If you’ve ever tried to sit down and write only to get a message from daycare that says your kid suddenly has a rash that looks suspiciously like hand-foot-and-mouth disease and he needs to be picked up right away, well, me too.
Writing while juggling a full-time job is one thing; writing while juggling a full-time job (or any job or no job) and kids is a whole ‘nother story.
But also? Not impossible. You just have to learn to plan for the interruptions instead of fighting them.
The Myth of the Perfect Writing Day
Before kids, I could schedule long writing sessions and actually…you know…do them.
Now? I get roughly four minutes before that summons from daycare or, when my son is at home, “Mama! I need to go potty!”
The perfect writing day is a myth. But that doesn’t mean writing itself has become a fiction. It just has to look different.
Plan for the Unplanned
The key: It’s not so much about planning, but about making your plan flexible, decreasing the friction, and expecting the unexpected. Here are a few strategies to get you started:
1. Lower the setup requirements.
Keep your project easily accessible—notes app, Google doc, Notion—whatever works. If it takes seven minutes to find the right device and open the files and reorient yourself, your writing window is already gone.
2. Have a “micro task list.”
Three-minute tasks. Five-minute tasks. Ten-minute tasks. So when you find yourself with a tiny bit of time, you don’t spend it all figuring out where to start.
3. Embrace messy continuity.
Stop waiting for that uninterrupted flow state and start trusting your ability to drop in mid-thought. It will be difficult at first (it was for me), but I promise it gets easier with practice.
4. Expect interruptions; don’t resent them.
Kids interrupt. Life intercepts. Your own brain sabotages your focus. It’s not a failure of your planning—it’s just life. And it doesn’t negate your efforts or your “legitimacy” if a crayon crisis or impromptu tea party interrupts your writing session.
Why This Works
When my son was teeny tiny, I had a really hard time at first on the days I had to cancel my plans to be home with him—whether he was sick or daycare was closed or anything else. I found myself fixating on everything I “needed” to be doing that day, and it made me resentful, and it made the days pass so, so, so slowly.
Once I learned to give up the fantasy of an otherwise productive day and just be present with little man, it got a whole lot easier to just have fun with him and snatch a few minutes here and there while he was napping or—as he got a little older—playing by himself.
Same thing applies here: When you give up the fantasy of the perfect writing day, you stop stressing about whether you’re failing or falling behind, you get to be more present with whatever is happening, and you start noticing all the tiny, imperfect opportunities that were there all along.
You stop feeling defeated by interruptions and start feeling empowered by adaptability.
And you stop waiting to write until life is calm—because let’s be honest, if we waited for that, we’d never write again.
You Don’t Need Control. You Need Flexibility.
Your house will be noisy, and your schedule will be unpredictable.
Your writing can happen anyway.
Promise.
If you want more gentle, realistic strategies that fit creativity into real mom life, download my free guide Authors with Crayons. It’s full of low-pressure, mom-friendly practices for writers who are constantly being interrupted.