Joan Sheehan Canning

Wow, where to start? We hired Joan along with another night doula (also fabulous), to help with the «transition» of being new parents. Joan started when he was five or so days old and stayed with us for 3 months+. Everyone tells you about the night times, and how you’ll get no sleep, and you’re up every hour, and part of that is true, but having Joan there helping me through the best ways to breastfed, burping, and just generally answering questions and providing comforting advice made getting up at 1am, 3am and 5am not so bad. Really. Equally, she would change his diaper and burp him so I could pop back into bed for those 20 extra minutes, which she was always good and reminding me to take!
As our son was able to take a bottle, Joan would then feed him his night feeds. Bliss! But even though I wasn’t in his room, she always made notes on his sleeping, feeding and popping (sorry :-)) patterns so we knew how he was doing during those few hours. Plus, she would write down helpful tips, products (for baby and mum), and websites etc. on these notes for us to read in the morning.
My husband and I are often told how easy our son is, and we always attribute a lot to his demeanor to the support and experience Joan gave us, and showed our son.
Experienced, always on time, kind and non-​judgmental. She cared for the family, and that really showed everyday she came to our home.
I would hire Joan again in a heartbeat, and will do with the next one.

Joan worked as a night doula to help me and my husband care for our twin girls from the time they came home from the hospital until they were about four months old. Joan very quickly showed herself to be caring, professional and extremely knowledgeable! She has a very warm nature and my husband and I felt incredibly comfortable having her in our home and, even more impressively, were very quickly able to sleep through the night having 100 percent confidence in Joan’s judgement, caring and vigilance in watching our daughters. Joan also routinely discussed our concerns with us and very patiently helped me and my husband think through the decisions that lay ahead. Our daughters were also sleeping mostly through the night at four months thanks, in good part, to Joan’s extraordinary help and guidance. Joan is a great, caring person with a wealth of knowledge and a wonderful support to any new parent! I agree with the advice is an earlier review, hire her quick!

Hire her, quick! That was the advice we received when calling one of Joan’s references. This was spot on. She is amazingly reliable, gentle and knowledgable. I learned so much from Joan, and my days and nights have been happier and smoother thanks to her support.

We are excited that Joan is now a postpartum night doula. Joan was actually our nanny for our twins, beginning at three months old. Looking back, we were young and naïve about hiring a nanny and we completely lucked out when we interviewed and hired Joan.
One of Joan’s greatest strengths is her professionalism. She is always very clear about her role, her contribution to our family, and the best possible ways to help in any given situation. We were always extremely comfortable about having her in our home and working with our children in their infancy. Joan has terrific experience with babies and toddlers and was always the clear expert on any issue. Joan takes great pride in her work — she was always studying to get better, looking at new recipes to fix food for our children, looking for new parks and places to take them. Joan also has a particular passion for babies and the exciting but scary time just after babies are born. She is a real expert in this area. I would trust Joan’s knowledge, expertise, and instincts on any issue regarding a baby. She is particularly helpful because, especially for first children, none of us know anything when they are first born.
And she got us through twins! I can only imagine how terrific she would be with one baby! We would hire her again in a moment to do anything related to taking care and helping parents through infancy. We are so glad she is out there working as a doula… no doubt many families will benefit in the future from her care, her knowledge, her commitment, and her warmth and sense of fun. We are fortunate she has stayed close to us and our children long after she left our employ.

Joan is fantastic, plain and simple. She provided consistent support, reassurance — not to mention valuable hours of sleep after the birth of our first child. It’s important that you feel a good rapport with your doula during this time and Joan is fantastic at providing guidance when you need it, but doing so in a gentle and reassuring manner. Most importantly, she took fantastic care of our daughter (so patient and loving), and she also was a wonderful support for me (helping with baby laundry, baby bottles, etc). She’s a wonderful educational resource — we’d start each evening chatting about our latest concern or issue, and I’d often wake up to a couple of relevant handouts or notes the next morning. I have to admit that I wasn’t sure whether or not bringing in a night doula would be an unneeded extravagance after the birth of my child, but I can absolutely say that this was one of the best investments we’ve made.

Joan was one of the two night doulas we used after the birth of my daughter last year. She was absolutely phenomenal and would I would refer her to anyone looking for a night doula. I learned a ton from her about breast feeding, swaddling, getting the baby on a schedule, etc. My husband and I still discuss how we really feel that having wonderful doulas really set my daughter on a great trajectory right from the first day she came home.