Behind-the-scenes of my business model
If you’ve been following my writing for a while, you know I’ve had many different seasons in my business.
The “I’m starting a business” season
When I started working for myself post-layoff, in 2018, I didn’t have kids. My husband was working the night shift at a hospital in downtown Seattle, so I was really inspired to work. I started out making $4,000/ month as a freelance writer, then eventually scaled to more like $8–10k/ months. The method, however, was pure hustle. I was juggling dozens of projects each month, mostly journalism or content marketing.
Over time, I realized that freelance journalism wasn’t sustainable in and of itself, if I wanted to make ends meet while living in an expensive city. So I added in other offerings: editorial consulting, working as a part-time managing editor, copywriting and assisting with a content migration, and developing internal content (blogs and newsletters) for large corporations. What most people saw, though, was my big byline in the New York Times, or the feature story I wrote about Instagram influencers for The Guardian.
The “becoming a parent in a pandemic” season
When my son was born, I entered another season. During the pregnancy, I was very sick with hyperemesis and (in…
