Being a Mom and having a career used to be mutually exclusive. But thanks to improved access to technology and changing social beliefs, that’s no longer the case. Whether high-flying lawyer or homemade mompreneur, having a job and a child has ceased to be a combination as complementary as water and oil.
Working from home has gone beyond stuffing envelopes or child sitting other people's kids. In fact, it's gone beyond carrying out admin work or answering phones, as well. Super moms are not just working from home to make some extra cash in between feeds. They’re running their own businesses and realizing that they can have their low sugar, no-fat cake (and eat it too).
No one said it was easy, though. It takes a strong willed woman to make it through night after sleepless night, work long hours, and speak to clients. Or even leave their newborn’s side to go to a different room and take care of business. Rational or not, the pangs of fear set in. What if he wakes up and freaks out when I’m not there? Or he rolls off the bed onto the floor or turns onto his stomach?
These are very real fears that can seriously stand between an entrepreneur and her deadline. If you find yourself checking whether your baby’s chest is rising and falling every 20 minutes, you’re not alone. Actually, one of the top ten worries new parents have is whether their baby is still breathing while they’re sleeping.
Technology To The Rescue
Luckily, technology is lending a hand, not just by letting mothers work from home, but by giving them the chance to be more productive. They can get more work done with the peace of mind that they aren’t neglecting their babies. And the industry is growing. Global revenue of the baby care products market is estimated to generate about $10.8 billion this year.
You read that right. There’s an awful lot of room to bring a product to this growing market, just as this growing market is making for a rise in mompreneurs who can actually get stuff done; whether they sell baby wraps or investment portfolios.
Work Without Worrying About Your Baby’s Breathing
Can you imagine a time before baby monitors? When you had to trust your instinct-or worse-open the nursery door and risk waking junior up. Luckily, smart sleep monitoring devices have allowed nervous moms to see their offspring in their slumber for a while now. But technological advances now allow you to track your baby's breathing movements and sleep position. Which means you can stray a few feet away from your child without feeling as if you’re doing something wrong.
MonBaby is an award-winning connectable baby monitor at a price accessible to moms from all size income families – in fact, it is the most affordable connected wearable baby monitor in the world. Parents can simply snap the smart button onto their baby’s onesie and connect to it through the MonBaby app. The MonBaby app – which works with both Apple and Android – displays the baby’s information in an easy-to-read manner. The information includes the baby’s breathing movements, body position (on his/her back or stomach), fall detection, proximity to the phone, and battery and connection status. The app also alerts parents of any changes measured and provides graphs and analytics to help track the baby’s progress.
Lev Grzhonko, CEO of MonDevices, Inc. the maker of MonBaby, had this to add “while nothing replaces parental care, the MonBaby Smart Button adds another layer of monitoring that is not available through existing audio and video monitors, allowing parents to rest and get a good night’s sleep knowing they will be alerted in case their baby needs attention.”
Get Pumped Up For The Day Ahead
Fear of breaking your baby aside, the fact of the matter remains that it’s still hard juggling motherhood with work. On those rare occasions when you feel rested enough to work and your baby actually complies by napping, you probably have to pump to keep your milk supply up.
With health professionals recommending nursing up to six months, but companies giving maternity leave of just six weeks (if you’re lucky), nursing is a controversial issue. If you work from home, pumping is a hassle. If you work from an office, pumping is a logistical nightmare. And who wants to spend half an hour in their car or restroom, just to avoid prying eyes?
Wearable breast pumps that fit inside your bra and move with you are the answer. Hands-free baby gear allows you to pump discreetly while working and take a conference call while fulfilling your duty as a mother. No more strange straining sounds in the background, or having to hold the bottle with one hand and balance your phone with the other.
Use Technology To Send Him Off To Sleep
Whether you breast or bottle feed, or have gotten over your fear of SIDS; all Moms run into sleep issues at some point in time. If your super mom friend brags that her wonder baby always sleeps through the night, she's probably lying. While mythical, miracle babies happen every once in a while, the majority will go through developmental leaps, get colds, or toothache, or simply wake every now and again for a snuggle.
One of the best ways of getting your baby to sleep is through a white noise machine that will lull him into the land of nod while you work on your presentation. So, you can stop worrying about that booming voice from the conference call waking your little one. They’re too busy listening to the soothing patter of raindrops on mountain grass or trickling water in a brooke.
Being a mompreneur isn’t easy, but it is possible. And thanks to inventions like MonBaby, Willow, and white noise machines, now you can get more done and step up your game, without diverting attention from your baby.