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The smart way to create a compassionate and professional lactation private practice, hosted by private practice IBCLCs Annie Frisbie and Leah Jolly.
Leah Jolly is a private practice IBCLC with Bay Area Breastfeeding in Houston, Texas.
Annie Frisbie is a private practice IBCLC serving Queens and Brooklyn in New York City and the creator of the Lactation Consultant Private Practice Toolkit.
Tune in each week to learn all the ins and outs of running a successful private practice lactation business!
Connect with Leah and Annie:
On Instagram: @lactationbusinesscoaching
On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lactationbusinesscoaching
On YouTube: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLv3-4pMgjlzbXD9KWFCIV3-1LipsTbgsj
Leah: Let's dive in. Hi Annie, how are you doing today?
Annie: I'm good. Leah, how are you?
Leah: I am doing very well. Very well. Excited for another episode of Lactation Business Coaching.
Annie: Always.
Leah: Looking forward to this episode a lot, because we're talking about...
Annie: You're looking forward to it? Because I'm not.
Leah: Well I guess more because Oh my gosh, it's such a big struggle and I know that we all are facing this and if we can come together and share about it, it always makes me feel so much better, so...
Annie: Well it's true. This episode is brought to you by Spruce. Leah and I both use Spruce in our private practices for a second business line, secure client messaging and a whole bunch of other really cool features you're going to hear about later in the episode.
Leah: Annie and I love Spruce. It's been a great service to use. Their customer service is great and my clients love being able to have secure messaging with me and Spruce has offered to have you try out their service for one month. If you check out our show notes, you will see a code to get one month free so you can see how awesome Spruce is as well.
Annie: Today we're going to be talking about imposter syndrome, so that's basically when you're sitting around in your house or in your car or in the shower and you suddenly have the idea or you're like, I know this now for absolute fact, I'm the worst lactation consultant on the planet. I'm terrible at my job. I don't know enough. I'm not helping babies. I'm not helping parents. Why am I even doing this? I should go find something else to do because I am the worst lactation consultant, and also everyone else can tell that I am the worst lactation consultant.
Leah: I know. This fear that they're going to find out. Today's the day I'm going to go out there and they're all going to be like, now we know Leah. Now you are the worst, for sure. We all have figured you out. We all know that you are not up to par. Yes. That is impostor syndrome in a beautiful nutshell right there. And yeah, it's deep and tough things to talk about but so important. So, so important.
Annie: Well before we get to the meat of our topic today, Leah has a marketing moment.
Leah: Yes. So today I was just going to talk about the importance of having new content because that always helps your website, social media. Constantly changing your content really moves up your SEO and blogging is a great way to do this and I think it intimidates a lot of people, even myself. So I'm speaking from Leah, do this marketing tip. Annie's a great blogger. But for your business, one thing when you're thinking about blogging is just kind of go through your day, thinking about the most common things that you're saying to parents over and over and over again, and you can make a little three paragraph blog about just something very, very basic. It doesn't have to be super complex. It doesn't have to be really long or fancy writing, anything like that, and this could really help boost your content so that you have this changing content on your social media or on your website, which will be really, really helpful.
Annie: That's a great plan.
Leah: Start blogging.
Annie: Well, you know, I think one thing, speaking of imposter syndrome, you might be like, what on earth do I have to say about any given topic that hasn't already been said by some other amazing lactation consultant? Because especially if you're at like, we all should be blogging, but I'm going to tell you, I think we should all be blogging because the way you have to say something is going to be different than the way somebody else does, and there is plenty of room for more content on these topics because that's how we can reach parents and that's how we can change culture. So I think there's always room for your point of view, your evidence-based point of view on breastfeeding topics for parents.
Leah: Yes. And what helped me so much was to just focus on getting three solid paragraphs. That's all I needed. Yes, sometimes they would go on longer, but just like boom, boom, boom. Go back to English 101. I have three solid paragraphs because they just always made me so nervous. I would see these like such beautifully written blogs. I'm like, Oh, I'm not a writer, I can't do this. So I would just - imposter syndrome - talk myself out of it and be like, I can't do it. I can't do it, and it's something that I'm working on trying to do more of to print.
Annie: That's great. I am all for it. Well, so we've already started bringing the episode topic into even into our marketing moment. But I guess the question is, let's start by asking each other. So what does make
you insecure in your private practice? So what is it for you, Leah?
Leah: Yeah, I think there's probably two areas that are my triggers for imposter syndrome. One would be when I go to a visit and it's just really, really hard and the mom is so hopeful that I'm just going to come in and bring my little booby fairy wand and I'm just like, ding and everything's perfect, and it doesn't happen way and I have to have that tough conversation that this is going to be a process and it's not going to happen right away. Oh my gosh, I just feel like, why didn't I have my booby fairy wand? Probably other lactation consultants would have been able to come in here and just whip this up in one second. And so I start to get that imposter syndrome like, oh, I'm not good enough. I couldn't fix them. So those are really, really hard. And as you know, we face those quite often. So that's something that really triggers me. How about you?
Annie: Yeah, I've got one. It's similar. For me it comes up when after I've left and I thought we had a great visit and then she starts texting me about how she's still in pain even. I keep trying your new position and it really hurts.
Leah: It's not working.
Annie: And I'm like, how did I fail? I failed you. And then it's like a subset of my bigger imposter syndrome, which is I love conferences, I love continuing education and I always feel like I understand these topics on an intellectual level and I can follow everything. And then I feel like what if one of these presenters came and watched me in the family and they would be like, she didn't do anything that I taught her. She's doing it all wrong.
Leah: Doing it all wrong.
Annie: You're one of those people that we talk about that's doing it all wrong. And so I get very nervous that I'm not implementing the things that I'm learning because I'm just not as good as I think I am. And so then that quickly leads to me thinking I'm actually terrible and shouldn't be doing this.
Leah: I know, I know. It's so hard. And I think on the business side, I get a lot of imposter syndrome too, because I have run this business for seven years and I have grown so much and I'm like, okay, I'm doing so great. And then I feel like I don't know enough about running a business. Oh my gosh, what am I doing? Am I doing this right? Am I doing that right? And so if something comes up or I learned something new and I'm like, oh my gosh, I haven't been doing that, I've been totally failing at this and I'll have a lot of fear around that. And so I'm always trying to bolster my knowledge because we have lactation certification. We've gone through the schooling, but most of us don't have our MBA and lactation so we're all kind of winging it. So I'm always trying to pursue more knowledge. I don't know bolster myself to be like, you do know about running a business. You do know about running a business because that's an area that really triggers me and yes, we are lactation consultants. Yes, we have imposter syndrome on that side of it, but we're entrepreneurs and business owners. Oh my gosh, that's so scary too. So I have it from both fronts. I'm sure you do too.
Annie: Yeah. And I think for me, it's strongest in the clinical stuff. And I guess there's a reason that I really love to talk about the business stuff and aren't out there trying to do studies because I just don't even have a science background. I was a drama major. I spent four years in plays and lying on a floor and practicing my breathing, which I was very good at, so looking and seeing, I'll go on some of these groups. You'll see somebody posting who's using a centrifuge to figure out how the fat, and I'm terrified by that. I don't know what that means. I don't know how would I do that? This is some real talk right here. I have the auscultator - I think that's how you pronounce it - the little stethoscope, and it was given to me when I launched my private practice. I have never used it because I'm scared to use it.
Leah: It's very easy to use. It makes you feel like all official to pull it out.
Annie: So now you guys know I literally am the worst. I have a tool that I am scared to use and I'm going in there doing consults, thinking I'm listening to swallows and looking at them and I think I know what I'm talking about, but I don't because I don't use the auscultator. So you guys all know that about me now. I guess I'm the winner.
Leah: Well, one of the biggest ways to cope with imposter syndrome is to talk about it and don't have shame over it, because the statistic I think is like 70% of people reported feeling imposter syndrome. We are not alone.
Annie: 70%?
Leah: 70%, and more so in women or people who are ever overcoming big boundaries, like becoming an entrepreneur. You're putting yourself out there. You're overcoming something that's not the social norm, and so I think you're at such a higher risk and you in speaking about it. Anybody who loves Brené Brown - shame cannot live when we're open and talking about it. Put light on shame and yeah, I think it's so powerful to share those times where we feel like, okay, this is an area that I'm not feeling very good or bad or I'm having imposter syndrome about and it feels so much better to know and you're not alone.
Annie: I'm not alone. I know I'm not alone.
Leah: There's tons of other people and all these other people, and I want to point out that there's some great resources out there for people who might feel really like they're really struggling with this area, and one was a recent podcast or YouTube video from Marie Forleo and she has some great ideas for tackling imposter syndrome that I think are so, so powerful. But Annie, when you're dealing with this, when you're sitting there thinking about the stethoscope that's sitting in your bag, what's your first go-to? What do you like?
Annie: My first go-to, and this actually came up. This specific thing came up recently because it was in a group where people started talking about using them and especially cause the people who are talking about using them were people whose clinical skills I respect, and the person who gave it to me is someone whose clinical skills I respect. So I know it's a tool that can be used and the first thought I had was you should just start using it. Just start using it and start seeing what happens. Just like anything else in implementing clinical practice is that don't expect the first time that you're going to know what is going to happen. And so the first couple of times I use it, I'm not going to end up with data that might make sense, but I know I can look back and see other times I've mastered things that were difficult to me, like learning how to do an oral exam on a baby. It's just the more you do it, the more you know how to do it, because when you have the underpinnings of the clinical knowledge you've been trained and it's just about implementation, the more you implement, the more your training is going to seep into you.
Leah: Yeah. I think that's so important. And just for that, for your example, you can read the information about it, but that's one of those things that it could take months, maybe even years to hone in the actual skill, but you can't start on that journey until you pick it up and put it on. So I think that's awesome, and gosh, now Annie, I'm thinking I need to pick mine up. I use it periodically. I have it in my bag every time I go, and maybe I don't know, 30% of the time I might use it. Now I need to use too. Let's do that, Annie.
Annie: Let's do that.
Leah: We'll hold each other accountable. Yes, let's do it on every single baby. Just say we're going to spend two minutes on every single baby, just listening because I think it is so powerful and we'll just know so much more.
Annie: We'll know so much more.
Leah: See, okay, there you go. This is how you guys can all join us in overcoming our imposter syndrome. One of the things...
Annie: What are some of your go-tos when you're having this feeling come over you of not being good enough?
Leah: Yeah. Well one of the things I think is really important is I think we have these just like you did, you have this moment of this is an area I feel really weak or this is the area I'm triggering. You had the reflection of, okay, I could get better in this area. Maybe this imposter syndrome trigger right now is a good kind of highlighter for some areas that I'm going to be working on. So maybe taking it not as a negative, it usually helps motivate me. So if I'm feeling really heavy imposter syndrome, this is a wakeup call for me that this might be an area that I need to build my confidence in. What steps am I going to take next to build confidence in? So it usually drives me. It seems to happen all the time on your Facebook group. Somebody will be asking about some business thing and I'm like I think I know about that. Wait, do I know about that? Let me go read about that some more and just build my confidence. It's a good highlighter I guess for areas that I am feeling less confident in, and then the other side of that is there will always be an area that you don't feel confident in and so we can't just always be thinking of, I'm sucking at that, I'm sucking at that. I'm also sucking at that. To have some kind of mantra in your head or a saying or thinking about the thoughts that you say around that, versus your first thought was I don't do this. I suck. I'm not even implementing the things I've learned; you know that thought trail versus you know what? That's something I could definitely address, but I'm a bad-ass lactation consultant. I have helped so many families, and yes, and your statements I think can be really powerful because if we always take these imposter syndrome moments and go down the negative thought trail, that can really wear on your overall confidence and then that will reflect in your work and in your business. But if we can...yeah, go ahead.
Annie: Oh yeah. Well I love that about the self-talk that you use with yourself cause it's something that I think we do with the families we work with. Some of the scripting that I give families who are working with a non-latching baby, or never-latching babies, in the consult, the baby latches and nice things happen and the mom is now terrified that it's never going to happen again and it only happened because I was there. So I will often tell them that that's a real thing. It's called the helper syndrome. I'm here so you feel better. You feel more relaxed. Now you have to do that for yourself. But what I want you to tell you, it's not we can do it because nobody can predict your future. Nobody can predict whether your baby's ever going to latch again. But what is true is what's happened in the past. We've done this before, and having that mental shift to say like for me, I need to learn something hard, to try something new. Just say I've done it before, and for you to say do I actually know about this, thinking about all the things you didn't know before and what you did to learn that, which was go to sources and do research. And so by reflecting on our wins of the past or even just things we've overcome in the past, or things that have literally actually happened is way more helpful than trying to push yourself into an unknown future.
Leah: It's so fun to hear stuff like that, where you're like, this is what I say to my families because this is one of the things I think is so hard for lactation consultants because we don't hear what everybody's saying. But it's so funny cause I say almost the same thing. You and I have never talked about this before.
Annie: Never, never.
Leah: I will say, you can expect that this might not happen again the very next time you go to feed. But now we know this is an attainable goal. This is something you and baby have accomplished. We know this can happen. And so now we're going to work towards this attainable goal, which is basically just another version of what you are saying, which is so cool cause I'm like, oh my gosh, we're all synced up.
Annie: Yup, yup, yup.
Leah: We have never talked about this, but we're all talking about the same thing. I bet so many people out there that are listening to this right now are like, yeah, yeah, me too.
Annie: Yes, totally. And it's great and I love when people share stuff like that in the Facebook groups because then you can even refine what you're doing even more, come up with a variation. But it is so fun. I love it.
Leah: I love it when you share stuff like that. So when we're thinking about that self-talk and sometimes our thoughts are really, really, really hard to control because we have this kind of monkey mind and it bounces all over and sometimes you're geared towards more negative thinking when you're in a bad place or having a bad day. So having a saying that you tell yourself, and sometimes it's really good to have this be like a super hyped-up saying. So I love on the Marie Forleo. I hope everybody will link to it. Everybody go watch her video, but she has one with F-bombs and the whole thing. Just like a hype you up, but we could also have something similar that remind you and it's your go-to when you're going down that train. It's like, no, you are an awesome lactation consultant, maybe throwing out like you have had so many moms appreciate the care that you've given. And she even says on that podcast, she says talking to yourself in the third person can be even more connecting. So you just really hyping yourself up. We think about football players. They just sit there and they jump up and down before the game and they're like, You're awesome. You're a rock star. You've got this. And I think we are in tough work too. We might not be butting heads with somebody else, but we're doing tough work too. And it can be helpful I think to have a statement, a go-to statement, and so I would challenge everyone to get a go-to statement and let's share it in the comments of this podcast so that we can all share about how we are talking ourselves out of imposter syndrome and I think we can all come up with some rock star lactation consultants’ mantras that we're going to keep ourselves in good head space, so that we can continue helping these families out. And one place that you can get inspiration for this is having well Murray on this podcast talks about having a hype file, but maybe a file if you get note cards from families or even electronic file if you have reviews or testimonies that people have given about you and read them when you're feeling bad, because I think that helps me. I've gone to that before when it's a week of just one after the other, just so hard and so hard and you're just like, this is it. I should quit. What am I even doing? I can't help anybody. Nobody wants me there. I will read those and I'll be like, okay, somebody, someday wanted me or liked me or not. I did a good job
Annie: And you can keep them on your computer or on your phone, just something where you can quickly look at it. I did a couple of years ago, I had in a one of those parenting groups, people asking about a lactation consultant. Some people tagged me and said call Annie Frisbee and then somebody was like, I do not recommend Annie Frisbee. She didn't help me and she didn't help my neighbour and I'm like...two of you.
Leah: Okay. Gut punch there!!
Annie: Okay, thanks. And yeah, I was devastated and what I did was I was like, I can't respond directly to this because nothing good will happen either. It's just a bad idea, privacy wise, to engage with people but also nothing makes you look needy and insecure and actually a terrible lactation consultant if you try to convince somebody that their perspective on you is wrong. There is no way to win with that. You just have to send it down the river as they say, watch it go by. But what I did was I went on my personal Facebook page and I wrote something like, I'm feeling really down about myself today. Social media is hard. I just need some hugs because I know my mom is going to see that and my mom will tell me why she thinks I'm awesome, and my dad was going to say something and my friends are going to say something, and so suddenly I had this entire comments thread of all people telling me how much they love me, and that's all I needed. That works! As long as these people love me and care about me, my actual people. I'm just out there to do a good job. I had a long time ago when I worked as a screenwriter and I adapted a book into a movie, a book called Speak and the author Lori Hall Sanderson, she's an amazing advocate. She actually has a memoir coming out this spring about using her personal story to transform a lot of things in society related to women's issues. I highly recommend it. I think anybody listening to this is probably going to love this book, but she said to me that, and this is in the very early days of the internet and putting yourself out there and promoting yourself and she said, this isn't real. This isn't me. This isn't you. what's real is your family and what's real is your friends and so not to say that you can't make connections with people on a public level, and I've certainly seen that that's possible to really find awesome people and make real connections. But there is a difference between your professional persona and who you are in a consult and that you have an identity as the lactation consultant, that is separate from your personal identity as a human being who is valuable and precious and loved and cared for, and who is allowed to feel scared and is allowed to feel insecure and is allowed to get angry and upset and all of those negative feelings.
Leah: And to be imperfect.
Annie: To be imperfect, absolutely and I was reminded by a friend of mine who does life coaching stuff and everything, she always comes up with great things to say when you're having a bad day. And she'll always be like, you know what? Nobody is expecting - well I guess they are expecting - but you don't have to be perfect. You just have to do your best and it will never be perfect and it will never be like if we...anyway you get the gist of it, but the idea of perfection and then that can bring in more imposter syndrome because like you're seeking, I can only feel good about this if I'm perfect and guess what? We're never going to be, but if we can go and give our all, then we can rest in the confidence of I gave all I could to this visit. Perfect or not great outcome or not. I did the best I could today. And like just feeling that can be really helpful when you're feeling this imposter syndrome. You know, if you gave your best, it's okay.
Annie: And being honest about that and you don't have to represent yourself as I'm perfect. I'm the
expert. In fact, I think everything we're saying here is like don't do that. Don't pretend to be something that you're not. Honesty is good and self-reflection is good, and remembering that how someone else perceives you is about them. It's not about you, and you can take how people perceive you, positive or negative and choose whether you need to implement change. So instead of responding and reacting either to criticism or praise instantly, stop and take it and reflect on it and decide, is this useful to me? Is this going to help me grow? And if it's not going to help you grow and that could equally apply to praise or criticism, send it down the river. It happened and it's over. Hang on to and keep the things that are going to motivate you to improve yourself and that are going to build you up. And also think about being somebody who builds other lactation consultants up. So if you feel that someone might be feeling insecure about something, how am I phrasing my response to their question in this Facebook group in a way that builds them up, and not in a way that might make them feel [inaudible;27:58]
Leah: I see that happen a lot in Facebook groups. Somebody will take the brave effort of saying I'm struggling with this case, and they have permission to post and they post about it. And then I feel sometimes the comments are like, well you didn't do ---. That would be the first thing that I would do, and then I'm like, oh, we could have worded that in a different way.
Annie: And you know it always comes from a good place. I got an idea and you get all excited and it's easy to, so like I don't ever think anybody is really thinking that they have the best way, but it can come across like that or even just somebody is saying, especially when someone in one of these groups is telling you something or sharing something that maybe does make you personally feel uncomfortable about the way you're doing things. So this often I would say comes up in questions about privilege and about race and all of those tricky things in our society. And if someone posts something where you're like, oh my gosh, I never thought about that and I'm maybe guilty of this, or maybe I do this, or I'm benefiting from this bad thing in our society, rather than reacting and instantly saying, well, that can't possibly apply to me because of X, Y, and Z reasons., and that's for you. But it's never going to help anyone for you to react instantly. So when you read something that maybe you feel like this might change me, let it change you. Let it in. See what it does without responding or reacting in the moment. And you might find that 24 hours later you have a totally different response to that. But I think it's important to remember that reaction and defensiveness when we feel insecure, they're going to make it worse for you, and maybe even make it bad for other people.
Leah: Yeah. And I think when we build these support groups and one of our goals of having this podcast was to really pull us together as lactation consultants. How we can really be supporting each other through these hard times because we know our work has unique struggles and imposter syndrome being just one of them. And how impactful we can be when we stand by each other and help each other and be very thoughtful about how we're supporting each other. And I think that's a really good point. So I think we've really hit this topic card. We talked about some hard stuff, but I also am so excited about our future and how we can bring more light to this so that more people are going around not feeling so "impostor-y". But before we wrap up completely today, Annie, what is your tech tip?
Annie: So my tech tip for the episode is related to the sponsor of this episode Spruce, and I want to share with you how I use Spruce with interns who want to shadow me for a home visit, and I also use it with the admin who does my billing for me. So I set them up...when someone wants to shadow me and I want to be able to share the client's address with them and clinical notes like the visit report or the paediatrician report or sometimes even the whole chart, obviously all with the client's permission. So all these clients have given me permission to share with this person, and this person has signed either signed the Business Associate's Agreement with me, or is already an IBCLC and required to maintain privacy with clients. So I've got all that in place. So now it's like the logistics of actually communicating them because I never want to use just texting to say, okay, meet me here. So I set them up in Spruce. Just like you can with your clients, you can invite to secure message. So I invite them to secure message and then I tell them everything we talk about client stuff, including their address is going to be here. So to work with me, you need to have the Spruce app. It's free for them to download, and so we work together that way. So it's worked really well so far because then I just feel confident that these people are not accidentally going to text me or send me an insecure email. I don't want to pay for them to have their own HIPAA-compliant email. And especially if they're an intern and don't have one yet, I don't want to really put that requirement on them. So this is free for them. I'm already paying for Spruce so it's doesn't cost me extra, and I get that confidence of knowing that everything we talk about about the clients is secure.
Leah: I love that. That's awesome. And we use the team feature cause there's multiple ones of us. You can have team conversations too within Spruce. So if you're talking about a client, but you want to be able to just text about it, you can have team conversations too. So I really liked that as well.
Annie: That's great. It's so relaxing to have that security of knowing that it's private. So it was so much fun talking with you this week.
Leah: Yes. Thank you for going through this hard topic together. It's just always so great to hear that we are not alone. We are all struggling with this together. Awesome. Well, we'll see you next time, Annie. Take care.
Annie: Take care and don't forget to check the show notes for that Spruce promo code that gets you a free month. All right. Bye Leah.
Leah: Bye.