Writing As Source of Income For Stay-At-Home Moms

I had been writing novels and poems from my elementary school days until college. It was a hobby that turned into a passion. I could easily think of ideas for a short story, and even before I got to the part of writing the introduction, numerous lines of dialogue were already in my head.

I am so lucky to have been given the chance to try different kinds of writing. I don't have a formal training or degree in creative writing, but it is something that I've been doing for many years now. I learned on my own, reading helpful articles and getting feedback from my friends who were only too happy to read my novels. In college, I took a degree in journalism. I was not much into news writing, and it was an accident that I took a course in writing, never knowing it was journalism. I couldn't back out, so I spent four years studying and majoring in Development Journalism. While I had fun with it, my only regret was that I was not able to use what I have learned in college. And it was only months after graduating when I finally accepted that my heart was not in writing news and feature articles.

During the last part of my senior year at the university, I was working for a small company as an academic writer and researcher. It was something that I could do considering that I was still an undergraduate. I was a writer until after graduation and only quit a few days before my due date (I was pregnant with my first child).

When my baby was a few months old, I began working again. I applied at a company offering writing services to American and Australian students/clients. I was an academic writer again, and I enjoyed that job although there were some ethical issues related to it. I worked for that company for almost a year before I resigned due to health concerns. Working in an office was not just for me.

For a long while, I was unemployed. I wanted to find another job but my options were limited. Fortunately for me and my husband, he had a friend who had an Internet cafe business, and he invited us to set up a writing business where I would serve as proofreader and my husband would be the manager. It was great! In the beginning, the business was booming, but it was hard for me because our writers had no previous experience in academic writing. There were instances where I would overhaul the paper or put too many comments in red back to the writer.

Eventually, the business dwindled. Our writers resigned one by one because they couldn't take the pressure of having strict deadlines. The business closed, and I was back to my parents' house to look after my two kids. I was again unemployed, which was depressing since I have two kids.

It took a while before I became employed, and this time, as an ebook writer for an online publishing company. I wrote long ebooks, around 10,000-15,000 words, mostly about famous people. I was so thankful I found a job that I didn't care I was just a ghostwriter. It was enough for me to see the books I've written up on Amazon.

I wrote one ebook per week, and it paid pretty well. I worked in an Internet cafe my brother owned, since I didn't have my own computer then. It was OK because I didn't have to wake up early in the morning to avoid traffic to go to a far away office. I could see my kids anytime of the day as well.

Sadly, that job did not last long because the sales dwindled. There wasn't much money in ebooks, I guess, so I and the other employees of that company were laid off.

Fortunately for me, I was referred by one of my co-workers to another independent client looking for ghostwriters. I also wrote biographies for him, though it was only for a month. The pay was the same.

From October that year until February of the following year, I worked from one client to the next. I wrote shorter ebooks, around 3,000 words, about easy topics, and I worked as a proofreader for a children's book. The pay was good, but the client stopped because she had difficulty sending me the money. She wanted someone closer to her location.

After that short gig, I worked as an editor/proofreader of SEO articles for blog posts. It didn't pay much, but I was able to earn a decent salary each month. The articles were short, between 100-300 words, and the pay was per 100 words. Some writers were good, meaning proofreading was easy, but others really needed some kind of training.

During that time, I was also hired fulltime by another online publishing company as proofreader/editor. I loved that job, reading fiction books even before they were published, and doing the necessary edits. A bit of writing here and there and that's it. Plus the hours were flexible. I could work whenever I want. I used a time monitoring software so that my employer could track my activities.

It proved difficult for me to work full-time as a proofreader for one company and part-time as proofreader for another. It was tiring. I was working and taking care of the kids and seeing to the household chores. The combined salaries were not enough to keep two jobs, so I had to quit my part-time.

I eventually resigned from my full-time as well. My daughter began attending kindergarten and there were just too many responsibilities that I couldn't handle a full-time job. I found a freelance job writing a fitness book with flexible hours. The hourly pay was the biggest from my past jobs', but it was difficult to meet the quota. The only reason why I loved that job was because I learned a lot of things from my researches.

As soon as the book was done, I resigned, and went back to the company publishing fiction books on Amazon. Now I work part-time for this company. The salary was not enough, but I don't know what else to do to augment my salary. And to tell you honestly, I don't know what I really want to do. A part of me wants to create a business and sell online, and another part wants me to continue working as a proofreader.

I'm gonna need a lot of thinking.

Coping Up With Husband and Kids Being Away

Three weeks already passed since my husband, Angelo, and our two kids, Aya, now 4, and Dylan, now 2, packed things and went to my in-laws in Bataan. That's around 60km from where I am staying. No, Angelo and I did not have a fight to render separation for a long time. We had to separate because we have no place to live yet as a family.
I tell you, this is a very difficult situation for the four of us (more on our part than our kids'). It takes self-control not to grab my bag and run to the terminal and take the four-hour travel to Bataan. Don't go thinking that I don't want to see my family. It's just that when you're starting as a family, you think of ways to save money.
As I've said, we have no house of our own. We just rent an apartment.
My husband and I had been away from our kids several times in the past, the reason mainly that we had to work and the work was away. We had to leave our children to my in-laws or to my parents. While we trusted our parents to care for the children, it was still very hard for us, not seeing our children and not being able to play with them. We were missing out grandly on the developments of our children.
But now, it was me separated from them. I have found a full-time job writing ebooks. This is an online job, meaning I don't have to go anywhere and work in an office. This fit my lifestyle perfectly because I wanted to see my children even when I work. However, Angelo and I decided to find another apartment, one that has lots of space for the kids and for our things. The last one we lived in was a bit OK, but it had no gate at the front and the landlady asks for payment in advance, which we didn't like.
After we had consumed the two-month advance pay to the apartment, my husband and the kids went to his hometown while I continued to work in my brother's computer shop. I was to live in my brother's house with his wife, my nephew, and my sister-in-law's mother. In exchange for the lodging, the 8-hour use of one of the computers in the shop, and the food and everything else, I decided to look after the computer shop as my brother has a computer repair shop in another location and my sister-in-law looks after her daughter. It wasn't too difficult, writing full time and looking after the shop, when there weren't too many clients.
I try to work as much as possible if only to keep my mind from missing my family. It makes me sad, not having the means to go to them whenever I want. And it makes me sadder that our circumstances require this separation. Sometimes I think that God must be punishing me and Angelo for our mistakes. And that punishment was our always being separated and not having our own place to stay.
But I am hoping for changes. I was able to secure an apartment not far from my brother's place. It has two rooms, extended at the back, with grills on the bay window in front and a gate, and the floor was tiled as well as the bathroom. It was at the farthest of the cluster of houses, away from the main road. I couldn't ask for more, considering that the price was very reasonable.
Just a week more, and then I will be able to go fetch my husband and kids and return here. I am doing great in my job, and this opportunity can help us pay for bills and whatever we need for the house. At last, we can now stand on our own feet.