Howdy,
I write this during my final hours of single fatherhood. In the wee hours of tomorrow morning, my wife will return from a mini-vacation she took with her mother. It's only been five days, but holy shit do these five days make me empathize with all the single parents out there who balance their writing with, among other things, taking care of younglings. It's exhausting and definitely cuts into your writing time. In my case, it's a pair of wild men, a.k.a., the micromen, a.k.a., the boys, etc. They're young still and have a penchant for a wee bit of the ultraviolence… luckily, directed at each other (most of the time).
Of course, I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir since most who reads this are probably fellow writers. Even with my wife at home, parenting duties are never far. My strategy is to do most of my writing in the early hours of the morning while the boys are still asleep. I've also learned over the years to embrace the advice of Stephen King in On Writing: just accept you're going to get interrupted, hours of uninterrupted writing time are just a myth.
Anyway, for any of those single-parent writers out there, I 100% sympathize. My short time of refereeing my wild men on my own has been tough. At least, I can see the light of the in the tunnel, and it's not 20 years away. Don't despair, single-parents can succeed, just look at J.K. Rowling!
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