Remaking Your Writing Schedule...Again

Ok, I got pregnant and therefore so tired that I couldn't hold my eyelids open with toothpicks to write. Then add to that the insult of insomnia when I finally did get to go to bed at night! My writing was suffering (not to mention my life); I didn't touch my novels for months.

I have changed my writing schedule multiple times over the past 2 years since i started seriously freelancing over 2 years ago. I've even written a few blogs before about time management and ways I had to eek out some time to write in my life as a stay-at-home mom with 2 pre-school children: Mastering Time Management to Meet Writing Goals, When All Your Time to Write Disappears... and How to Find More Time to Write.

Writing truly is something I have to squeeze in around the edges of other things--and those other things keep changing. I had a good thing for a long time in getting up at 6 with my husband, making him breakfast, then writing until the kids for up around 8--and then my husband got a different job that allowed him to sleep in later. I found it didn't make sense to get up at 6 myself, write for a bit, be interrupted to make breakfast, then try to get back to writing a bit before the kids were up. Also, somehow my husband making noise at 7 registered in my kids' brains and they more often than not got up, whereas doing all this at 6 didn't stir them. So that writing schedule bit the dust. Changes in my husband's schedule have dictated the most changes to my writing time. When he started traveling extensively, for weeks at a time, internationally, then I found myself with a lot of writing time, particularly after the kids were in bed for the night, but conversely, when he was home, I found myself with none. But I guess what the optimist should see is that I've always weathered the changes, finding a way to love the writing enough that I could get up at 6 to write or stay up to midnight to write--despite any prior convictions about what time of day was my most creative, or that I was naturally a night person and couldn't conceive of writing early in the morning!

So, enter pregnancy. I was so commonly falling asleep in the afternoons, even while sitting up, that my years' long habit of writing during my kids' naptime was impossible. Even when I could eat and drink to make myself stay awake, I couldn't summon anything worth keeping when it came to writing. And by the time I finally got my kids to bed at night, I was ready to drop, so writing at night never happened either. And the whole cycle was perpetuated by insomnia that struck in the wee hours of morning, so I started each day exhausted.

But I've now found a workable system by actually giving in to what my body kept trying to tell me. I succumb to the afternoon nap; in fact, I plan on it. When I sleep in the afternoon, two great things occur: 1) I am alert in the late evenings after my children are asleep, so I write! and 2) the insomnia problem seems to have gone away; when I go to bed at midnight or later I sleep through! So here's to my new writing schedule and meeting my new deadline for completing my novel! (A Baby Changes Everything)

Articles I've written:

What is a Disposable Diaper Made of Anyway?

Firefighters Fight to Rid Kids' Sleepwear, Baby Gear, Furniture of Toxic Flame Resistant Chemicals

Why is The United States Reacting Differently Than Other Governments to Cell Phone Risk Study Results?

When Miscarriage Means Labor

A Baby Changes Everything

Those of you who read previous blogs of mine might recall that I set myself a deadline for completing a draft of my novel. (Deadline For Complete Novel Draft) I said beginning of July, which later changed to end of July. But the reality was that by end of July, I could not have claimed to have even opened a file since perhaps April! Under normal conditions, this would be a huge blow to my ego and sense of self-worth, not just my goals, but I had unwritten caveats that I knew form the beginning could and should derail my goal. And any of you who know me personally know that I have been pregnant since April, and that is why my writing came to an almost complete standstill. The fatigue of the first trimester was so great that all the writing I could manage was one big article I was writing for a magazine. It was astonishing how difficult and plodding the writing of that article was; I felt like my brain matter had been sucked out of my skull! I knew I would write nothing but that article for the month of May, and sadly, even when the article was done, I was still so tired, I still didn't get back to the novel.

Something more than just lack of energy happened though; I was at a complete standstill in writing the novel because I'd lost my ability to make decisions. I was nearing the end which requires that I not simply meander but do the complex tasks of wrapping all the plot threads up. I found I couldn't simply phone that in, and the parts of my brain responsible for creative thinking seemed utterly shut down!

So as July and my deadline loomed, I knew it wasn't happening. But I did do something: I registered for a conference featuring a clinic with a published novelist (Joyce Magnin) for the purpose of getting some direction, inspiration and motivation because my new goal is to complete the first draft before the baby comes in December.

I did go to the conference, a month ago now, and I can proudly say I've actually been writing again!  I'm not so tired as I was, now that I'm a bit over half-way through the pregnancy, and some creativity has returned. (Though I can't yet say I'm at the top of my game; I still feel somewhat foggy and creatively handicapped.)  But I am just glad to be writing again and proud of the fact that I did, with some help of the conference clinic, solve some problems in my plot and figure out how my ending will occur--though I still have a lot of details to iron out. I'm getting the excitement back and am more motivated to finish Asher's story. I WILL complete this novel!


Articles I've written, available online:

Choose Your Best Birth Options

Natural Deodorants: Do Any Work as Effectively as Popular Commercial Brands?

Your Body is Electric-- How Electromagnetic Fields From Cell Phones, Wireless Devices Interact with Your Body’s Nervous System

Breast Cancer Less About Genetics Than We Used to Think

Getting More Writing Assignments

Oh, the irony of it all! I decided to hang up my hat as a freelance writer for periodicals after finishing one last article in May. And I did. That's why it's funny that now I have, for the first time, reached the point where editors I'd written for a year or 2 ago have seen the long-term interest generated by my original article and want me to write more for them! And just after I'd determined my life doesn't have room for that particular venture....

The editor of You and Me: America's Medical Magazine wants a follow-up article to one I wrote because he said it has generated so many requests from women to get in touch with me to find out more about what I wrote regarding vulvodynia.  That was my first paid article I wrote two years ago, and the article's presence online in the magazine is still getting me new emails. I am considering writing that follow-up article, mostly because there's just so little information out there; it's not like other topics where "some other writer could do it." Other invitations though, I'm not so sure I'll do. I really don't have time in my life of re-routed priorities.

But what I've learned is encouraging: if I write quality articles, editors will remember me and SEARCH me out. So take heart, you other freelancers out there! That is pretty cool. I'm grateful to have found that to be true.


Articles of mine online:

Choose Your Best Birth Options

Women Find Courage on the Other Side of Pregnancy/Infant Loss

Organic Food: Eight Benefits for You and Your Children

High Fructose Corn Syrup: Thirteen Reasons to Avoid It