Balancing Business and Babies – with Rosie Dumbrell, founder of Lenny Rose Active, and 4 x Mum

If there’s anyone who can relate to the business (or work) and babies juggle, I think I certainly can! Being a bit of a later starter to my motherhood journey, I was lucky enough to be able to grow 4 humans across a 5 year period (my eldest turned 5 just 2 weeks before my 4th baby was born, all singleton pregnancies!). At the same time, I was simultaneously growing my first business, a Yoga and Pilates studio, and then sold this business to start my now current start-up – Lenny Rose Active. Starting a new business whilst navigating morning sickness, recovery from birth, breastfeeding, toddler tantrums, sleepless nights certainly has its challenges – but also affords a lot of flexibility and autonomy I wouldn’t otherwise have. I do have to point out though, I think there would be a lot less pregnancies and births if it wasn’t up to the female population to bear it all. Just saying!

So how does one balance the demands of growing a start-up business, family, and still manage to function ? ( if you had asked me 6 hours ago, when my now 7 year old was refusing to get in the car, because he couldn’t find his pokemon cards, I would have said maybe you don’t ;0)

But seriously – a family can be all consuming, a start-up (or any phase of business) can be all consuming, so how do you navigate both?

For me personally, motherhood has been a very steep learning and growth curve – just as has starting new businesses – full of growing pains, highs and lows and everything in between. It has forced me to really take a good hard look at what is important to me, what I value most, what I can and need to let go of, and where I am most valuable to my family and business in spending my time. It has forced me to be very purposeful and deliberate, about the split of time between family and business, and to do my best to create strong boundaries between the two, so each is given the fair go it deserves.

When going through my values (Dr Demartini’s site has a great tool you can access for free) I realised that family AND having an impact/being of service are both high on my values list, and that despite cultural conditioning telling me I should not work with so many young children, that I should spend all of my time mothering, I had to dig deep and listen to where the suggestion, motivation and resistance and willingness were coming from. My parents valued working hard, working until you grind yourself to a halt; my husband’s family were the same, but the women worked hard in the non paid parenting role, rather than going out into the workforce. So it was a real tug of war for me on what I should be doing, having the luxury to choose, might I add – which is not something everyone has. At the end of the day, I have done the work to understand what is important to me, and how I best show up in life – and it is in balancing the two, at least for the moment.

Time – the golden bullet 

Something else I have had to work very hard at is “taking up space” in my own life, and making space for my own dreams and goals, alongside being a very active and involved mother.

This for me means working on a “part-time” basis (2 full days and 1-2 ½ days) per week, but then working early mornings and late evenings whilst the kids sleep, and and most weekends getting up at 4 am on a Saturday/Sunday to get close to a full day of work in by 9am. It means not a lot of time for socialising, though connection is also important so I have started to create more of a business network which has been very helpful – through Lift Women, SBE, Launch Vic and Scale – all amazing support networks.

I have also had to work very hard on remembering that I am a human BEING, not a human DOING, and that I can only control what I can control. I can’t control if my kids or I get sick and need a day off school or work, but I can control how I manage it (rest, work from bed, get a grandma around to help if needed, should it not be anything too nasty or contagious, of course!). I can shift things around and be flexible to honour my family’s needs – just as my family needs to be flexible at times about how my work fits in and the weeks where the balance is tipped in the other direction.

School holidays are always a huge challenge, as I have a nanny on the days I work, but don’t like to leave all 4 kids with one person regularly or for long – so I tend to try to organise school holiday programs, play dates, extra time with our amazing parents (grandparents) and also for some of the time adjust my work hours to be 3-4 hours in the morning very early before the family wakes, or the end of the day, so I can enjoy some extra quality time with my tribe. This isn’t sustainable all year round, but works for me to hold my high value of quality time with my family AND working hard in a business where I want to positively impact as many women as possible.

Self compassion

This is a huge one I have worked on, and continue to work on in the context of parenting, and in work. When we stuff up, learn from the mistake, and take a huge dose of self compassion. Beating ourselves up isn’t helpful (and sure isn’t the message I want to send to my kids)!

Asking for more help – building the village

This is something I am getting better at – getting a tribe around me both at home and in my business – you can’t do it all alone, and it is certainly not weak to ask for help. Emma Isaacs, founder of Business Chicks and mother of 6 has drummed this into me and I am glad for it. 

At home, I regularly ask my husband to step up more, his family to help out more with the kids, and have a few casual babysitters on my book to be able to call on when I need an extra pair of hands. Being a martyr ends up working for noone – so figure out how to cost effectively get support – it could be carpooling with friends so you have less taxi-ing around to do, involving family more, getting a cleaner, or relaxing your standards (i.e. how often you do the washing!) a little whilst you are in the thick of a growth period in your family or business.

Your business, and your family benefit from getting the best version of you – so surround yourself with the supports that you need to make this happen, however that looks for you.

In my business – I have an affordable (remote) VA who takes care of our customer service and email + social media marketing.

Exercise 

It may sound counterintuitive as its an ‘extra’ thing to build into an already crammed out schedule – but moving my body each day is a non-negotiable (or at least 5-6 days a week). Sometimes this is getting to the gym – other times it is taking a call that I can manage with video off and walking for the 30-60 minute meeting. Sometimes it’s doing yoga whilst my kids jump all over me or on a Friday night while they enjoy a movie. But I make it happen, its a habit and a priority, because its integral to feeling good and my psychological and emotional wellbeing too.

Managing your nervous system

This is probably one of the key things I have introduced and understood more fully over the last couple of years. As a mum, you are sleep deprived, overstimulated by noise, light, touch, requests, lack of personal space – and much more. In business, its up and down, never a smooth ride, so we are operating on constant “fight or flight’ mode. It’s not until I understood polyvagal theory, and how the nervous system works and requires nourishment, that I was able to make headway into feeling calmer, more grounded and less reactive to both work and home life stresses. Everyone will have a different take on what works for them – but for me – regular exercise, breathing exercises (like Wim Hoff, and 5 breath cycles per minute / slow paced breathing exercise) Yoga, and meditation such as Irest, are all in my black book. A regular walk with a friend (albeit at 6 am on a Friday each week) to talk about the ups and downs of parenting and business, a regular check in with a psychologist once a month – I work hard on having my chaotic life happen around me without being too chaotic on the inside. But it does take commitment, experimenting with what works for you, and a good understanding of your “why.” Mine is being a responsive, not reactive parent (where possible!) and an agile and growing business that helps me and my family to thrive. I hope you can find your why on taking better care of yourself amongst the juggle, too.

You can find a few more motherhood tips over on my podcast – Mama Matters, and find out more about Lenny Rose Active here.