Anna Jean Bradley RM

HCA - Registered Health & Nutrition Counsellor

Midwifery shouldn’t come at the cost of your wellbeing.

Today’s midwives are facing unprecedented levels of stress, exhaustion, and overwhelm, leading to burnout at an alarming rate. It’s no longer enough to just survive the relentless demands of being on-call, unpredictable hours, interrupted sleep and the emotional weight of caregiving. 

You deserve a career that’s sustainable, but more than that, you require it in order to give good care and be present for your clients and your personal life.

But wait! How do you thrive in a profession

known for its intensity?

The literature is clear.  Better recovery, and the ability to manage your energy and nervous system are not just nice-to-haves...they are essential skills for every midwife. 

Through my revolutionary personalized professional development program - Thriving On Call - I work with individual midwives to help them restore their energy, reclaim their sleep, and rebuild their sense of purpose. 

For practices, institutions and organizations, I offer impactful, evidence based workshops that spark conversations. My services are designed to balance the ideals of the midwifery culture with real life.

Free Resources include my blog "The Midwife Life" and my "Better Recovery Map and Quiz" , which you'll see as you scroll down.

My Promise

I promise to guide you toward a new way of working, where your well-being is integral to your professional success and personal satisfaction.

Together, we’ll challenge the toxic status quo mindsets and cultures, and shift the narrative. 

I’m dedicated to helping midwives thrive - both in personal lives and in practice.

Put Your Oxygen Mask on First!

It’s no secret that there are larger systemic issues in midwifery that desperately need to change: issues that challenge our ability to truly thrive long-term. 

But here’s the thing: advocating for change or contributing to solutions becomes almost impossible when you’re barely surviving day to day.

Burnout leaves you depleted, with no energy left to fight for the change you know is needed. 

Yes, systems changes are crucial, but they can take months to years.  In the meantime, you need to have the skills to take care of yourself right now. 

By focusing on your own sustainability, you not only improve your immediate well-being, but you also strengthen your ability to be part of the long-term solutions. 

When you’re better-rested, energized, and resilient, you can show up fully for your clients, your family, and to make positive contributions to the profession as a whole.

When we get those systems changed, that will certainly help.

As midwives, however, we know that we will always need to maintain and improve our capacity to respond to complex challenges.

Workshops and Speaking


With 1 in 3 Ontario midwives considering leaving the profession within the next five years, creating more sustainable conditions is an urgent priority.

These conditions are essential not only for the longevity of your practice but also for the quality of care you provide, the culture you foster, and your retention rates.

I am deeply committed to changing these statistics—practice by practice, midwife by midwife.

Since stepping away from nearly 40 years of clinical practice, I have immersed myself in research and coaching around burnout, resilience, sleep deficit, nervous system regulation, and optimal clinical performance.

Combining this knowledge with my extensive experience, I now offer midwives feasible, evidence-based tools that help them recover better, maximize their sleep, restore their energy, and elevate their professional performance and satisfaction. 

I provide live online presentations and workshops tailored to the specific needs of midwifery practices, ranging from 1-hour lunch talks to half-day workshops.

Two Popular Sessions Designed to

Support and Sustain Midwives:

Presentation: “Better Recovery: A New Core Competency for Sustainable Midwifery”

This 60–90 minute session offers a fresh, evidence-informed approach to the pressures of on-call midwifery.

Participants will explore how cognitive clarity, emotional presence, and sustainable practice depend on better recovery; and why not all forms of rest are created equal.

We’ll unpack the difference between numbing out and restoring capacity, and outline key shifts that make recovery more accessible - even in unpredictable schedules.

👉Ideal for lunch & learns, practice retreats, association meetings, or CE events.

Suggested honorarium: $250

(Adjustable based on group size or delivery format.)*

Workshop: “Presence of Mind: The Meta Emergency Skill Midwives Need Most”

This 3-hour workshop explores the conditions that support or erode

presence of mind - that essential clarity and responsiveness we rely on in high-stakes clinical moments to unlock our training and performance.


We’ll examine how presence of mind is shaped by specific physiological factors (including sleep, stress recovery, and nervous system load), and why Better Recovery is one of its most critical, yet overlooked, foundations.

Drawing on insights and evidence from emergency medicine, human performance science, and the recovery literature, participants will learn how to:


✅ Recognize when capacity is compromised before it becomes critical

✅ Implement recovery-supportive strategies before, during, and after call

✅ Protect clinical judgment, cognitive function, and emotional bandwidth under pressure

Includes real-world examples, reflection tools, and a take-home planning resource to support lasting change.


Suggested honorarium: $475 for up to 10 participants

(For larger groups, breakout options and custom timing are available.)*

*When weather and distance permit, I’m happy to present in person. Suggested honorariums are based on live online delivery.  

Feedback from past participants has been overwhelmingly positive:

- “Thank you so much for preparing the presentation for our midwifery group. It was a great addition to our retreat and really got us talking about supporting each other.”

- “Thanks Anna Jean! We really appreciated your presentation and had a fruitful discussion afterward. It was a great start to our day.”

- “Thanks for kicking us off on the right foot! It really set us up for success.”

Let’s connect to discuss how I can help you and your practice thrive, or to discuss custom topics for your institution or organization. 


The Midwife Life Blog


Exploring the mindsets, tools, knowledge & skills to empower midwives to thrive in the modern world.

Start Reading!

Free Resources

Your clinical performance doesn’t just depend on what you know:
it depends on how much capacity you have left.

That's why I created the Better Recovery Map & Quiz:

It's a free visual guide and self-assessment quiz to help midwives

recognize where they are in the recovery cycle

and take small, strategic steps to protect clarity, focus, and energy.

  • Download the map.

  • Take the quiz.

  • Start shifting out of survival mode with tools made for real on-call life.Here's some stuff

Upcoming Opportunities

Click on the event for more details!

All times are Eastern

BRIEF BIO

Anna Jean Bradley is a Registered Midwife who has retired from clinical practice after a career spanning nearly 40 years. She practiced in both urban and rural settings, working pre- and post-legislation in hospitals and delivering babies from Jamaica to the Arctic. A dedicated educator, she initially supported learners through the apprenticeship model and later served for many years as an Adjunct Clinical Professor (Preceptor) for Ontario University Midwifery Education Programs. Following a personal experience with burnout in 2000, she successfully returned to practice and continued to practice for two additional decades.

In retirement, Anna Jean specializes in the intersection of clinical performance, recovery science, and sustainable professional practice. With a deep understanding of the unique challenges of midwifery, she explores evidence-based strategies for optimizing sleep, mitigating cumulative stress, and enhancing resilience in on-call healthcare settings.

Her work integrates research from physiology, neuroscience, and occupational health to develop practical, high-impact interventions for midwives facing chronic fatigue and work-life boundary challenges. She is the creator of the S.A.N.E. Synergy Framework, a structured approach that emphasizes sustainability, aligned impact, next-level clinical performance, and enjoyment in professional practice.

Anna Jean regularly delivers workshops and training on personal resource management as a clinical skill, advocating for a paradigm shift in how midwives approach self-care—not as something apart from practice, but as an essential component of clinical excellence. She also writes and speaks on the critical role of recovery in preventing burnout, improving decision-making under pressure, and maintaining a high standard of care in demanding healthcare environments.

Her current work includes Thriving On Call Level One, a 14 week program for midwives that uses the SANE system to support optimizing sleep and recovery with a focus on micro-recovery strategies, energy management, and practical implementation in unpredictable work schedules.

Equally important, the program emphasizes practical implementation, providing guidance and support to help midwives integrate sustainable practices into their daily routines in ways that are both adaptable and effective within the realities of their work.

While deeply invested in supporting individual midwives, she recognizes that broader systemic challenges—workforce shortages, institutional constraints, and unsustainable professional expectations—contribute significantly to the current crisis in midwifery.

She is passionate about these larger structural issues and believes that midwives who are well-resourced, less depleted, and more empowered are better positioned to advocate effectively for meaningful change.

By equipping midwives with strategies that enhance both personal resilience and professional longevity, she aims to strengthen the collective capacity for advocacy, ensuring that efforts to improve midwifery culture and working conditions are driven by those with the clarity, energy, and presence of mind to lead the way.

She remains actively engaged in the midwifery community, providing workshops for practices, speaking at conferences, serving as an Emergency Skills Workshop instructor and periodically teaching advanced clinical skills for the Association of Ontario Midwives. 

Connect With Me

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