Deadlines in the Middle of Chaos

If you’ve been dealing with chronic illness for any length of time, you will know (from experience) that some days and even months are filled with more chaos than others. Plans fail. Life spins out of control. Your strength depletes quicker than ever. Health issues complicate matters more than normal. 

When a looming deadline is thrown into the mix, creativity can feel far away or unreachable. 

I’m going to be brutally honest for a moment here. Life has been difficult lately—more chaotic than normal. After a year of enduring grueling cancer treatments with my husband, he had a stroke in August. Hurricane Helene devastated our region at the end of September. Then just 10 days ago, my mom fell and broke her leg. I rushed to help my parents deal with decisions they weren’t quite ready to make. While there, I realized that I had forgotten something critical—my own seizure medication. 

Going without my seizure medication for a week is like walking a tightrope between living life and avoid every possible trigger, but somehow I managed to do it. By the time I returned home on Sunday, I was physically spent and emotionally exhausted only to find a pile of forgotten notes on my desk for a new project I had agreed to write for an education publisher—one that was due in just a few weeks. 

At the time, I could have never foreseen the circumstances that were about to occur. 

Here’s the thing: When I agreed to the deadline schedule, I thought I had plenty of time. At the time, I could have never foreseen the circumstances that were about to occur. Suddenly the deadline was just a few weeks away and I had made very little progress. How could I have lost two whole months? 

As a career writer, I had learned to push through difficulties. I wrote when I didn’t feel like it and knew the power of revision was stronger than fleeting flights of inspiration. I worked hard and made my deadlines—even if my body crashed for days or weeks afterwards from pure exhaustion. But this time, I knew it just wasn’t possible. Life was too chaotic, and my creativity was frozen. I needed a little breathing space. 

So I did something that I had never done before: I wrote to my editor, explained my circumstances, and asked for an extension. 

Health issues force us to the point when we have to recognize what we can—and can’t—do. 

Asking for help has always been difficult for me. I see it as a sign of weakness or even failure, but here’s the thing—it’s not. It’s simply a recognition of our own limitations and boundaries. Health issues force us to the point when we have to recognize what we can—and can’t—do. And, it reiterates that sometimes, it’s okay to ask for help. 

And you know what? Sending that email wasn’t the end of the world—or even my career. My editor didn’t get upset. In fact, she had family in Western North Carolina who had gone through devastation from the hurricane, and she completely understood. We worked out a new deadline schedule that fit within my parameters and didn’t disrupt the publisher’s schedule. I just had to step up and ask. 

Life happens. We all face things that are out of our control. But if we can be open with each other when life becomes overwhelming, we might just discover that others are more understanding than we give them credit for. And we might just be one conversation away from getting the help we desperately need—if we are brave enough to simply be honest. 

Don’t get me wrong … I still have to push through to do the work. The project won’t go away and it won’t complete itself. But I’ve given myself a reasonable amount of time to work on it. I’ll just take a deep breath and dive in. 

And this time, I will make my deadline. 

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