Pregnancy & Postnatal Entrepreneurs Collective Podcast

Naming your business can feel like one of the biggest, most loaded decisions you’ll ever make, especially when you work in the birth and postpartum space, where identity, values, and care are so closely tied to what we do.
In this episode, I’m sharing the full story behind my recent rebrand to Your Birth Biz, why I moved away from The Pregnancy & Postnatal Entrepreneurs Collective, and what the process taught me about fear, confidence, and allowing your business to evolve as you do.
I also take you back to the very beginning, to when I was naming my antenatal education business, My Baby Beginnings, and how I deliberately chose a name that could grow with me over time. From there, I explore the common tension between choosing a strong “brand” name versus a more SEO-friendly, descriptive business name...and why there isn’t one right answer.
This episode is part personal story, part practical guidance, and part permission slip. Whether you’re naming your business for the first time or wondering if the name you chose no longer fits, this conversation is for you.
In this episode, we cover:
Why I originally chose the name Pregnancy & Postnatal Entrepreneurs Collective
How fear and a desire to “include everyone” can influence business naming
The difference between a brand name and an SEO-friendly name (and the pros and cons of each)
Practical tips for naming your business when you’re starting out
Why your business name is not a lifetime sentence
How to recognise when it might be time to rebrand
What Your Birth Biz stands for now, and who it’s for
This episode is for you if:
You’re stuck trying to name your birth or postpartum business
You’re worried about choosing the “wrong” name
You feel disconnected from your current brand or business name
You want to build a business that’s ethical, sustainable, and aligned with your values
At its core, this episode is about permission — permission to grow, to change, and to choose what supports you now, not just what felt safe at the beginning.
✨ Explore the new website at yourbirthbiz.com
✨ Join the conversation in the Pregnancy & Postnatal Entrepreneurs Collective discussion group
Want to find out what Birth Biz Stage you're at and the right next steps for you to take based on your stage? Then take The Birth Biz Quiz now! 
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In this episode, Niamh is joined by Aoife Lennon, perinatal educator, IBCLC, former Home Economics teacher and founder of Bumps & Bainne. Aoife describes herself as a “full-time challenger of the polite nonsense that surrounds birth and breastfeeding” — and this conversation very much lives up to that energy.
Aoife shares her journey from nearly 20 years in secondary teaching to building a values-led birth work business, shaped by her own birth experiences, motherhood, and a powerful shift in priorities. We talk honestly about fear, identity, financial risk, mindset work, and what it really takes to step away from a “safe” career and back yourself.
This episode goes deep into themes that so many birth workers grapple with but don’t always say out loud:
 – feeling called to this work but unsure how to make it sustainable
 – the emotional weight of leaving a pensionable job
 – the importance of community (or “the village”) in both motherhood and business
– why not everyone needs to like you ... and why that’s actually a good thing
– leaning into your authentic voice online, even when it feels uncomfortable
Aoife also speaks candidly about building her business slowly and steadily, charging her worth, and the role that mindset and peer support have played in helping her stay the course. This is a conversation about courage, feminism, motherhood, and redefining success on your own terms without the hustle-bro nonsense.
If you’re a doula, lactation consultant, antenatal educator or birth worker who’s ever thought “there has to be another way”, this episode will land right in your chest.
Connect with Aoife:
Instagram: @bumps_and_bainne
Website: www.bumpsandbainne.ie
If this episode resonated with you, send us a DM and let us know what landed. These conversations matter — and you’re not meant to do any of this alone.
Want to find out what Birth Biz Stage you're at and the right next steps for you to take based on your stage? Then take The Birth Biz Quiz now! 
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In this episode of The Pregnancy & Postnatal Entrepreneurs Collective Podcast, I’m joined by Parnuuna Thornwood, guide and teacher behind Feel Good Rebel, for a calm, grounding conversation about visibility that doesn’t ask you to override yourself to grow your business.
What I loved most about this conversation was Parnuuna's tone  - calm, warm, and deeply respectful of the fact that visibility can feel genuinely hard, especially for birth and postpartum professionals. There’s no pushing, no “just get over it”, and no one-size-fits-all strategy. Instead, we explore visibility as something that can be built incrementally, at a pace that feels safe and sustainable.
We talk about how many people say “social media just isn’t for me”, and how often that belief is tied not to capability, but to fear, past experiences, or a lack of safety -  both online and in real life. Parnuuna brings a nervous-system-aware lens to visibility, reminding us that if your body feels unsafe, forcing yourself to show up more will only create resistance or burnout.
A big part of the conversation centres on why blindly following someone else’s strategy doesn’t work for so many people. While structure and guidance can be helpful, growth rarely comes from copying, instead , it comes from being supported to develop your own way of showing up. This is where coaching becomes so valuable: not to remove fear entirely, but to stop fear from keeping you invisible and stuck.
We also name something that often goes unspoken, the reality that there are genuinely unsafe things in the world, and it makes sense that visibility can trigger fear. At the same time, we explore how much energy gets lost worrying about what friends, family, or the imaginary person in the corner might think...the people who were never meant to be your clients in the first place!
Instead, this episode invites you to gently shift your focus:
 away from posting for posting’s sake,
 away from external pressure,
 and towards relationship-building, connection, and service.
In this episode, we explore:
Why visibility feels easier for doulas, lactation consultants, antenatal educators and women in general when it’s calm, gentle and incremental
How a lack of safety — not laziness or confidence — often sits under resistance
The nervous system’s role in showing up online
Why following someone else’s strategy can disconnect you from yourself
The difference between fear that needs compassion and fear that needs boundaries
Letting go of worries about friends, family, or imagined judgement
Why visibility works best when it’s about relationships, not performance
It’s a reminder that visibility doesn’t have to be loud, constant or performative — it can be human, relational, and rooted in safety.
🎧 Listen now and explore what visibility could look like when it’s built on trust rather than pressure.
Parnuuna has kindly shared a free calming 3 day reset, to boost your sense of
confidence, time and energy, you can sign up here:
https://feelgoodrebel.kit.com/0d761c0f86
Connect with Parnuuna
Website: feelgoodrebelacademy.com
Instagram: @
Want to find out what Birth Biz Stage you're at and the right next steps for you to take based on your stage? Then take The Birth Biz Quiz now! 
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Have you ever been offered something in your business that looked brilliant on paper — but felt wrong in your gut?
A collaboration, a speaking gig, a brand opportunity, a new direction for your work — and instead of excitement, you felt unsettled, conflicted or quietly uncomfortable.
If you’re a doula, lactation consultant, antenatal educator or birth worker, this experience is far more common than you might realise.
In this episode, I’m talking about mission, principles and values in your birth work business — what they actually are (not the fluffy corporate version) and why they quietly shape every decision you make, whether you realise it or not.
This is not about branding or writing something pretty for your website.
 It’s about clarity, alignment and confidence in how you run your business.
Episode Timestamps: Mission, Principles & Values in Your Birth Work Business
01:10 – “It looks good on paper but feels wrong”
Why so many birth workers struggle with business decisions despite being highly skilled
02:40 – Why strategy alone isn’t enough in a birth work business
The missing foundations beneath marketing, pricing and Instagram tactics
04:10 – What mission, principles and values really are (not the fluffy version)
Why this is about clarity and alignment, not branding
06:00 – What happens when your business feels misaligned
How saying yes to the wrong things slowly disconnects you from your calling
07:30 – Using your mission and values as a decision filter in business
How to decide what to say yes and no to as a birth worker
11:10 – My own mission statement as a birth worker
How evidence-based care, human rights and social justice shape my work
13:30 – Why your mission is more than a website statement
How it guides your services, marketing and long-term direction
15:10 – What values are (and what they are not)
Why values are not personality traits or buzzwords
18:40 – Fear vs misalignment in business decisions
How to tell the difference between nerves and true value conflict
20:30 – What happens when you ignore your values
Cognitive dissonance, regret and ethical drift in business
22:40 – What a values-driven organisation looks like in real life
Lessons from working in a homeless charity with lived organisational values
25:10 – Stewardship and quality as working business values
How real values guide everyday decisions, not just big ones
27:30 – How this shaped how I run my own business today
Applying organisational values to a solo birth work business
29:00 – Saying no to misaligned opportunities (even good ones)
Why I declined a major speaking opportunity on ethical grounds
34:00 – How values guide content and visibility decisions
Why I sometimes don’t post things that don’t align, even if they’d perform well
36:20 – Why mission and values make business simpler, not harder
Reducing decision fatigue and overwhelm in self-employed birth work
38:00 – Using your mission and values when you feel unsure
How written clarity helps you decide whether something is fear or misalignment
40:00 – Invitation to reflect on your own mission and values
Why ever
Want to find out what Birth Biz Stage you're at and the right next steps for you to take based on your stage? Then take The Birth Biz Quiz now! 
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As birthworkers, visualisation is something we trust deeply. We use it every day with clients to prepare for birth, reduce fear, build confidence, and support emotional and physical readiness.
But when it comes to our own businesses, many of us stop using this powerful tool altogether.
In this episode, I explore how visualisation can support you as a birth worker not just in birth preparation, but in business growth, confidence, decision-making and sustainability. We look at why so many of us under-utilise visualisation in business, how it’s used in sports psychology, and how belief often needs to come before evidence.
The episode finishes with a guided future visualisation designed specifically for birthworkers, helping you connect with your future self and the business you’re building.
In this episode, we explore:
Why visualisation already works in birth work
How birthworkers use visualisation to support confidence, reduce fear and build trust in the body
Why “the mind rehearses and the body follows” is something we already believe in
The parallels between birth preparation and business growth
Why birthworkers often abandon visualisation in business
The pull towards logic, strategy and constant action
Waiting for proof before believing in ourselves
Confidence being tied to bookings, income or external validation
Visualisation is a core, evidence-based tool in sports psychology – not something considered “woo” or vague.
We discuss:
Mental rehearsal and neural pathways
Why athletes visualise the process, not just the win
How the brain responds to imagined experience as if it were real
Why this matters for birthworkers in business
Visualising staying grounded when things don’t go to plan
Preparing your nervous system for visibility, pricing, launches and quieter periods
Moving from hoping things will work out to trusting that they will
Visualisation as identity work, not wishful thinking
Guided visualisation for birthworkers
The final part of this episode is a guided future visualisation created specifically for birthworkers building their businesses.
You’ll be invited to:
Gently move one year into the future
Connect with the version of you whose business feels aligned, sustainable and abundant
Notice what matters most to you – values, impact, ease and fulfilment
This is a practice you can return to again and again:
before launching a new service
during periods of uncertainty
when confidence dips
or whenever you need clarity and grounding
Just like birth preparation, repetition matters.
Key takeaways
Visualisation is not about pretending or bypassing reality
It’s about training your nervous system and decision-making for where you’re going
Birthworkers already know how powerful this tool is – this episode invites you to use it for yourself
If you enjoyed this episode, I’d love to hear what came up for you during the visualisation.
You can always pop into my DMs on Instagram and share what you’re dreaming into being 💛
Want to find out what Birth Biz Stage you're at and the right next steps for you to take based on your stage? Then take The Birth Biz Quiz now! 
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