This post inspired by the “Jasons” – @Jason’s post “Can you have a baby and a startup” and this post by Jason Roberts “How I’m Bootstrapping a Startup While Raising Three Kids.”

I am 35 years old, I have an 8 month old child that I breastfeed full-time and I am doing a startup. Big deal. Who isn’t? :)

Many women start businesses after having a kid, usually because they want to stay home and have an income. This was what I wanted to do after I had Ripley. I decided I wanted to look after him exclusively for his first year and then get a job as a consultant or something where I could continue staying at home with him. My husband and I took off with Ripley to Singapore and France and during that time somehow I ended up a co-founder of Noot. It was unexpected, and quite honestly the timing was horrible. I was in a foreign place, exhausted from being up at night with Ripley, and doing Skype calls with my co-founders at odd hours or in-between Ripley’s naps. The thing is, I was so excited about the idea that I couldn’t stop. Many times I considered quitting because I just wanted to sleep, but I figured this was my chance to do a startup after years of working for other people and I was so passionate about the idea that even my husband Sean was rooting me on.

We came back to the US in September and we had plans to be in Japan and Vienna for October and November but cancelled them for various reasons including my Dad being sick in intensive care and so I could focus on Noot to raise some $$. We’ve been living in a sublet minus any of my baby items which are in storage and so have to make-do with living in a non-baby friendly place with a lack of baby necessities. I don’t have an income as we are bootstrapping Noot, so we can only afford a Nanny one day a week which means Sean and I juggle looking after Ripley. We both stay up very late at night to get as much work done as we can uninterrupted. We are both exhausted because Rips still wakes up several times at night and is very active during the day. It still doesn’t stop me.

I’ve flown to Dallas with Ripley by myself for a meeting and had to breastfeed on the plane one row away from someone that was in a meeting with me the day before. It was disturbing. I flew to Atlanta and back to LA in 20 hours for one meeting and had to pump in the airport bathrooms because there was nowhere else for me to do it. I expect that I will have to continue facing these kinds of challenges if I want to succeed as both a mother and a co-founder.

Honestly, I never expected to write this blog post because I just figured this is what every other woman that is working and has a baby must do, not something to make a big deal out of. But when I saw that email from Jason Calacanis and blog post from Jason Roberts, I just had to speak up so that more women can tell these guys that what they are doing is not extraordinary by any means. I mean come on, Jason Calacanis is rich, his wife stays at home and they have a night nanny. Not exactly a tough situation. What’s tough is single mothers and fathers trying to raise their kids by themselves. Me and the “Jasons” have supportive spouses who are at home for big chunks of time.

So moms and dads out there that are doing a startup, tell the world YOUR story. Please! I need to meet more of you for the support and inspiration.

Love,
Tara