I’ll never forget bringing my oldest son home and thinking to myself, will I ever sleep a full night again? The postpartum period is exhausting, challenging, and so beautiful. The best thing a new mom can do is arm herself with as much support as she can. That’s why I’m so excited for today’s blog feature.
Oh, how I wish every Lake Country mom could have Maggie by her side! Luckily, she agreed to sit down with me and share more about her business and how she’s helping Lake Country families. I edited some of her responses for clarity but overall left the conversation as is so you can get to know Maggie. Please enjoy!
Lake Country Newborns | Parent Resources
Can you please introduce yourself and your business?
I’m Maggie Omick and I am the owner of Lake Country Newborns. Our home base is here in Oconomowoc but we serve families across southeastern Wisconsin.
Who do you serve and what problem are you solving?
We help make life with a newborn easier by offering professional and postpartum overnight and daytime support for babies and families during the first year of life.
Most families that we work with are looking for support whether that’s an extra set of adult hands, a night nanny so they can get some much-needed rest, or what I call baby care coaching because a lot of parents just don’t know the first thing about taking care of a baby so we come in and fill that need. Some people book us out ahead of time. They don’t know what they want but they know they want help. Other people call us 2-4 weeks in, feeling overwhelmed and exhausted wanting professional help and guidance. Most families work with us for those first 12-16 weeks. However, we have certainly worked with families from 6 months and beyond.
I’ve been a doula since 2018 and it’s amazing how much has changed since then.
We live in the information age with almost too much information and not enough support.
We tend to serve two groups of parents; either they’re around 30ish having their first baby or 40ish having their first baby. Both have their sets of challenges. Most parents we are seeing are dual working families with the full intention of returning to work after their leave is over.
Two things: they’re very focused on their careers so besides working on their nursery they aren’t as prepared for a newborn and with the older sets of parents, they’ve lived a lot of life and are more tired from taking care of a newborn so there’s this shift. There’s just so much information at our fingertips that parents are overwhelmed and we come and cut through that. As trained professionals, we know what may work with babies and what might not.
The village has changed. In the past, women were younger and women were staying home. Well now your mom could still be working, they have their own lives, your friends are working outside the home so there’s this huge dynamic shift. Lake Country Newborns is able to be that village for people.
Image Above Courtesy of Maggie Omick
What inspired you to start your business?
I’m a master-level social worker by trade and I took a position at a group home for pregnant and parenting teens. These teens would give birth to their babies and I would help them adjust to parenthood and taking care of a baby. Essentially, I was a doula in that role and didn’t even know it. Once I started having my own kids I left that career, but I still needed to keep working to make an income for our family. To do that, I opened my own in-home daycare which I loved doing. I did that for almost 10 years!
Through that, my sister said I should be a postpartum doula but I didn’t even know what that was! I reached out to my midwife and she filled me in on what a postpartum doula was and said there was a need in our community. I completed my training in May 2018!
My midwife referred me to work with some local agencies so for a few years I was commuting up to an hour working with families. I loved helping my families through the postpartum period, but working overnight and driving an hour home wasn’t ideal. Plus, there really is a huge need for postpartum doulas in the Lake Country and Milwaukee Metro areas. I finally took the plunge and we opened in July 2021.
Honestly, part of my mission has become raising awareness that postpartum support even exists.
Can you share more about the process of working with you?
Most people start just checking us out online. You can submit a form to schedule a consultation and that comes right to my inbox. I’m the care coordinator. We set up a Zoom or a phone call and find out a little more about you and the family and what you want help with.
We do everything from light housekeeping, cover sleep health basics, breastfeeding support, light meal prep, and overnight support. Once we find out what they’re looking for and what support they have around them already, then we talk about if they want days or nights, a lot of care, or a little care. I take selecting our contractors very seriously and our contracts are reviewed every year.
Do you have any other Lake County resources for parents?
We have quite a few local resources, but I’ll share our top two. We refer families to Erin Meinel at Lake Country Sleep. Her scope is different from ours whereas she gets into the nitty- gritty of sleep and we don’t.
We find a lot of mamas looking for breastfeeding support so we refer out to Live, Love Latch with Lisa Harris.
I’m working on a resource guide for our families, so follow us on social media to see when that’s ready.
How can readers connect with you?
If you want to learn more about Lake Country Newborns, please visit the website as that holds a lot of information. Of course, if you want to schedule a call, please send a message. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook for daily inspiration, encouragement, and helpful resources.
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