My journey to becoming a sleep coach wasn’t linear. It was born from a deep desire to help families, shaped by my own struggles as a mother, and fueled by a commitment to challenge the status quo in infant sleep support.
I was a teacher, working with children every day and loving the impact I could make in their lives. But when I became a mother myself, everything shifted. Suddenly, I wanted nothing more than to be home with my girls. The thought of someone else witnessing their first steps or comforting them when they cried felt unbearable.
Yet I still yearned to help children – I just needed a different way to do it. That’s when it hit me: what if I could support children by empowering their parents? What if I could work through parents to create positive change in children’s lives while still being present for my own family?
Like so many new parents, I felt immense pressure to sleep train. The messages were everywhere – from well-meaning friends to pediatricians to the endless parade of sleep books promising babies who slept through the night. The underlying message was clear: good parents have babies who sleep independently.
So I did it. I sleep trained.
And I immediately regretted it.
Something felt fundamentally wrong about leaving my baby to cry, about ignoring their calls for comfort. My instincts screamed that this wasn’t right, but I’d been told this was the only way. The experience left me feeling disconnected from my own intuition as a mother and desperate to find another path.
Determined to help other parents avoid my experience, I decided to become a sleep consultant. I enrolled in what I thought would teach me everything I needed to know – a traditional sleep certification program. This was my first of what would become four certifications.
What I learned shocked me.
The information being taught as fact didn’t align with current research on infant development. The course promoted outdated ideas about baby sleep, pushing methods that went against everything we now know about attachment and brain development. But one concept particularly troubled me: self-soothing.
The certification program taught that babies could “self-soothe” – that they had the capacity to calm themselves from a state of stress and stop crying on their own. This didn’t sit right with me. How could an infant, with their underdeveloped prefrontal cortex, regulate their own emotions when even adults struggle with this?
I couldn’t shake this feeling that something was fundamentally wrong with what I was being taught. So I did what any determined person would do – I kept learning.
I became a student of infant development, diving deep into:
What I discovered was revolutionary: everything I’d been taught in that first certification was based on outdated research from the 1950s. The more I learned about how babies’ brains actually work, the more convinced I became that there had to be a better way to support families.
Armed with real knowledge about infant sleep and development, I started helping parents. I offered them something different – support without sleep training, education about normal infant sleep, and strategies that honored their instincts while meeting their babies’ needs.
The response was… mixed.
I received significant hate for sharing alternatives to sleep training. The sleep training industry is powerful, and suggesting there might be another way threatened many people’s businesses and beliefs. But alongside the criticism came something beautiful: relief.
Parents messaged me with tears of gratitude. Finally, someone was telling them it was okay to respond to their baby. Finally, someone was explaining why their baby woke so often and that it was normal. Finally, someone was supporting them without asking them to go against their instincts.
I started with monthly coaching packages and hourly consultation calls. Word spread organically – parents who felt supported and understood shared my approach with others. Within 18 months, I had completely maxed out my capacity. I was turning away families who desperately needed support, and it broke my heart.
That’s when I realized: I couldn’t do this alone.
If I wanted to help more families, I needed to train others. But more than that, I wanted to create a louder voice in the world of infant sleep. One voice sharing alternatives to sleep training could be dismissed. But what if there were dozens of us? Hundreds? What if we could create a movement?
The Baby-Led Sleep and Well-Being Specialist Certification was born from this vision. I poured everything I’d learned – from those four certifications, countless additional courses, and years of working with families – into creating a comprehensive program that would prepare others to support families without sleep training.
What started as my personal mission has grown into something bigger than I ever imagined. The coaches who’ve completed the certification aren’t just building businesses – they’re changing lives. Like Sarah Hemstock shared, this work allows her to “contribute, better myself as a parent and spend time working with other Moms sharing information that is so, so important and not talked about enough.”
These coaches are:
Every family we support creates a ripple effect. Parents who feel confident in responding to their babies raise children who trust that their needs will be met. These children grow up with secure attachments, better emotional regulation, and healthier sleep relationships.
As Racheal Sheppard, one of our certified coaches, shared: “The strong emphasis on attachment and emotion have completely changed the way I think about parenting my toddler… This information is so in-depth, and it all makes so much sense.”
Today, I’m no longer a lone voice sharing alternatives to sleep training. We’re a community of educated, passionate professionals committed to supporting families with evidence-based, attachment-focused sleep support.
The hate still comes occasionally, but it’s drowned out by the chorus of grateful parents and empowered coaches. We’re not just building businesses – we’re changing the conversation around infant sleep, one family at a time.
If you’re reading this and feeling that pull – that desire to help families while being present for your own, that frustration with conventional sleep training, that knowing there must be a better way – maybe you’re ready to join us.
The Baby-Led Sleep and Well-Being Specialist Certification isn’t just a business opportunity. It’s a chance to:
As Elli Pears beautifully said, “This course has empowered me as a coach and as a mom to put relationship first when dealing with common sleep and parenting challenges.”
The world needs more voices sharing the truth about infant sleep. Parents deserve support that honors their instincts and their babies’ needs. And you deserve a career that aligns with your values while allowing you to be the parent you want to be.
My journey from conflicted mother to confident sleep coach to certification creator taught me one crucial lesson: when we follow our instincts and commit to learning the truth, we can create profound change – in our own lives and in the lives of others.
Are you ready to be part of this movement?
