this post is adapted from an entry I wrote for the on-hiatus website From Diapers to Deadlines, which Toni and I collaborated on a while back. The site is down for now, but we had a ton of great content in the archives, and I thought some of my readers who are interested in freelancing might enjoy reading it…so I’ll be re-posting selected entries. If you have a burning question about writing or balancing freelance or at-home work and motherhood, drop me a line–I’ll respond here, or maybe dig up an old post that covered the issue in-depth.

Now, on to the post…

How many times have you done one of the following?

Put off getting childcare you desperately need to work because you can’t justify the cost. No, you’ll just find a way to write that 2,000-word article (or whatever your freelance job requires you to produce) after everyone’s gone to bed, when your eyelids are hovering at half-mast

Found yourself interrupting your work to tend to requests for snacks or break up a squabble–when your spouse is also in the house, watching TV or reading the newspaper

Apologized to your spouse for asking him or her to watch the kids while you make a deadline

I’d like to tell you something I learned the hard way: nobody is going to take your work seriously until you take it seriously yourself. Not your husband or wife or partner, not your kids, not your mother, and certainly not the editor or client you’re trying to impress.

It can be really difficult to do this, whether we’re just starting out or have been established for years. When we aren’t widely published or making a lot of money freelancing, it’s hard to justify the time we spend working on it. Sometimes, even when we are well-established, it can feel like we’re letting somebody down if we’re taking time away from family needs to work–even when we’re squeezing writing into the hours nobody else wants from us (usually sometime after midnight). Hiring child care or household help can seem like a luxury we neither need nor deserve. Asking the spouse to help out in the off-hours just seems unfair. After all, doesn’t he (or she) deserve a break, too?

But here’s the thing–if you’re serious about having a freelance career, it’s illogical to try to cram work in after every other commitment in your life. It simply won’t fit. There has to be an investment made in your role as a freelancer, whether it’s financial, or time, or even emotional–the mindset that you deserve to have it and that it’s valuable not just to you but the whole family. Think of it this way: if you were working outside of the home, it’s not as though you’d look at childcare, or a work wardrobe, or a business-related trip as an expense you couldn’t justify. And I’ve never heard of a single mother expecting her husband to tote a toddler to the office with him.

I’m not arguing that every writer or web designer or (fill in the blank) needs or has to have child care when they’re just getting started. I didn’t for a while, for a variety of reasons. Often, money is so tight that the budget simply won’t allow for child care expenses, no matter how badly you want a sitter. In those cases, you have to improvise for a while. Some people make a commitment to keeping their children at home while they work, and I respect and admire that (and have been that person until quite recently). But if they’re going to gain momentum–without completely losing their minds and burning out after a few months–there’s still going to have to be compromises made in some other area. It’s not about child care, specifically–what you really need is a mindset that your work gets priority–not necessarily before family or kids, but just…somewhere in the top ten. If it’s shoved to the bottom of the list somewhere after vacuuming the drapes, it’s not going to get very far. If that means you have to get somebody else to vacuum the drapes, so be it. If you don’t want to use a sitter, then your partner or spouse might have to take over for you in the evenings and on weekends so you can work. Don’t apologize for it. Your career is not unimportant, and it’s not selfish. Even if you aren’t making money yet, the time you’re putting in now is building a solid foundation for income later. That’s what owning your own small business–and really, being a freelancer is running a small business–is all about. You put in a lot of hours at the beginning for a payoff down the road.

It’s not always easy to convince the people in our lives that what we’re doing is important and valuable and that there will be a return on investment later. That’s why you have to convince yourself first. If you aren’t certain that you deserve or need the family to invest in your career, fake it until you make it. Don’t apologize for your work. Don’t grovel or beg for scraps of time. Figure out what you absolutely need and arrange to make it happen. Expect some resistance, but don’t give in. Just re-state what you need over and over until it sinks in.

Take yourself seriously. Start right now. What is one thing you can do to invest in yourself and your work? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.