep consultant. I would love to support families, but it scares me. I don’t know if I want to put myself out there. I wouldn’t know how to do x, y, and z.” All of that stuff, everything is figure-out-able. Fear, I think, can either paralyze you and keep you stuck or it can be those nervous butterflies that really sort of help you soar. 

Meagan: Yeah. 

Jayne: I love those nervous butterflies. I don’t let those feelings paralyze me. I use them to leverage my next big move. 

Meagan: I know. I mean, when I became a doula, I signed up and took the course. I was like, “Yes.” I started interviewing and so many people said, “Wait, you haven’t had a vaginal birth? How do you feel like you can even support me?” That comment would happen multiple times. That was already an insecurity that I had about becoming a doula, but I still had this fire inside of me that felt right. I easily could  have just been like, “You’re right. I haven’t had a vaginal birth and you’re right. I probably can’t support you. I probably can’t.” 

I probably could have quit there, but you don’t have to. These things are scary and if it feels scary, if it feels exciting, but it’s just a little too nervewracking, that probably means it’s right. That probably means it’s right. That probably means you should go for it. 

Jayne: I think so too. 

Meagan: Right? I’m so happy that I did continue pushing forward. Yes, eventually I had my vaginal birth, but I was very capable of supporting and so are you, Women of Strength. If this is resonating to you, don’t let fear get you because I can’t remember. I was just watching an HGTV show the other day and they were talking about if you don’t go for it, you’re going to miss 100% of the time. 

Jayne: No, that’s one of my favorite quotes. I think it’s Wayne Gretzky or Michael Jordan. I think the quote is, “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” 

Meagan: That’s it. That’s exactly what they said. You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. It’s like, okay. What are you going to have to lose if it doesn’t work out? All right, cool. I did it. I showed myself I tried. Great. Move on to the next thing. But anyway, I love that. I love that quote. I was like, “Yes. Yes.” That resonated so much. 

30:36 Ages covered in Jayne’s course

Meagan: Okay, so let’s talk a little bit more about your course and sleep training. What age range does it cover? What age range and who does it really apply to? Because I mean, luckily I have a 12-year-old who sleeps, but would it apply for a 12-year-old or is it more for the younger age?  

Jayne: Yeah, the course is geared towards infants, toddlers, preschoolers, I say early elementary-aged kiddos. There is really not a hard stopping point because if you think about it, anything you would do with a 4-year-old, why couldn’t you do it with a 5-year-old, and anything you do with a 4-year-old, why couldn’t you do it with a 6-year-old? 

I will say that the oldest children that I tend to have success with are about 7 or 8. It’s not that 9, 10, and 11-year-olds can’t learn to sleep independently, they can. The problem with working with families that have older children is that if parents haven’t set a boundary around sleep by the time their children are 9, 10, or 11 years old, it’s unlikely that they are going to just because they start working with me. I feel that they feel they are just too far gone and they just feel like this is something that we are never going to be able to change. It is absolutely something that they could change. It just feels, I think, too hard for them. It’s too deeply ingrained in their family culture to change it and that’s okay but it’s not that it can’t be changed. 

The course covers the science of sleep. We talk about REM cycles and circadian rhythms. The course covers the science of sleep, and safe sleep. We practice safe sleep per the American Academy of Pediatrics safe sleep guidelines. We teach sleep as it relates to different developmental ages and stages. What happens at 3-4 months that can impact sleep negatively? What happens at 8 or 9 months that can impact sleep negatively? What happens at 2.5 that can impact sleep? 

At all different developmental ages and stages, things happen that can get in the way of sleep and how do we recognize those developmental milestones and make sure that we are keeping sleep on track regardless of those things happening? 

We teach all the different sleep training techniques as I mentioned. Everything from really gradual and parent-present strategies all the way through extinction and everything in between. We teach toddler, preschooler, and big kid appropriate strategies and communication techniques. We talk about unique circumstances of how to support moms of multiples, how to support moms who are struggling with perinatal mood and anxiety disorders, and how to support families that have kiddos with special needs. We have an entire section on supporting kids with autism. We have training on how to talk to parents about travel, illness, teething– all the stuff that just comes up. 

And then we teach you communication strategies so how to talk to moms about crying and how to help ease their fear and anxiety over their children being temporarily frustrated or upset about the changes that you are making. We will teach you how to write a sleep plan so that all of your thoughts and advice are really organized in a way that can be easily received and well-received by really tired parents. 

And then we teach you how to successfully grow a business. We teach you how to get on a phone call with a tired mom and talk to her in a way that makes her feel comfortable with you. We talk about marketing. We talk about mindset work which I think is so important. So many new entrepreneurs’ minds are not in the proper place for them to thrive and grow as entrepreneurs. We talk a lot about shifting our own mindset so we can position ourselves to thrive just as we help our clients do the same. 

And then at the end, there is a resource library, a whole bank of articles and studies and evidence and all sorts of good stuff so that when a mom says to you, “I think my baby is teething and that’s why he’s not sleeping,” we actually have some articles with really good studies linked to the fact that teething really isn’t a major disrupter to sleep the way that parents think that it is. 

So when somebody comes to you and says, “I want to sleep train, but my sister-in-law is telling me that my baby is just going to cry until he is tortured and traumatized and damaged,” we have links to articles and studies that literally prove that that is actually not at all the case. It’s an entirely evidence-based course, science-backed and my goal is for our students to graduate feeling really confident and empowered to support families at the highest level to get them the results that they desire. 

Meagan: I love that so much. So if you are a parent wanting to take the course, you can take the course. It’s also going to teach you how to be a sleep consultant and then also, at the tail end of it or through the whole thing, get to also learn how and maybe if you’re interested in it. I feel like experience a lot of the time is where we find our passion. Sometimes that goes hand in hand. I think you mentioned that earlier so they can learn how to take off and do their own business. 

36:00 How to find a sleep consultant

Meagan: What does it look like to one, find a sleep consultant as a parent and two, as a mom who wants to maybe become a sleep consultant or a doula– we have a lot of doulas on this podcast that listen maybe wanting to add to their services– what does that look like to find this course and find a sleep consultant to help? 

Jayne: To help each other– I understand what you are asking. Yeah, it’s interesting. It depends on how– some parents are very plugged into what’s going on in parenting and some parents are very unplugged. Either way is fine. I think that there are pros and cons to both, but if you’re hanging out on Instagram and you have a young baby, I bet the algorithm is showing you sleep consultants and how to sleep train your baby or that sleep training is terrible. It’s showing you all of that stuff. If you’re totally unplugged, then maybe you don’t even know that sleep consultants exist. I actually hear that a lot. 

Sometimes when I am connecting with people who are interested in starting their own business from home and they don’t really know what type of business they would want to start and I just share with them what I do, they will say, “That is so interesting. I have three kids and I’ve never even heard of a sleep consultant. I didn’t know that was a thing.”

Meagan: That was me. That was me. I didn’t know. I didn’t know I could get help. 

Jayne. Yeah. Yeah. So I think that it looks different for everybody. As a sleep consultant, I actually just landed my most recent client. It was a referral from a pediatrician. I live in Baltimore, Maryland and a pediatrician in Great Neck, New York, shared my name. 

Meagan: Whoa. 

Jayne: Yeah. How exciting is that? Because our businesses are entirely virtual or at least mine is. I work with families all over the country and all over the world and here a pediatrician in Great Neck is recommending me to her patients which is amazing.

Meagan: I love that. So awesome. 

Jayne: I think that some pediatricians are recommending sleep consultants which I can totally understand why. Pediatricians have 10 or 15 minutes with you and they are trying to get a full deep-dive into how your child is doing. One of the questions they always ask is, “How is your baby sleeping” or “How is your child sleeping?” If the answer is, “Terribly,” they don’t really have an hour to go into all of the different options for how to help you fix that and they certainly aren’t available to help support you through it. 

They tend to be very pro-sleep consultants. They will refer out to us because they know that we are helping their patients in a way that they do not have the capacity to support. Pediatricians are a great referral source both for parents and for sleep consultants. I have partnered up with mental health professionals, therapists, and also not just mental health professionals, but occupational therapists, physical therapists, and speech/language pathologists. I get referrals from a family photographer, one of those photographers who takes those beautiful little newborn shoots. Mom troops into her studio exhausted complaining about how they were up all night and she says, “Oh, let me give you a business card for my friend who is a sleep consultant.” 

So I get referrals that way. I think for parents to connect with a sleep consultant, the best way is to ask other parents if they’ve received this type of help and if they have the name of somebody they know. Of course, Facebook groups are a great resource for connecting with others who can help you in some capacity. But really, just talking to people. I think what we do is a service-based business. It’s all based on relationships and personal connections. Most of my business comes to me by way of former clients of mine sharing my name with their circle and their network of friends. 

Meagan: Word of mouth. 

Jayne: Yeah, word of mouth so if you are a mom who is struggling, ask your mom friends if they have sought help in this area or if they know anybody who has sought help. Ask your therapist, your pediatrician, or your OB/GYN. A couple of weeks ago, I was out to dinner with my husband’s friend who is an OB/GYN. I was telling him what I do and he was like, “Oh, I could blow up your business in a hot second.” I’m actually really busy so I was like, “Please don’t.” 

Meagan: You’re like, “Yes. Do that, please.” Oh, you were like, “No.” 

Jayne:  Yeah, I’m actually pretty busy so I was like, “Actually, please don’t,” but it just goes to show that he didn’t have a sleep consultant that he was referring, so there is so much room for growth for sleep consultants to be connecting with professionals that could blow up our businesses. We just have to get out there and connect with those people. 

Same with parents. If you don’t know where to seek help, ask a friend. Ask a professional. Ask your postpartum doula and somebody will have the answer for you. 

Meagan: Yeah. I love that. That’s how doulas work too. It’s word-of-mouth typically, then you’re like, “Oh my gosh, yes.” You find that personal connection. 

40:59 Cost to hire a sleep consultant and potential earnings as a sleep consultant

Meagan: What do sleep consultants usually charge for a parent looking and for someone again, I’m going both here. We have such a wide audience from parents to doulas that may want to expand or maybe even parents wanting to add this. What can someone expect to pay and then what can someone expect to make? 

Jayne: Sure, okay. Fair enough. I’ll speak for myself because I think that there’s a really wide range of services and pricing just like wth anything else. You can go get your hair cut for 19 dollars or you can get your hair cut for $500. 

Meagan: Yep. Yep.

Jayne: I will just give you my own numbers because I’m more than happy to share and understand that there’s a wide range of normal on both ends of what I charge and what I earn. I charge– I have two options for services. I do a two-week virtual consultation which is pretty comprehensive. It includes again, a written plan, a phone call to onboard, text message support for two weeks, and then a wrap-up phone call. I charge $750 for that service. I earn about 8 to 10 to $12,000 a month supporting families. So I don’t know. I support 10 or 15 clients a month typically. 

I used to support way more, but now that I’m more focused on supporting my students, I’ve scaled back on my client support. In addition to supporting families in that two-week consultation, I also offer what I call an “ask me anything” call. It’s just a 30-minute strategy session. It’s an information dump and I charge $145 for that 30-minute call. It’s really intended for troubleshooting. I don’t get on those calls with parents who have literally never sleep-trained their baby. It’s more for a baby who is already doing well, but maybe needs help transitioning from three to two naps or maybe it’s a 2-year-old who is going to bed just fine and sleeping through the night but waking up at 5:00 in the morning and parents need help modifying their schedule. 

That’s what it looks like for me. We have people in the program who are homeschooling their kids and this is a passion project for them, a side hustle, and maybe they earn $1000-$2000 doing this work. Maybe they are priced more at $500 and they support two or three families a month and then we have other people inside of our program or who have completed the program who have created sort of an agency model of sleep consulting and they are supporting families but then they also have two or three or four people working under them and they earn more than I do monthly or annually doing sleep consulting support. 

There’s also the option to support families in-home. All of my work is virtual so I can support families who live anywhere and anytime. I don’t have to physically be there to get them results, but a lot of doulas who enroll in my program actually prefer to support families in person just because they are so comfortable with that already. 

Meagan: Yeah.

Jayne: Their pricing structure is entirely different. They are charging either a flat fee for a certain amount of time that they are either moving in with a family or maybe they are just doing two or three overnights and then transitioning to virtual support. Maybe they have an hourly rate that they feel comfortable charging while they are there. For most of the doulas who take our program, the one thing I tell them when they complete the course is that they’ve got to raise their hourly rates from what they were charging pre-sleep consultant certification to post-sleep consultant certification because really, this education and this knowledge that they now have, the tools that they have to get families results are so much more valuable. 

So even if they are not traditionally supporting families as sleep consultants, just the knowledge and expertise that they now have warrants, in my opinion, a higher hourly rate. Some of our doulas don’t even necessarily practice as sleep consultants. They just use the credentials to justify higher income earning potential. 

Meagan: Their rate, yeah. Well, I mean, you really wouldn’t want a surgeon performing– you wouldn’t pay a surgeon a small amount just because– I’m trying to think of what I’m trying to say. You’re going to hire the professional who has the credentials and you’re not going to look at the pay because they have the credentials. It’s important. I encourage anybody looking to become a doula, a sleep consultant, a postpartum doula, or whatever to get the credentials and seriously charge what you are worth because you need to. 

Jayne: We have this conversation inside of our center for pediatric sleep community all of the time when our grads are getting started. A lot of the time, they are anxious to set their rates at a number that I think would be worthy of their expertise and they are nervous. I always explain to them, “Okay. Would you rather buy your shoes at Payless or at Bloomingdale's?” They all say, “Bloomingdale's.” It’s like, “Okay. Well, Bloomingdale's shoes are more expensive. They’re also perceived to be better and when you charge a higher hourly rate, sometimes what comes along with that is the idea, whether it’s true or not, that you are highly qualified and you’re better at what you do.” 

You need to command that authority in your business. You do have that knowledge. You do have the skills. You do have the expertise. Charge accordingly. 

Meagan: Yeah. You’re way better at explaining that than I am. 

46:57 Where to find “Becoming a Sleep Consultant” 

Meagan: Okay, so we’re wrapping up. We talked about what it covers. We talked about what you can make. We talked about how you can be helped as a parent and how you might find extra inspiration through your journey. Okay, so where can people find your course? Where can people find more support? 

Jayne: Yeah, sure. Sure. So if you’re interested in becoming a sleep consultant, I would say that the two best places to learn more about it would be my Facebook group which is called “Becoming a Sleep Consultant” and my podcast, same name– “Becoming a Sleep Consultant”. The podcast is a really awesome place to get a feel for what it looks like to go through the program and start your own business. You can hear stories of others who have done it– teachers, doulas, stay-at-home moms, engineers, and all sorts of interesting people. I think hearing the stories of others who have been through the program is really inspiring. 

I would say the Facebook group and the podcast. If you are interested in learning about how you can get support for your child’s sleep, thesnoozefest.com is my website for sleep support. 

Meagan: Perfect. And then asking around, asking those parents, talking to your community, finding the sleep consultants in your area. 

Jayne: Of course. Of course. I’m not the right sleep consultant for everybody and I have hundreds of sleep consultants that I’ve trained. You’re always welcome to connect with me and tell me a little bit about what you are looking for and what type of support you feel would be best for your family and I’m happy to match you up with somebody who I think would be the right fit. 

Meagan: Awesome. We are going to make sure to have the podcast and all of the links for your group and your website and everything all listed right here in the show notes below so definitely go check it out. Yeah. I even think what you said earlier, even if your kid is sleeping pretty well but you are kind of into that transitioning stage, maybe from a crib to a bed or whatever, I just think that everything you offer is so beneficial. I definitely highly suggest checking her out. Thank you so much for being with us today. 

Jayne: Thank you. 

Closing

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