EP35 | 10 Tips for Virtual Visits

Leah: Hey there, Annie.

Annie: Hey, Leah. How are you?

Leah: I'm doing pretty well hanging in there with the rest of us. Yep.

Annie: Staying inside, being with my family, getting less done than I think I would be at this time. I

Leah: know. Isn't that crazy? When at first they were like, stay at home. I was like, Oh, this is going to be awesome. I'm going to reorganize like every cabinet in my entire house and funny story. None of it has happened. Apparently, I'm still just as reluctant to organize when there's a pandemic as when there's not a pandemic.

Annie: So I mean, you're, you're the same person before the pandemic as you are during the pandemic. So I think that makes a lot of sense. I have not started knitting again, which I was like, Oh yeah, I'm gonna have all this time. I'm gonna knit again. I'm gonna read all these books that I want to read. Not happening. Not happening. That's all right. It's fine. It's totally fine. There's nobody has to try anything new or push themselves during this time. It is okay if I don't end up, you know, with totally shredded abs by the end of this pandemic.

Leah: I've discovered so many recipes that are. So wonderful and so not good for me, but they're amazing and they pass the day so nicely.

Annie: I know. I look forward to the moment in the afternoon when I spread Nutella on a Girl Scout gluten free toffee tastic cookie. That's amazing. And the reason we have so many toffee tastics is because we order them to sell. Two people. Oh, and now they're just in our garage and we're like, something's got to be done with these Girl Scout cookies. Yes. Pandemic food. Gotta go somewhere for my belly with Nutella.

Leah: A hundred percent. Mine's chicken. We got this like, my neighbor has this chicken, buffalo chicken dip that you like eat with tortilla chips or something. You can literally put it on anything and it's just so amazing and I can eat so much of it and it's like basically cream cheese and it's so good.

Annie: When we finish recording, I need you to text me that recipe because I have some shredded chicken and some cream cheese that I don't know what to do with.

Leah: Gotcha. I've gotcha. All right. So we're talking about virtual visits again today.

Annie: And we've got 10 tips for you for virtual visits. But before we give you our tips. Leah has a motivation. What do you have for us this week, Leah?

Leah: Yes. So one thing I've found for myself when I'm doing a virtual visit is I've noticed that it takes me a few minutes to kind of get online in my brain to Do the virtual visit and I started thinking about like, why does it sometimes feel like that? And I think it's because you know, like when you go to a home visit, you might be walking up to the house or the going up the elevator and you're thinking, okay, after this, I'm going to do, and I'm going to get this and I'm going to reach out to that person. And then you ring the doorbell and you have this moment where you're like, okay, now I'm here. Now I'm present at this place, and I'm all in, and now I'm here. And with the virtual visit, we don't necessarily have a virtual doorbell to, like, bring us centered into this moment. So you might be still searching on, you know, something as you're clicking attend this meeting. And so, I feel like it's great to take a moment, kind of like when you would ring the doorbell at somebody's house, and maybe just get on the call a minute or two early, take a couple breaths, be present. So you can show up for this family and flow really nicely just from the get go. And it's really helped me so much to have that time. And I didn't realize it when I first started. I was like, why am I feeling so, I don't know, discombobulated as I'm starting these calls? And then I found when I did that, it made such a big difference. So I hope that helps you guys as well.

Annie: It’s a great tip. I, you know, sit at my desk to do the consults and it's the same desk that I sit at to respond to emails and write, you know, things to the mailing list and update my website. And so I sit down and I'm very much in like to do mode and taking that moment to be like, okay, I have to be present. It's about them, not me. That's really helpful. I'm not always the best at remembering. To just consciously shift gears. So I'm going to be taking that motivation tip to heart when I have my virtual consult later today. Awesome. I hope it helps. So we're going to get into our 10 tips for virtual visits and what these are all things that we've sort of gleaned as we've been doing them and think of these not so much as like, here's the right way to do it. But more like, here's what's worked for us and things that we found helpful. So the number one thing that I have found helpful in doing these virtual visits is to prepare my clients in advance for what to expect. And so I'm also finding here where I am in New York City, there's these new families are really like emotionally, mentally, physically birthing in New York right now is really hard. So they're not really bringing their full attention to understand exactly what's going to happen during our time together. So I'm making sure that my, the email that they get, the confirmation is really clear about what to do, how to log in, what I am hoping that we're going to do during the visit, and just to really kind of Overstate things to these families because they're not necessarily able to fill in some of the gaps the way they might be, you know, where you're adapting to a new situation there. They're really hampered right now because of the conditions and maybe even what they've been through in the hospital and their own fears about being a new parent during this time. So that's really helps just getting them ready and really Giving them all that I can to let them know, like, here's, here's just what we're going to do during our time.

Leah: Yeah, I found that super helpful too. And in my email as a side tip, what I did was I, you know, wrote it, wrote, you know, several sentences about each thing, but I bolded the most important thing in that sentence. I wanted them to. So that, like, as their eyes scanned it, because I feel like, you know, new parents are so exhausted. They're just, like, scanning things. They're not, like, taking it in. So I bolded what I want them to, like, pay attention to, you know, like, really, like, three words out of each sentence. I bolded them. And hoping, I mean, I don't know for sure if that's helping, but it's definitely so important to help them understand so much. So one of the things that I found really helpful is to make sure just from a logistical standpoint, to make sure that you either have a credit card on file from the get go, or you're getting payment ahead of time. So either one, like We do the credit card on file just because we're doing, you know, like if it extends the time it could change the fee, you know, if it goes past timeline and so we have that on file and then we just let them know like we'll be invoicing them per their credit card at the end of the visit based on the time. But I know some people will take payment ahead of time.

Annie: I just think taking payment up front just because it's easier and especially for like the brief consults that I have. It's just like just pay me. I have already forgotten to charge people.

Leah: I know it's so it's so hard and I think because you know my flow I had such a flow on how I did it. I mean like I had the moment in every consult that I talked about money and I haven't quite felt a good way to talk about that on the virtual visits and the logistics of it are just so much more challenging. So I feel like this really helps it kind of be taken care of and off the plate before you even start the visit and then you can just kind of focus on. them and what we need to accomplish in the visit versus having to think about those like.

Annie: Definitely. It's just like one less thing. Yeah, you really want to feel like every minute was spent on them. So that's a good one. I also on that same note to make sure that we're maximizing every minute we have together. I've been telling my families to send me any pictures and videos that you that they think would help me understand their situation in advance of the visit. And so I'm like, just send me things. And so, you know, get a lot of those, like, you know, 45 second clips of the baby screaming at the breast, or I've been gotten some beautiful, like latch ones where I'm like, gosh, like that I would never have gotten that close. In real life. Actually, maybe I would, but you know, usually we're not like, like, so totally zoomed in on them the way you can with the video. And, um, that also helps set the tone from the beginning. Like we talked about in our last episode that I'm really going to be trusting them. to explain their baby to me and explain their situation to me. And so just saying like whatever you think would help me understand what's going on with you. And little side tip for those of you who take insurance, you can't bill insurance, at least with Aetna for the time you spend outside the consult looking at those videos. So what I'll do is I'll look at them when they come in and do a quick little, okay, I know what's in this video, and then I will pull it up during the consult. And explain what I'm seeing to the family while the video is playing. So that way, that's my kind of way of reviewing the video during the consult. It also helps because I, I just find the logistics of like, okay, like get your baby like this, then let's zoom in. Sometimes it's too much and it's not really what they want or they show up in their baby is. And that's fine. And I'm like, you know what? I don't, I'm not going to force that as a thing. I'm not going to make sure like we do in a home visit that your baby has to be awake and ready to feed. Like, you know what, let's, we scheduled it, we're here and we can do things outside in advance of the visit. So that's been really working for me.

Leah: I think it really helps focus the visit on what needs to be like, you can get some glean, ahead of time. So, you know, like exactly where you want to dial in on where you want to focus is helped me tremendously to get them before. And then also anything I feel like we've missed, you know, like the baby wasn't hungry. Like I'll have very specific pictures. I want them to send me afterwards and knowing like some of the ways they take pictures ahead of time, I can kind of coach. Okay, so for the picture, I went afterwards. Try this angle. You know, because I know how they took the last picture, so it actually has helped me, like, kind of coach them on how I want the next pictures that I might need them to send me to be, and that's been super helpful as well. Now, I have really set up my little kind of station. It's kind of funny, though, because I have this, like, basket, and it has, like, my boobs, and my baby, and my bottles, and nipple shields, and pillows, and, like, everything's in this basket. I don't know. I have, you know, four boys, but inevitably I never have my little baby out. But now the baby who is now named Jimmy comes out anytime the boys walk in my little space, which is in my bedroom. It's so funny because they pick up Jimmy and they sit next to me in the other chair and they're talking to me while they're holding Jimmy and it's so cute. It's so adorable. And, you know, they never really had my. baby doll out because it was always in my consult bag. So now it's right there. And so now my boys are learning how to be good dads and hold the baby. Sometimes they don't hold it very nicely, so I have to correct them like, that's not how you hold a baby or they're like, it's just hilarious. So the boobs are being thrown around and thrown at each other. It's gotten really interesting, but I have found that it's so, so helpful to have like every single potential visual aid that you might want to think outside the box and have a lot of these visual aids right at hand so that you can, you know, like I have pump flange, I have a hockey in there, I have a nipple shield, a couple of different nipple shields. I have the, you know, feeding to thing set up and I was trying to think if there was anything else. I mean, literally like anything I could think of, I have in there so that I can just grab it really quick and like tell, demonstrate things to the family. Have you kind of got your space set up?

Annie: I do have my space and I have, I'm looking at it right now. I have my baby doll. I have my demo breast. I have a nipple shield. I have a syringe. And what I don't have, I have no bottles. Oh yeah. And I don't have like the Hakka because I'm like, my clients have those and I'm not, I never needed them. I've never needed them. I've always used what they had and I need to buy some. And it's just, you know, one of those things that's on my list. Like I sit down at every consult, I'm like, I have this little, um, I have to grab it. I'm going to grab it and show. You can't see this, but I'm going to tell Leah. I just reached over to my desk and I have this little tiny four ounce bottle of hand sanitizer that I bought from some like crunchy online place. It's a blood orange and it's got moisturizing coconut oil in it. still have it because I don't leave my house. I don't really need hand sanitizer. I'm only interacting with these people. So I've been using the bottle to demonstrate how to like this hand sanitizer. Here's where the bottle, but it's actually a good size for my baby doll. So I can show them how don't hold it at the end, hold it like a pencil and demonstrate that. But I'm like, every time I pick up that bottle of hand sanitizer, I'm like, just Go on the internet and get some, get some bottles, get a, I mean, I hadn't thought about getting a Hakka, but I'm going to get one of those too. I used to carry one in my bag and then I gave it to some client and never restocked.

Leah: It hasn't helped because so many people have them, but they don't know how to use them. So I can show them like in real time, like, Oh, okay, do this, you know.

Annie: And you can put the Hakka on the demo breast and you don't have to use your own breast which is helpful, especially if you don't have them. If you're, you know, or I mean, I'm not 0 percent comfortable with unclothing myself during a consult, although I grab my own breasts all the time. And speaking of unclothing yourself during a visit, tip number five is you may be reading a lot of things about how, like, you know, just stay in your soft pants and in your jammy pants and, you know, just do that. And that's. You're only going to see you from the waist up. I can't tell you how many times I have stood up during a virtual consult to show I do it when I stand up. I do it to show how a baby's supposed to be. I do this like hands up, extend my neck, flex my hips, crouch down. I'm like, like a frog and actually make myself like a frog. And I do that during home visits and I'm still doing it during virtual visits on camera. And I'm always like, I, I may not have a, an actual bottle, but I always have. Pants on and I'm with other people seeing.

Leah: Yeah, yeah, you don't want to have like you're beat up, you know, old, you know, from college. We sort of boxer shorts all the time.

Annie: All the time. I mean, you and I are kind of the same age, boxer shorts over long underwear, the dining hall in college. Why are we doing that? Why? Oh, I don't know. It's cute. We look so cute. It was so cute.

Leah: And we used to have like things written across the butt.

Annie: on the butt. Uhhuh. .

Leah: Yeah. What the heck? Anyway, so don't wear those. They might not be the most professional look, but make sure you do have pants on for sure. I've done the same thing and like been really appreciative that I had. Like decent pants on and most of the time it's just like black leggings, but you can't tell that they're just black. So anyway, that's, that's an important tip. So let's talk about the lighting, both for your client, but also for you, because if you're demoing things, if you're moving around, you want to make sure your lighting's really good so they can get those visual think cues that you're trying to give to them. And this has been hard for me. I actually had to like, break out my ring light because of where I'm having to sit. There's windows behind me, which is like the worst lighting situation, but it's just inevitably, it's the only place in my house that I can get what I need, privacy and quiet and all those things. So I had to then kind of balance that with a lot of light in front of me. And so it's like working all this lighting situation. So my room looks like you're, you know, like we're filming something really important in there.

Annie: You are filming something really important.

Leah: Well, yeah, I am. Right. You're right. I am filming something really important, but it's funny cause I have to like. Break it all down at the end of the day and then put it back up in the morning because, um, it takes up some of my room, but sound too, is. That's super important and you might want to do some checks on that and periodically throughout the visit, you might ask the family just from their perspective, can you hear me? Okay. Is my lighting? Okay. Can you see me? Can you see what I'm showing you right now? I think that's been really helpful to make sure that they're getting everything out of it. And then, you know, we talked about prepping your family and I. Well, if the lighting doesn't look good, I always ask the family, like, is there a place that we could at least get by a window, you know, because sometimes our lights are just dim or they're, you know, if the walls are really dark, it makes everything look really dark. And so I've just been like, Oh, do you have a window that you could open up? Or can we sit a little bit closer to the window? Seems to be the best for lighting in my experience. How about you? Yeah. Okay.

Annie: Yeah. And that kind of leads into our next tip, which is, uh, don't rush it. This is new to everyone, including you when you're trying to learn something new or do something that's different. If you try to rush yourself, it's going to make it harder. So it's totally okay to Spend a few minutes and say, Okay, let's just we'll figure this out and, you know, maybe say don't don't worry about the time I'm building in a 30 minute buffer at the end of all of my virtual consults because I don't want them to feel like any tech challenges we're having are going to take away from the time that they get with me. So I'll say the same thing. You know, they're like the baby pooped. I'll be like, Okay. Please go change a diaper. I'm right here. You can bring me with you if you want. It's we can keep talking just to help them feel like they like, even though there's with the virtual visits, it feels more like there's a time constraint, you know, like starting and time I don't want them to feel like I'm rushing them. Like to get done by a certain time. So you don't have to feel productive. Um, and I have been, you know, giving, you know, grace of a few extra minutes when, you know, if I feel like they need it and not charging them for that.

Leah: And I think building in that buffer has been super helpful for me as well, because there have been times where we like. And so we needed to stop the call or whatever. And so if I had had them back to back, it would have been, it would have been crazy.

Annie: Yeah. I mean, with that, don't be afraid to close and rejoin the connection if it goes bad and tell them, you know, just close out and come back in and that's totally fine to do. And then just add the time and have a, so that can totally. Be legit and fine. And same for you and just say, I'm just gonna close out and come back in. Don't worry. This isn't gonna impact the time that we have together.

Leah: Okay, so, you know, pro tip here. Make sure you take your air pods out. If you guys do take a break and maybe they are going to go run and change the baby's diaper. Yeah. And you're gonna like, Oh, I'll run to the bathroom. Take those air pods out because you might still be feeding them All the wonderful sounds from your trip to the bathroom, the toilet flushing. So, you know, that's a pro tip right there. I mean, sure you mute yourself or just go ahead and take those AirPods out.

Annie: If you're using AirPods. I think that is critical advice because, um, I'm not saying I've ever done this, but I feel like maybe people listening have done this year you're in your home. Maybe. listening to a podcast or an audio book, nature calls here. What are you going to do? Take your AirPods out. Stop listening to your podcast. Just because you're going to the bathroom. No, you go into the bathroom with your AirPods in and you continue listening to your podcast while you're going to the bathroom. And I feel like. That was just a lot of information I just gave you, but if you can relate, you know, I like, I like being with my people who keep it real and where their AirPods or their other wireless headphones, but it's not cool when there's another person who could potentially be listening to the things that you're doing in the bathroom.

Leah: Definitely. Definitely. That is a pro tip right there.

Annie: So our next tip is after you've apologized to them for bringing them into the bathroom with you during your break, you're going to actually make sure you have a backup way to reach your family. The clients. in case things do go bad, your connection goes bad, you lose them, they lose you, your internet goes out and everything shuts down, you've got to restart your computer. So have their, you know, cell phone ready to be able to text them or their email address, have that handy, maybe even on a second device, so that you're able to Get to them quickly and say, we just lost connection. I'm working to restore it. Hang tight. I'll be right there. Have that ready. So you're not having to like dig for it. When that happens, it's inevitable. It's going to happen and it's fine when it happens. It's fine. Nothing bad is going to happen, but it'll be better if you're able to tell them, just don't worry. I'm still here. Here's what's going on. Yeah,

Leah: I think that's super helpful and I've totally had that happened several times where we've just completely froze and I'm like texting them like, Hey, everything froze. I'm going to reboot and let's get back on in just a second. You know, so I think that's so helpful. The other thing that I've had to remind myself of over and over and over again is that, like, I'm still the same person That I was when I was in person with these people that I am now that I'm virtual with them, which means when things are getting crazy, I know how to help things calm down, even if I'm only virtual with them, if things are feeling like they're escalating, you know, like we know how to bring that presence. That still comes across with the virtual visits and it feels scary like maybe we have to be different or act different or do something differently, but really the amazing lactation consultant you were prior to doing virtual visits is still the amazing lactation consultant doing the virtual visits. And yes, we're all on a learning curve, but it's all still in there. And and you bring that. Every time you get online with these people, um, just like you brought it when you walked in their house.

Annie: Yes, I, everything about that. I couldn't have said it better myself. Aww.

Leah: Well, I know Annie, as we wrap up our tips today, that you also have a tech tip for us. What you got?

Annie: I do. My tech tip is to have an Ethernet cable that can hardwire your connection to your computer. If you're using a computer to do virtual consults, so I have a ethernet cable, it plugs into the back of my. Wi Fi router, and then I can connect it directly to my computer. And then I'm actually, as we're recording this right now, cause we're using, we use zoom to record and we take a, do a recording. We were having for a long time, a lot of troubles with our audio. So we would be, Lee and I would be talking to each other and we would get this weird, and maybe you've heard it. During zoom calls that you've done where all of a sudden, like the sound goes really like, and then, and then you hear five seconds later, you hear the, what the person was saying, and it's all speeded up. And so that was like a disaster for podcasting because I would have to be like, Oh, wait, hang on. It glitched. I lost everything. Can you say that again? And it was really, um, stressing both of us out. And I just. Didn't realize that it was because of my it's actually we it's my Wi Fi connection. That's the problem getting clogged up. And when I was getting ready to do my gold presentation, they told me that I had I was required to be on Ethernet. With my wife, I turned off. So that was like a like, this is the tech thing you have to have. And it actually was very hard for me to figure out how to do that. I had to reschedule my tech check a few times because it just wasn't working. And then we finally figured out that we got it connected, but the ethernet wasn't reading. And then I turned off the modem and turned it back on. And from then on, it's able to to recognize when I'm connected to Ethernet, but it actually took like I actually cried about it because I was like, I don't understand. I'm connected. I'm plugged in. What more am I supposed to do? Am I really going to have to call the cable company? I'll do anything to avoid calling the cable company. And then we're like, Oh, wait on off. Oh, there it is. And so that has really helped since I've started using Ethernet connected to my computer. Bye. With the WiFi off, Leah and I haven't had any of those stuttering, juddering craziness that we were, that were really adding so much time to our recording sessions and interrupting our flow. So if you're feeling like your, your WiFi is spotty, look into getting an Ethernet cable.

Leah: I think that's an amazing tip and I totally told my husband about that. I was like, we have to make this happen. So we're working on it as well because I think it really. It makes such a huge difference with everybody online these days. I think all the Wi Fi's are getting so clogged up and overburdened. So I think that's a great tip for these virtual visits. Well, this has been a really fun chat and getting to hear these tips, you know, it always just helps me also know things that I want to shift with the things I'm doing too. So it's been great talking. to you today, Annie, and I look forward to talking to you again soon.

Annie: Me too. All right. Take care, everybody. Bye.

Leah: Bye.