{"id":11650,"date":"2018-02-27T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-02-27T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/?p=11650"},"modified":"2017-11-28T10:52:34","modified_gmt":"2017-11-28T15:52:34","slug":"time-for-writing-with-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/time-for-writing-with-kids\/","title":{"rendered":"The Difficult Truth About Writing When You Have Kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

Five and a half years ago, my writing career finally seemed on the verge of taking off. I\u2019d just published my first novel, I\u2019d finished writing <\/span>Publishing E-Books For Dummies<\/span><\/i>, which was to be published by Wiley, and I\u2019d launched an online membership site for writers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then I got pregnant.<\/span><\/p>\n

This was, of course, a lovely and joyous occasion. It was also \u2013 as you might imagine \u2013 the start of my writing career grinding to a halt.<\/span><\/p>\n

A couple of years on, with a nearly two year old daughter and a newborn son, a great writing day involved 15 minutes of writing while their naps (briefly) overlapped.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you have young children, I\u2019m sure you know what it\u2019s like. Kids take up a <\/span>huge<\/span><\/i> amount of your time and energy \u2013 not just with feeding, changing and playing, but also all the extra laundry and food prep. Not to mention the broken nights.<\/span><\/p>\n

You might well wonder if you should <\/b>just give up on writing all together<\/b><\/a>, at least until they\u2019re in school.<\/b><\/p>\n

Some writers do: For them, it may well be the right choice.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the majority, I think, want to keep up at least a bit of writing.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"writingThe hard truth about being a writer with children<\/span><\/h2>\n

Becoming a parent is probably the biggest change you\u2019ll ever go through in your life. <\/span><\/p>\n

When my daughter was born, I had the vague idea in my head that (after a brief spell of maternity leave), life would just…carry on as normal.<\/span><\/p>\n

But of course, once you become a parent, <\/b>you simply <\/b>won\u2019t<\/i><\/b> be able to carry on working at the same pace as before<\/b><\/a>.<\/b> A great deal of your formerly free time is taken up by caring for your child \u2013 and doing all the extra chores that children create.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m someone who likes to move fast, and it\u2019s been hard to realize that I simply can\u2019t write and work in the same way as I could pre-kids. It\u2019s also been tough to watch other writers, without kids, zoom on ahead of me in their careers.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re fairly new to parenthood, I\u2019m sure you\u2019ll have been through many of the same emotions. Some well-meaning friends or family members may tell you to \u201cenjoy every moment\u201d of your kids being young, or that the most important thing is to just focus on your children right now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Please don\u2019t let that sort of advice become a massive guilt trip.<\/span><\/p>\n

Don\u2019t give in to writers\u2019 guilt<\/span><\/h2>\n

When I\u2019ve surveyed the writers I know, or looked at the discussions cropping up in writing-related Facebook groups and forums, there\u2019s often a lot of guilt associated with writing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Writers feel guilty for taking the time to write…and parent writers can be particularly prone to this.<\/b> It may seem self-indulgent, even selfish, to take the time to write when you could be playing with your kids (or putting on the third load of laundry that day).<\/span><\/p>\n

On the other hand, many writers also feel guilty for <\/span>not<\/span><\/i> writing \u2013 even when things are really hectic. They feel that they <\/span>should<\/span><\/i> be writing a certain amount per day, or per week, and they berate themselves for not achieving that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, <\/span>let go of the guilt<\/span><\/a>. You\u2019re not just a parent \u2013 you\u2019re a person in your own right, and there\u2019s nothing at all wrong with taking some time for yourself to do something that you find fulfilling.<\/span><\/p>\n

At the same time…if you need a break from writing, don\u2019t feel at all bad about taking one. There\u2019s honestly no \u201crule\u201d that says you should write every day, or write a certain amount each week. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Three crucial steps for carrying on writing when you have kids<\/span><\/h2>\n

If you do want to keep up at least some writing while your children are young, here are three crucial things to do:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Negotiate with your partner<\/span><\/h4>\n

Unless your partner is also a writer, they won\u2019t automatically know what you need. Tell them!<\/span><\/p>\n

Be explicit about what you want: \u201cI\u2019d like to spend two hours every Saturday afternoon writing. Could you take the kiddo out to the park?\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

(In return, of course, you might make sure that your partner gets a couple of hours every week to focus on something <\/span>they<\/span><\/i> really want to do.)<\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re parenting on your own \u2013 first, I salute you; I can\u2019t imagine how hard it must be. Can you rope in a friend or family member to help, even once a week, so you can get some time to write?<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Make the most of the writing time you do have<\/span><\/h4>\n

I\u2019m a bit embarrassed to admit it, but I\u2019ve actually written <\/span>more<\/span><\/i> fiction since having kids than I did before! \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Because I now have to schedule in my writing time, I find that I\u2019m more likely to actually do it<\/b> \u2013 before kids, it was easy to wait for \u201ca free Saturday\u201d or \u201ca whole afternoon\u201d to write.<\/span><\/p>\n

When you sit down to write, write. You might want to switch off your internet connection and silence your phone. <\/span><\/p>\n

Short writing sessions can actually be an advantage here: most of my fiction writing happens in 30 minute chunks, and it\u2019s easy to tell myself I can focus for 30 minutes!<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Don\u2019t be a perfectionist<\/span><\/h4>\n

Writers, I\u2019ve noticed, can have a tendency towards perfectionism. While this can be helpful at times (like when editing), it can also be seriously detrimental.<\/span><\/p>\n

A couple of sayings that I find useful are, \u201cGood enough is good enough\u201d and \u201cFinished is better than perfect.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

This doesn\u2019t just apply to writing. If you\u2019re struggling to find enough time to write, maybe you need to lower your standards when it comes to chores \u2013 or your children. <\/span><\/p>\n

It won\u2019t do any harm to use ready-made meals or to let them watch a bit of extra TV, if that means you can free up some more time to write.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re about to start a family, or if you have young children, you can absolutely keep writing. You may even find, like I did, that you\u2019re more efficient now that you have less time available.<\/span><\/p>\n

If, however, you want to take a break from writing while your children are young \u2013 then do. It doesn\u2019t have to be one-time decision, either: you might decide to have a year off, but if you change your mind, you can always pick up writing again.<\/span><\/p>\n

Whatever you decide, remember that <\/b>you<\/i><\/b> are an important part of your family (just as much as your kids are) and you are absolutely entitled to arrange family life in a way that makes <\/b>you<\/i><\/b> happy too.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Making time for writing as a parent can be a challenge, but should you stop writing completely?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":11926,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1389,1390,1391,1392],"class_list":["post-11650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-craft","tag-make-time-for-writing","tag-writing-as-a-parent","tag-writing-while-parenting","tag-writing-with-kids"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewritelife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}