How do you manage working fulltime and writing?

Write when the baby is sleeping? That's what I did.

Nap time is sacred, for many reasons!

It's hard, which is why I'm moving at a snail's pace. I'm working full time as a teacher, part time as a photographer, full time mother, and full time grad student.

Needless to say, I have to sacrifice sleep to write. It sucks. BUT summer vacation is coming soon! Yay!

Hi 77

Well, I work from 730am to 430pm.

I get up at 530. I'm at the starbucks by work at 6. I write until 715.

I pick up my son at 5pm and I take care of him until 8 when he's in bed. Then I prepare for the next day. Make my lunch. Lay my clothes out. Say hello to my husband . Read. Collapse some time between 930 and 1030.

On the weekends I get up and stay at the Starbucks in my neighborhood for as long as I want in the morning, but because my brain is trained to work intensely for a short period and then move on, I can really only squeeze 2 1/2 hours out of Saturday and Sunday (unless I have a deadline, or someone has requested something).

My theory is, mornings are my best time of day. The brain is fresh and ready to roll. I won't give those hours to my job. My best hours belong to my family and my work (where applicable)

I've finished a few drafts of a novel in this way, and am in the middle of a second (which I may trash in favor of something else - don't know yet)

I always hope and pray for more time, but this is what I've been given, and I find whining about it only drains my energy. So find your best hours and give them to what matters to you!

I get up and workout from 5 to 6. Write / study the craft from 6 to 6:30. Work from 8 to 4:30 and cram in some writing or reading while I eat lunch at my desk. Write / study from 4:30 to 5:30. Dinner prep and/or kids' activities until about 7'ish then write until 8, if it's a good TV night, til 10 if it's not. My son practices his trombone in the office with me while I write / study on weeknights. Weekends, I read and/or write and critique while I do laundry and in the evenings.

Basically, I just cram it in the nooks and crannies and have dropped maybe 80% of the frivolous stuff like shopping and going to the movies and cut my TV watching by at least 50%.

AuburnAssassin said:

Basically, I just cram it in the nooks and crannies and have dropped maybe 80% of the frivolous stuff like shopping and going to the movies and cut my TV watching by at least 50%.

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Cutting out TV is critical. It's the key to everything. Thanks for reminding me.

Yes I have cut out 100% of TV. Even the news. Even DVDs. Even LOST.

I work from 7.15 to 4.15

I write in the evenings, on the lap top, in the living room, with tv on and family life going on around me. On a good night I can turn out about 1k. But what I usually do is, while I'm at work and having a quiet moment, I think about what I'm going to write in the evening so that, usually, if all goes well, it's pretty much all worked out in my head by the time I get to sit down and write.

Weekends are an entirely different beast. I write like crazy.

Brute force and awkwardness. I cram in bits of writing whenever I can, like a few minutes during lunch, quick breaks at work (like a 5 minute break between tasks, 2 minutes while waiting for a conference call to begin), slivers of time at home, 10 minutes before bed, etc. Right now, I don't have a set writing schedule per se because those get shot to heck too easily. Instead, I set a daily word quota I have to hit. I always outline before I write so I don't waste time spinning my wheels when those tiny writing opportunities do occur.

Somehow, I've managed to write a bunch of short stories and a novel this way. Those bits add up.

ETA: this method doesn't work so well for revisions, so I do those during the weekend when time is a bit less crunched.

I totally agree with FireDrake - I think the key is to be thinking about your writing all the time (well, a lot of the time), so that you already have things worked out in your head. Then when you do get half an hour at your computer, you're essentially just typing your work up.

I get up at 5 every morning, am at work by 7. Work till 3 and then pick up the boys from school (Hubs drops them off at 8:30) I have an hour lunch so I spend it writing paper and pencil usually. I plot/brainstorm on the 20 minute drive in every morning.

Typically I get an hour when we all get home while the boys unwind and hubs plays with them, then dinner, family time, bed for them, bed for us. Usually by 9:30-10.

Weekends are a little more relaxed. I'll have hubs entertain the boys for a few hours while I transcribe everything I wrote that week. If the weather is nice, writing gets put on the back burner and we do yardwork.

For me, its grabbing an hour here and there and because I have such a small amount of time, I usually know exactly what I am going to write so I can knock out 2k in about an hour.

Some days, I get zero writing done.

Deadlines are different. I put hubs on kid duty and lock myself in my office for hours at a time. Sometimes I will take my comp days and just write all day at home.

xtine said:

Cutting out TV is critical. It's the key to everything. Thanks for reminding me.

Yes I have cut out 100% of TV. Even the news. Even DVDs. Even LOST.

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AGREED! I absolutely have to put aside other things, and I decided TV was wasting my brain most of the time anyway.

I wake up about 5:45. At school by 7. Home by 3:30. Dog walk. Chores. Dinner. Then during the evenings, the TV is on, but my laptop is on as well. And guess which one I pay the most attention to?

I'm lucky because my nest is empty. Not NEARLY as much stuff to do as you mommies have!! I admire those of you still raising kids who find any time to write at all!! Way to go, ladies!!

A side point -- my mother had a stroke, so I'm going to be scarce online for a little bit. Any prayers you could direct her way would be greatly appreciated!!!

xtine said:

Cutting out TV is critical. It's the key to everything. Thanks for reminding me.

Yes I have cut out 100% of TV. Even the news. Even DVDs. Even LOST.

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lol. This is impossible for me. I'm a hopeless TV watcher and even if I'm not focused on it, I will have the TV running in the background for noise. Can't stand silence.

Like some of you, I don't have children running around, so that helps. But I do have a full-time job and a part-time job. I've pretty much decided that getting in 500 words a day after a working day is good enough for me. (I'm not a morning person; kudos to those of you who get up early to write.)

Even if I don't get in my word count, so long as I've done *something* toward my writing business (promo, web site updates, blog, etc.), I'm satisfied with that. On the weekends, however, I write from the time I get up until the time I go to sleep. Yesterday for example, I was up at 9 and wrote until 2am this morning. (Finished that damned book too!) I shoot for 5K a day on weekends.

Between work and school, I have no time for writing at the moment. In 3 weeks, exams will be done, and I'll just have work. I plot during meetings (everyone thinks I'm taking notes) and research on my lunch break, email myself ideas and whatnot when they come to me (because I'm guaranteed to lose them otherwise) and then write late into the night. But, I'm pretty able to function on as little as 4.5 - 5 hours of sleep. As long as I have a loud alarm clock.

Currently, I work full-time, have two books under contract to be written this year and freelance write web content. I do not have kids - my household consists of one neglected husband, three neglected cats and two neglected dogs. The third dog, my Sheltie, is the only one who gets attention. lol

I am up at 5:30 and work on either a manuscript of articles, depending on which is the tighter deadline. I leave for work at 8:15 (flex hours to avoid Dallas traffic). I work 9-6 and write on my lunch hour and during downtime at work. I am a technical writer and cloning and staging software sometimes takes 10-15 minutes of processing time alone, so I've trained myself to work in 10-15 increments when available. I also write during lunch. Home by 6:45 and I change clothes and go back to work until my husband gets home - then we eat. I usually hop back on the computer and work another couple of hours before bedtime. On weekends, I put in 14-18 hour days, depending on deadlines. Essentially, I have no life. But I am working this much to pay off all debt so that one day (soon, I hope), I have the option to quit the day-job.

Time-saving tips I use:
Record your must-watch tv and forward through commercials.

No one ever put "she had a clean house" on a tombstone. Learn what you can let go. Because I make money writing, I did cost-benefit analysis and decided I can make more money writing during the time a housekeeper can clean my house, so I pay a housekeeper to clean every two weeks. I also have a lawn guy - same theory applies.

I don't cook, which is probably why I'm fat, but anything easy and microwaveable is my friend.

My husband is an enormous support and usually takes care of the laundry and putting food in front of me every day.

I pretty much write in the evenings and on the weekends. I think the trick is realizing that you're not going to get the output of someone who doesn't have a full time job. It used to drive me crazy that some of my friends would write 6k a day and write an entire book (edits and all) in a month. I just can't do that.

Other than that, cut out as many hobbies as you can, write bits where you can, and don't beat yourself up too much on it. I'm happy if I get 2 pages on a weekday and 2k on a weekend day.

And I go over paper copies of edits on my lunch hour.

jana13k said:

No one ever put "she had a clean house" on a tombstone.

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No, but I would suggest cleaning the bathroom more than once a semester. That was just icky.

Kate_Sherwood said:

I totally agree with FireDrake - I think the key is to be thinking about your writing all the time (well, a lot of the time), so that you already have things worked out in your head. Then when you do get half an hour at your computer, you're essentially just typing your work up.

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This is true for me, and absolutely necessary, since I only have 2-3 hours per night to write. Husband works nights, I work days, and we take care of our two kids under the age of 5 in between.

Oh, and no TV. Not even a cable connection.

I've become a "binge writer" I'm afraid. Once I discovered I could literally write a full manuscript in 30 days, that's what I seem to wind up doing. And as much as I'd like to claim I write every day . . . I don't. I usually write for hideously long periods on Saturdays and Sundays--often racking up 15-20K a day. So four weekends, and I've got a book. The rest of the time, I plot it in my head and get ready for the sessions.

I should only mention this ONLY works because I don't need edit passes. I'm a one-take writer. I shudder to imagine how I'd manage to do multiple passes with my current job, livestock (which often takes more time than children) and a hubby that I happen to very much enjoy the company of.

In truth, I probably WOULDN'T manage, and would have to give something up.

Kudos to those who manage the game other ways.

Oops. As I was about to add my 2 cents, I realized this was in Romance. (Should be in the Roundtable) Do what I (and the Netherlands) did. Harvest time. Write during hours that you do not currently own. For the last few years I have been getting up at 4:30AM to write for 1 - 1 1/2 hours before getting ready for my day. That is solid writing time and I don't feel guilty that some other part of my life is suffering for it...it's time that I harvested from sleep time. All writing, no guilt.

I am a teacher on spring break at the moment. I've been writing new stuff in the morning when I'm much fresher and then revising in the afternoon. But, on a normal weekday, I can occasionally get 20 minutes to a half hour in the morning. Most evenings I can manage to get an hour or so in. I can devote 4 to 6 hours on a weekend day. If I do more than that, I'll crash.

I only work about 15 hrs per week outside the home now, but while writing my first novel, I was working full time, and I'm a mom. I didn't sleep for three months straight. That's honestly the best answer I can come up with because I really don't know how I did it, other than remembering I was tired all the time.