Last year around this time, my family was facing a crisis.

For a while things were going great. I had given birth to a baby girl, I had a fantastic full time job, and my husband had just quit his 7-year dead-end job to pursue a different career.

Then, one by one, the pieces started to fall. My company was bought up by a media giant who promptly fired everyone. My husband lost his new job, and could not go back to the old one. We had some rainy-day funds saved up but they were quickly getting depleted by rent and bills, baby supplies, and never-ending student loan payments.

At the time this was happening, I had been freelancing for a few years. It was never something I saw as a “job” – it was something I enjoyed doing, and it earned me some extra cash on the side.

Suddenly my writing “hobby” had turned into our sole source of income.

How do new mothers make time to do anything? I had no idea. I barely had time to get anything done as it was. I tried fitting in writing when I had time, but it left me constantly feeling that I should be working.

After a month of barely pulling enough money to cover a few bills, I sat down with my husband and we discussed our options.

Our solution was amazingly simple: what I needed was a schedule.

We worked backwards, determining how much money we needed to live comfortably. We then broke this down into smaller chunks, figuring out how much I needed to make per week and how many hours this would take me. From there it was just a matter of spreading these hours throughout the days in a way that would work for everyone.

The first week was tough – I was doing way more writing than I’d ever done before. But, little by little, things got easier and I settled into the schedule. My husband is still looking for a job but I am now able to comfortably make enough money with what I now realize is my writing career.

Thanks to my new schedule, I managed to escape with my sanity, and retain my love for writing. And, I know that, thanks to my freelancing, my family is going to be just fine.

Yuliya Geikhman is a full-time freelancer, full-time mother, and full-time wife and she somehow manages to have hobbies in between. She’s been writing professionally for over seven years, and would love to write words for you. Contact her at: https://yuliya.contently.com