I spoke too soon. Our germs a few weeks ago were barely illness. This week we have the whole house (bar one) falling and it\u2019s about to get ugly. We\u2019ve got the littlest home from nursery, not sleeping overnight and being a limpet in need of comfort throughout the day, we\u2019re getting not a lot done, and fast. My husband and I both aren\u2019t well either and it\u2019s the ultimate clash of ill parents trying to care for an ill child. With the added complication that we\u2019re both self-employed. And it suddenly doesn\u2019t feel too clever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We spend our evenings drawing up battle plans of how we\u2019re going to tackle the next day \u2013 whose turn it is for the school run, who gets which block of work time and who is on nursing duty for our youngest. There are negotiations over essential meetings, discussions over the importance of being in the office at certain points and whose turn it is to go to the shops for medication, both pharmaceutical and chocolate-based.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It’s the first time we\u2019ve been affected by illness while we\u2019ve both been self-employed. It\u2019s made us both look at our clients and be grateful for the flexibility they have offered in terms of getting work done. It also sparked some interesting\/difficult conversations about how we prioritise work, whether it should be dictated by earnings and day rates, whether its about loyalty to longer-standing clients, or ones with potential for the future. There are absolutely no right answers on this one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I think this \u201cnew normal\u201d of a post-covid world is more accepting of work and life clashes. It was fine when my daughter occasionally popped in and needed me, or I had a Teams chat with someone while she was bunkered in for comfort. No-one commented when I sent emails at 9pm because the house was finally quiet and we both cracked on with some work because we didn\u2019t know how long the window of opportunity would last. While it could be a bit of a dangerous work\/life blurring, the benefits for an ill, sleep-deprived parent being able to work whenever (potentially wearing whatever) are huge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This was my second time balancing illness with freelancing. I already knew I was taking time off over Christmas with a slightly extended 3 week break that was long overdue and much needed, but this meant I was facing 3 weeks without income. I knew I\u2019d feel this in January when there was no work to invoice for. So, the prospect of adding to this period by taking time off for sickness felt too risky. I\u2019ve been ploughing on and crossing my fingers we all get through it soon. In the end, I lost so many hours of working this week, there\u2019s no way it can be the start of my Christmas break. The only way to do it is to cut my three week break down to two weeks as I make up the work I\u2019ve still got outstanding. I know that really limits my downtime after a really busy period, and I\u2019ll be returning to the same level of business for January, February and March, but the options here are pretty limited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s no doubt we\u2019re in survival mode. Fuelled by caffeine, over the counter drugs, huge quantifies of sugar and a hopeless desperation that the end must surely be in sight soon. I\u2019m mentally booking a month-long break for Easter as my motivation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Photo by Mufid Majnun<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I spoke too soon. Our germs a few weeks ago were barely illness. This week we have the whole house (bar one) falling and it\u2019s about to get ugly. We\u2019ve got the littlest home from nursery, not sleeping overnight and being a limpet in need of comfort throughout the day, we\u2019re getting not…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":289,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-day-in-the-life-2"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t