How I’m Preparing for Maternity Leave as an Online Business Owner

Tune in or read the blog version below!

Today’s blog has been requested quite a few times through the course of my pregnancy, which is all about how I am taking maternity leave and how I plan to handle postpartum as an online business owner.

The concept of taking maternity as an entrepreneur can be really foreign and I totally understand that there are a lot of questions around this.

As many of you know, I am expecting my first baby at the end of February here in Brazil, and actually by the time this episode airs, he may or may not already be here!

Our Mindset Going Into Birth

Ragz (my husband) and I, we live super unconventional lives. We travel full time, we are having our baby boy abroad. We are very strategic, and I would say not as stressed as many other parents seem to be while preparing for their first baby.

I remember being almost 36 weeks pregnant a few weeks ago, and people were asking, ‘Oh my gosh, how is the nursery coming along? Like, are you guys ready?’

And at that point, we  weren’t even moved into our final Airbnb yet, and I didn’t have a crib or a nursery and most baby things, but I was able to get all of it in one online shop and one in person shop.

So I have a very relaxed approach to giving birth and to postpartum and this is how I am approaching my maternity leave as well.

The other thing I do want to point out is we are planning to continue our full time travel lifestyle so we don’t necessarily want lots of furniture and unnecessary items.

So that goes back to being strategic with this whole process. And today I’m going to pull back the curtains and explain how exactly I’m preparing my business for maternity leave with passive income and monthly recurring revenue coming in.

My business will still be generating income even when I am not working. I’ve set up The Wanderlover to run without me and I am just so grateful for the ability to be able to do that.

You currently listening may not be pregnant, and this may not apply to you right now, but I personally got so much value from my mentors sharing their journeys throughout the years with pregnancy and new chapters in life that I know for those of you who may have kids in the future, it will apply too.

So whether you’re a business owner, a soon to be parent, or simply just curious about how to plan for major life transitions while running your own business, then this episode is for you.

Maternity Leave as an Entrepreneur

As you can maybe tell by now, maternity leave as an online entrepreneur is drastically different from traditional maternity leave.

So unlike traditional jobs, there’s no set policy or structure for entrepreneurs.

It’s entirely up to you to decide how much time you want to take off, how to delegate your tasks in your business, and how to ensure your business keeps running smoothly while you’re away or even whether or not you want your business to continue running while you’re away.

The amazing thing with how our lives are set up is that both Ragz and I will be home. We work from home and we are flexible with our locations. It’s not like we need to request to be at a certain place for an extended period of time.

External Help

The other amazing thing that I am so grateful for is that my family is coming from New York to visit and my mom is staying for a month and my dad for a few weeks to come help and spend time with the baby.

We will also have a night nurse to help with feedings at night, so hopefully Ragz and I can both get some sleep.

I have lactation consultants that will help with breastfeeding.

I have a doula to come help with adjusting to postpartum life and postpartum changes.

We also have a private chef on standby to help with prepping meals. We have lots and lots of meals already prepped in our freezer to just microwave in case we need them.

And the amazing thing is we can hire a day nanny if we need and we’re going to play it all by ear.

So we have a lot of help lined up and I am just very grateful for that.

Honestly, I am not sure how much time i’m going to need adjusting to this whole experience, so obviously we’re going to play it by ear, hire more help or maybe lay off some help if we feel like things need to change.

But because neither of us go into an office, we’re not required to be at a certain place at a certain time and for a set amount of time.

I’m just really grateful that I’ve built this brand where I can make passive income and take as much time off as I need. Or if a part of me is still like, what if I’m bored during postpartum? I get to go back into my business as soon as I want as well.

Distinguishing Work and Life

The really interesting thing about running an online business is most of your day to day actions is such a blend of work and life.

So it’s really hard to distinguish what is work and what isn’t. Unlike in the traditional sense, you have a work laptop, you have a work phone, and you have your work email. I have my work Instagram, thewanderlover, but is posting on Instagram work to me? It honestly does not feel like it.

I may want to record a podcast episode about my postpartum experience because I genuinely love recording these episodes.

Is that considered work and should I just say no to that? Who knows, but I’m not pressured to record and I won’t be giving myself that task.

But if I did want to hop in, if I did want to say hi on the podcast, I won’t stop myself. If everything else is handled around the house with the baby, I can do whatever I feel like.

Define Boundaries

So with that being said, the first step I took to properly try to figure out what this whole maternity leave process looks like for me was to define exactly what I wanted from my maternity leave and set clear boundaries. How I wanted to feel and how I’m envisioning the first few months after giving birth to my first born baby boy.

And what I decided was that I want to be fully present for my baby during those early weeks while making sure my business doesn’t come to a complete halt.

And to take it one step further, I want my business to be making as much money passively and on monthly recurring revenue than if I was actively working.

So that is what I set out to do. And what it has evolved and manifested into means taking at least three months off from client calls, any calls on my calendar, because I don’t know what my schedule will be like.

I do not want to be actively working at all or having anything I have to show up for on my calendar.

I’ve been slowly delegating and stepping away from the business for the past few months. So it’s been a really easy transition and I’m not worried at all about just completely disappearing from my business because with scheduling, with automations, it’s not going to look like I’m disappearing.

During this time I’ll be focusing on recovery, bonding with my baby and adjusting to this new chapter, knowing that my business is going to run by itself and be making money while I am away.

There are a few things that I intentionally did to make this possible and to make me feel so prepared for motherhood. The first is streamlining my business. 

Streamline Systems

So since I would say, the beginning of last year, since I knew that I wanted a child and as many of you may know last January I had a miscarriage so the whole year I thought I was going to be a mother in 2024 and that didn’t happen.

But it gave me a wake up call because I was already thinking of how to take time off and what passive income would look like for the business.

So last year I really worked on simplifying and automating as much as possible.

This includes automated systems. So my email sequences, lead magnets, payment processings, they’re all set up to run on autopilot and tools like ActiveCampaign and ThriveCart have been lifesavers because they fulfill, they deliver, they make me seem present even when I am not pressing send on an email.

Content Batching

Content batching is another way that I’ve been able to step away because I’ve batched a lot of content ahead of time, especially for this podcast. And this way, the Wanderlover community will still have value packed content even while I am gone.

Starting from next week, we are doing a top 10 rewind on the podcast, which are replays of our 10 most listened to episodes over the past over 220 episodes. And if you listen to the passive income episode from a few weeks ago, you’ll know that I’ve set up passive income streams well in advance to make sure I’m hitting my monthly income goals as well.

The last things that I introduced were evergreen offers and self paced programs. So I’ve really been focusing on creating and promoting evergreen products like digital courses and digital products that don’t require my real time involvement.

These products will continuously generate passive income even when I am not in front of the computer. 

Delegating

So the next intentional step that I took was to delegate everything to my team. This looks like having guest coaches filling in for all of my calls inside my programs. I have my social media manager helping me with all of my content and the Wanderlover Podcast Instagram.

I have. support and additional tasks and admin for my virtual assistant. If you have a team, this is truly the time to lean on them and make sure that again, your business can run itself without you having to be there.

So I’ve been working really closely with all of the people on my team to ensure they’re trained and confident in handling day to day operations and giving them extra tasks.

I really wanted to make sure that. All of my clients and community members still felt supported and they didn’t just feel like I completely disappeared. So I want to make sure that they are still getting the support and the training that they need and still be able to grow their businesses.

So for example, in the business Academy Facebook group, we have live coaching calls every month, and we are bringing in guests, experts around websites, SEO, Google, Facebook ads, and we will have learning sessions, even if I’m not the one hosting the sessions. So there is always a way for you to continue delivering, even when it’s not coming from you yourself.

Preparing Financially

Next, the area of my business and life that I was focusing on is financial preparation. So making sure all my numbers line up to sustain the lifestyle and the next few months that I envisioned for myself.

One of the perks of having multiple streams of passive income is the financial stability it provides. So I intentionally set aside a buffer in case of any unexpected expenses during this time. And in the past few months, I’ve really focused on revenue generating tasks to create that financial cushion.

It is so important to make sure postpartum that you’re not stressed about money. You’re not stressed about ‘Oh, maybe we do need extra help and we need to hire a nanny’.

I want to be able to have all the help I want with my time freedom, location freedom, financial freedom to give myself that peace and security while taking care of a newborn.

Preparing Mentally

Going off of that, I’ve also intentionally focused more on mental and emotional preparation, having the support system to rely on because it takes a village!

Instead of having things, and going back to the beginning of the episode you guys know that I didn’t purchase anything for the nursery until a few weeks ago, and I see so many people getting so invested into how their nursery will look but then being so overwhelmed as new parents because they don’t have anyone or like a community to lean on.

And I think if you spend that time developing relationships with new parents or looking for that support network it will pay off in the long run.

I’ve been doing a lot of inner work to prepare for this transition. I don’t think anyone can be 100% prepared, but having the mentality that your life is going to be bigger and better than you can ever imagine, and you are fully capable to be the best parent that you possibly can be for your child.

Having a baby is monumental. It is a giant life changing event. So it’s okay to feel excitement, nervous, anxiousness, and feel even guilty about stepping back from work.

But if you prepare yourself in the correct way and embrace the changes and make sure your life and business are at a point where you can handle these changes, it helps you a lot mentally and emotionally.

I’ve also embraced the idea that It’s okay if everything doesn’t go perfectly and if I have no idea what I’m doing in the beginning, but I am willing to learn, right?

So it’s all about that growth mentality and flexibility and self compassion that’s really going to give me the confidence and perseverance to pull through.

My Advice

And lastly, if any of you are preparing for your own life transitions while running an online business; as soon as you know, let’s say in the future, you want kids. My recommendation to you is to one start early.

Give yourself plenty of time to prepare so you’re not scrambling at the last minute and to be kind to yourself.

Remember it is completely okay to slow down. Your business will still be there when you’re ready to fully return.

And I personally am just so grateful to be able to share this journey with all of you, documenting what I’m going through, what I’m thinking, and who knows, maybe in a few months time I will prove myself wrong and nothing I prepare for will go as according to plan, but I will also be sharing openly about that as well.

I hope this episode helps you. inspires you and empowers you to navigate your own transitions with confidence. Honestly, guys, I feel like I’m still going to pop in when I can on social media and in my communities. I will try to record a birth story and share life behind the scenes as a full time mother, full time entrepreneur when I feel ready.

Thank you all so much for being here as I go through this pivotal life transition. I’m honestly just so grateful for each and every one of you listening.

We begin our Top 10 Rewind next week and I will catch you on the other side when I am a mother! Have an amazing week, my loves.

If you found this episode helpful, don’t forget to share it with a friend and leave a review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts!

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