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

Last Freelance Assignment: Poetic Ending

I hesitantly clicked the send button this afternoon on the last freelance assignment--at least in this phase of my career. I'm not searching for any more writing assignments at this time. At first, it was in a push to finish a complete draft of my novel. But now it's even more imperative I cut down on my expectations for myself-- a baby is on the way.

This last assignment was really quite poetic; my last story was the first one I wanted to write, the one that compelled me to start writing again. The topic of pregnancy loss. In that more than 2-year period, I've mostly hit a brick wall on getting to write on that topic. I got to write about from a pro-life point of view in Celebrate Life; that was good, but it didn't have the breadth to make all the points I wanted to, nor did it reach a large general audience. It was a "preaching to the choir" kind of article!

While battling constant hunger pangs of morning sickness and fatigue, this article took more than twice as long as normal to write. Also, because the topic is so important to me, I labored over every word. For something less critical to me, I'd have more easily cut the length and turned it in--but for this, I agonized over more creative ways to fit more and more content into fewer and fewer words. Obsession is the word that might best describe. I spent the past 2 weeks shaving a few hundred words.

Getting this article in print will be my zenith, in some ways; it was completing a primary goal that got me started. But in other ways, it'd be funny to call this one my zenith--it is certainly one of the lowest paying assignments I've ever done! Both because the publication, a newspaper-run magazine, pays extremely low in comparison with other magazines, but also because I put so much extra labor into it. If you figure out my hourly rate....oh well, I really don't want to know I am going to get paid less than a dollar an hour, or something like that!

As in many things, a writer decides success not just by the money made. In this, my success is counted in getting the stories out there. I interviewed four phenomenal women who have lost a baby to miscarriage, stillbirth or early infant loss. Of course, the benefits to me go beyond the money. I learned a lot in interviewing them. Some people have a very dismissive, cavalier attitude toward pregnancy loss; I know the deep wounds that response creates. Most people just don't know what to say/do and most people stay silent, isolating the woman who just experienced tragedy. If my article can educate and help communities understand a little more about the experience and the kind of support that helps a woman piece her life back together and rise whole again, then getting paid little monetarily is worth it to me.

So here's a nice bookend to my freelancing career of my early thirties...Maybe I'll take it up again in the future. Who knows....

Now, once the morning sickness stops, I'll get back on the project of that novel....


Other published articles:
Choose Your Best Birth Options

Cloth Diapers Versus Disposables: Switching Systems

Are Schools Expecting Our Kids to Read Too Early?

Chef Jamie Oliver Versus School Lunches: Where Do The Dietary Guidelines Come From Anyway?

When writing a dreaded assignment is better than writer's block....

I was working, gung-ho, on the novel, week after week, doing no other kind of writing. And now, I'm at a dead stand-still. I have no idea where to go next. Writer's block to the extreme. But the problem isn't really about transmitting thoughts from my brain to the paper. It's about decisions. I can't write anything until I make some decisions about what will happen and when. I don't want to slow down though--I'm on a goal to finish the first draft by the end of July!

I once said that writing other things, such as articles, was something I did to help handle writer's block. Well, funny, it actually is helping. If in no other respect than in keeping me from idleness during the block!

Many months ago (maybe Nov/Dec?) an editor assigned me an article on pregnancy loss, due mid-July. A while back, I said I was done freelancing for now, to focus on the novel, except for one assigned piece. Well, this is that piece, a piece I've been wanting to write for two years. One of the reasons I started writing articles was because I felt passionately that miscarriage in particular is not covered well. But after 2 years of getting nowhere as far as convincing an editor to let me write on the topic, I finally get the assignment...and I don't really have the passion to write it anymore. In recent weeks, I've been seeing July as a guillotine--it's the month of my novel deadline as well as this article. Well, I don't want those 2 to compete. I decided I should just write the article and get it done early, so I can then really focus on the novel. I decided to start working on the article the first week of May.

Funny things happen though. I hit this intense writer's block for my novel on Monday, so I charged into preparing the article, a week early, and without really planning it, I'm further along than I'd ever intended. I'm in the interview process, not the writing process yet. But it's very good--I like being productive and not wasting time entirely--writer's block or no! And another good thing is, though I didn't feel any great push to do it, the passion to cover the topic is coming back as I work on it. There are times I really just don't want to revisit that, a dark memory in my own life. I know it's not an article I can write by phoning it in; it's going to require some emotional involvement and I think that's why I was balking at it. I'm past that experience, or so I think, with 2 healthy, living children, and I no longer need to write about it for my own therapeutic reasons. But I do still think it needs attention; therefore, I'm glad I'm coming around, warming to the assignment again.

So here's to writer's block on my novel that actually made me PREFER to write on an emotionally tough topic for a magazine. Writing an assignment always go better if my attitude towards it is positive.

Other articles I've written:
Choose Your Best Birth Options

When Miscarriage Means Labor

Fire Retardants Found in Babies' Umbilical Cord Blood Associated with Developmental Delays

Vulvodynia: Is The Pain Just in Your Head?

Making People Like Your Antagonist

I gave a great writer friend some chapters to read a few months ago. She said something that struck me as surprising then, but that makes total sense to me now. She said she wanted everything to be written from the point of view of Curt, one of the male leads; she wasn't really interested in what Maizy thought. (I had the point of view about 50/50.) That surprised me because when I began the germ of this story, it was Maizy who I identified with--it was her story in the first place. My sympathy lay with her. So how had I let her become someone a reader didn't want to know more from--someone who was static, uninteresting and, really, trying the reader's patience in her obstinacy to change?

My story doesn't have a classic villain. Maizy is not a villain. But I do have protagonists and antagonists. And really, Maizy is an antagonist to all my other 3 lead characters, to varying degrees, and at different times. My story is about a real family, albeit maybe a pretty dysfunctional one.  Maizy is an antagonist so often in their lives that somehow I think I've lost how to paint her in any positive light, to make anyone like her. How did that happen, when I first found her as my sympathetic character, and Curt, in my mind, was kind of an idiot, irresponsible, someone who came and messed everything up? Well, now that I think about it, I knew I had my work cut out for me in making him likable. I didn't want the reader to hate him. I wanted to show that he could redeem himself. Well, I guess I've done such a good job at elevating him, to make him likable, that the process by which I did that had put Maizy in a less likable light. Curt has sort become the hero of the story I've written so far. I find myself with 2 challenges: how to make his son Asher rise to that level as well and how to make Maizy someone we like.

I read in a magazine article recently about not making your villains one-dimensional. There needs to be something that makes us identify with them, something that makes us see them as human and understand, on some level, his/her motivations.

SO that's my task for Maizy. I need to get into her mind more, I guess, and let us find ourselves identifying with her fear or her paranoia that leads her to do the things she does. We may not agree with her choices, but we should identify with her fears.

But I'm finding it really hard to write her. I've been writing a section of her life I never intended to write. I was going to have the only revelation of Asher's childhood come through his memories of the past, and then, it'd be up to the reader to decide how much we put stock in his memory. But now by having to write a number of years from her and Curt's point of view changes the reader's perception considerably. I find myself grappling with the questions of how to make her--is she really abusive, borderline abusive, or is Asher just so sensitive that he just perceives her in ways that makes him feel she is? I find I don't like choosing. I liked it better left to the reader to interpret how much try trust Asher's memory. But whatever I do, I have to strike a very difficult balance--Ash has to have survived something tough enough to have caused the effects in his personality that we see evidenced in him as an adult. And yet, whatever that is, I don't want it to make us hate Maizy so strongly that we no longer care about her point of view or her. Wow. How do I get myself into thee messes. Why did I have to pick such a formidable challenge for my first novel???

Another challenge is figuring how I can sustain the tension of their relationship through all the years of their marriage. Maizy can't be a one-note Nellie. I can't have the entire sucess or failure of their marriage rest on one thing about her.  I realize too that Curt has to be culpable too. I show him as such a hero in the first number of years, but he also can't be staticly heroic.
I really have to show Maizy's strengths as well as Curt's flaws. 

I don't know how I'm going to do it yet--this is my blog to write through the problem. I guess I have to try to reveal more of her emotions in those early days, show some of her pain so we see she's scarred. I guess I need to throw in some stuff from her childhood. Flashbacks, maybe, but short ones. Just snippets. And how she's feeling right after Jared's death. I've just not really dealt with that. I wrote that part of the novel when my idea of the novel was quite different. I need to go back, now or in draft 2, and beef it up, get into Maizy's head, intimately. I think I did a good job of letting the reader see her vulnerability and fear after Asher is conceived and she's scared for her future. I need to reread that and go back and infuse that kind of stuff into earlier parts of the novel.

Online articles I've written:
Choose Your Best Birth Options



High Fructose Corn Syrup: Thirteen Reasons to Avoid It

Green Tea Anti-Oxidants: How Do They Actually Fight Cancer?

5 Rookie Mistakes in Novel Writing I had to Slay (Thanks Joyce Magnin!)

Here's a list of things I slowly absorbed over the past year, though they were all told to me in one 20-minute conference with novelist Joyce Magnin last March.

1) Don't try to be too mysterious in your novel's opening. I've read in other places too that your reader should know what the character is privy to. (Well, I see some exceptions to that, but in general I'm beginning to get the overall principle.) I was sooo guilty of this.  I didn't want to name Maizy's husband/the baby's father mentioned in the prologue's first paragraph. What the reader got was a lot of confusing "he" pronouns--some referring to the father, some a newborn baby. I had this hangup about not naming the man in the prologue because the first chapter went back in time to when Maizy was with a different man, and if I named the man in the prologue, the reader would instantly know that relationship in chapter one was doomed. I thought by not naming the man in the prologue, the reader would  be able to meet the rest of the story with the ability to wonder which man she'll pick. It sounded good to me, for years, but now I get that frustrating ambiguity doesn't serve much but to add confusion. Besides, my prologue carries enough ambiguity--the point is to make you wonder what happens to the baby and what she did that she feels so much guilt--those are the hooks my novel needs.

2) Don't dump a lot of back story in the your novel's beginning. Save as much back story as you can for later, sprinkled in bits and pieces as you weave the rest of the forward-moving story. My prologue had once been 30 pages--all from a short story that I wanted to keep in tact. A lot of it was back story. I cut it down to 9 for this conference and felt quite accomplished. But in the conference, I remember feeling like I was back in school, at the desk of an English teacher with a red pen, as Joyce sliced through paragraph after paragraph with a pen: "We don't need to know this yet." Slash. "Not needed." Red slash.  "Not needed." Ouch. But a year has gone by, and I see she was right. There was actually very little that the reader needed in that introduction. The reader didn't need to know how Maizy got where she was--yet.

3) The reader doesn't need to know how your character got where she got--yet--but he/she does need to know where she is now! My opening was scant on setting the scene and developing atmosphere. Joyce said I needed to spend more time on world building. Up to that point, I'd been so focused on following earlier advice to shorten my prologue that I'd been cutting, painfully cutting, to shorten the word count. But I'd been cutting the wrong things and preserving things that were better sprinkled throughout the rest of the novel.

4) De-clutter dialogue. Especially in the opening, my dialogue was cluttered with all the details I was trying to squeeze in--characters' appearances, mannerisms, emotions, etc. It was so full of information, the conversation moved very slowly, the reader constantly asked to process new information and yet not lose the momentum of the conversations. Joyce also took her pen and slashed through my synonyms for "said." I've read it in books before: "forget what your high school creative teacher taught you." Writing declared, retorted, implored, reported, spat, enunciated, replied, etc., should be rare. "The reader doesn't really notice 'said,' but the other words slow her down," Joyce said. Dialogue should move, not bog down, generally.

5) Simplify sentence structure. I'm super good at writing very complex sentences, with proper punctuation and everything. But what's good for poetry and academic writing is not necessarily good for contemporary fiction. Sentence variety, yes. But I was really burdening my prose with over-long sentences. Maybe Twain is noted for it, and countless writers before have had paragraph-long sentences, but it's hard to pull that off in today's publishing world.

Joyce ended my conference saying, "I do think you do have a story here," like she was generously searching for a diamond in the rough. "But you have to learn the basics of fiction writing."

(As an aside, I should tell you I think that was the worst reception of my writing I've ever experienced. I was that kind of student in high school and college who always excelled, whom professors asked to stand and read her writing for the whole class, even when I was a sophomore among senior English majors. To find that my skills didn't seamlessly translate to the world of contemporary fiction was a bit...deflating. But necessary.)

To follow what kind of feedback I got on my revisions a year later, in conferences last week, follow to the blog post "A Year Comparison: Shopping My Novel's Opening at Writers' Conferences."


Articles I've written:
What is a Disposable Diaper Made of Anyway?

Are Schools Expecting Our Kids to Read Too Early?

Hormone-free Milk: Dairy Companies Pledging Not to Use Artificial Bovine Growth Hormone

Chemical Imbalance Theory of Depression Incorrect; Antidepressants Ineffective