Jennifer Zeven:
Freelance Writer | Podcaster | Author-In-Progress
(still) an #opinionatedwoman
I’m writing the book I wish I had read in those long-ago, lost days of early motherhood.
Nearly 10 years after I felt like I might drown in the silence and creative/intellectual arrest of postnatal depression, I realised words hadn’t deserted me.
They welled up from their resting place and began to pour out like a torrent. My wings had grown back.
I realised I wasn’t writing an article, but a manuscript.
Over 25 Thousand Words Ago…
I started out as a copywriter. I was good at it, but I didn’t love it. I had to choose between writing other people’s words and working on my own writing – creating something visceral, vulnerable, strong, and necessary.
Deciding to stop writing copy was the day I became an emerging author, a writer: that title I’d been so reluctant to claim, so repeatedly assured wasn’t ‘real’ work.
I’ve always been a writer.
I see and make sense of the world in stories.
I thought I’d smash out the first draft of my manuscript in a year – had I forgotten about all the mothering and the time it takes up? Well yes.
But also this: when one writes about motherhood, it’s like falling down a rabbit hole; a worm hole. Lucky I don’t fear dark corners – my work is in progress.
