Working from home is never easy. If someone tells you otherwise, they are telling you a fib. It’s even harder for mums who have to combine caring for their children and working at the same time.

I work from home and I’m a mum of a one year old, (who is currently napping while writing this). With this, I have to combine a healthy work load with an unhealthy washing load. I have to admit, I was one of the suckers who thought working from home would be a breeze. I thought that I could work for a couple of hours a day and fit in all the other duties of a mum and a wife. I was wrong… To begin with and then it started to get easier.

The first shock to the system was working with dollars rather than English pounds. I have to take my fee for the work I have completed and split it more or less in half. This sucks believe me. It may sound great that I have just been paid $150 for a job, when in reality I have only got about £75. It is much easier now as I budget with this in mind. If someone wants a quote in dollars for some work, I have to think about what I am going to be paid, not what the client is going to be paying out.

Keeping deadlines was another shock to the system. I won’t be the first person to tell you how important keeping deadlines is when you are a writer. I may be the first person to tell you that I have missed quite a few deadlines in my time. Working from home with a child is never easy and sometimes she has to come first. I always let my clients know that I am going to miss a deadline and let them know when I can have the work completed. Most of them understand, if they have children themselves all the better. Some of them however, don’t understand. For the ones that don’t understand, I simply don’t work for them again as I need clients that can understand my situation at home.

Most of my clients are American; this means that when they are sleeping I am awake. Not because I am up with a screaming baby all night, but because of the time differences. This was something else that had to be overcome. Some clients won’t understand that there is half a world between you and that you won’t be awake at 3am in the morning. Some clients won’t understand why you can’t be online waiting for emails 24 hours a day. If you find you have a client like this my advice is simple; find another one.

Just because we are freelance writers writing your articles or website for you, doesn’t mean you own us. It doesn’t mean you can dictate what we do during the day when we are not waiting for your emails. We will write your content and it will be great, just be sympathetic to parents all over the world wanting to make their child’s, and their own, life better.

This is a guest post by one latest “Featured” writer,  Sarah Folega.

Sarah is a freelance writer in the UK. She owns her own copywriting business and is currently writing a grammar book and some children’s books. You can view her website here: Copywriting, Grammar and Spelling Tips