:: This is a chapter-to-be from my book-to-be, Good Enough Writer: A Guide for the Outsiders, the Misfits, and the Beautifully Complicated
Dear Friends,
Welcome to the first paid post of my Substack, one that supports the books that I have in progress. I literally cannot write these books without you. My publishers don’t give me big advances (or advances at all) even though they are lovely presses. I don’t expect that I’ll ever receive a large advance.
Ten days ago, I turned 50, and with that wisdom, I can say that publishing is vastly different from what it was thirty years ago, when I started my master’s in creative writing program. Even in a mere thirty years, the landscape is unrecognizable. And that’s okay. Really. I won’t be getting big advances.
But I do have you, a community I never had before, and I like this world better. Truly.
If you are not a paid subscriber, you’ll be able to read some of this piece and hopefully learn a lot from what you read. If you are a paid subscriber, you’ll be able to read the whole thing. (Note: You might prefer to read it online and not in your email. It’s a longform piece for sure.)
One of my works in progress is a book for writers. I’ve been teaching writing for over twenty years, and I’m currently faculty in the MFA program in writing at Drexel University. The point is, I think about writing a lot. I love reading craft books, books about the publishing industry, books about the writing life. (I still have my hardcover first edition of Bird By Bird by Anne Lamott from the year it came out. I was in college.)
My book is tentatively titled Good Enough Writer, and I hope to have it completed by the end of this year, 2026. As I go, I will share working drafts of chapters with my paid subscribers. Some of these chapters will be more philosophical. Some will be more instructional. This one is definitely on the philosophical side, but I hope you find it interesting—especially if you have ever thought to yourself, “Should I write a book?”
(The answer to that question is always “Yes.”)
Also, please provide feedback! Any comments you might have on what you liked or what could be better are more than welcome.
I’m so glad you’re here.
-Katie
@ @ @
Chapter Title: Chrysalis
[As I said above, this chapter is a work in progress. I’m still trying to nail down the throughline, and also I think it’s pretty depressing and I’m funnier than this. For a book on writing, having a meandering, weird essay about capitalist, patriarchal, gendered norms might not be the thing. I don’t know. What do you think?]
As writers, productivity is a constant concern. We track our word counts. We use journals to track our writing progress. Tracking writing output is just another way to measure ourselves and whether we are doing enough. Whether we are enough. And most of us fail to measure up to whatever gold standard we have in our own heads.
There’s nothing that trashes your creativity more than believing you aren’t doing enough. That pressure is how you end up in bed watching reruns of Ted Lasso. (Or The Witcher. It depends on my mood.)
Public discourse about productivity dramatically changed during the COVID-19 pandemic. In real time, we could watch it split into two main camps, which have persisted to this day. The first looks like this: “How to Make the Best Use of this Time at Home!” I call this the “productivity during hard times” genre.
The second looks like this: “Stop Worrying about Being Productive During a Crisis.” I call this the “reject productivity” genre. If I were to pick a camp, it would be the second. And yet, I cannot stop worrying about productivity.
Even now, years after the “end” of Covid, in the year 2026 as I write these words, I worry that I am not doing enough. That worry grinds at me daily, and I know I’m not the only one. How can we be creative under this onslaught of advice for what we must do in order to…be creative? Be productive? Be a successful writer?
It just isn’t possible.
***
Recently, my spouse and I were gathering up every pair of headphones the kids had scattered around the house. The kids complained that they didn’t have any for school, and so we wondered if we needed to buy more pairs. The kids use headphones a lot; we continued to homeschool once the pandemic hit, and we never stopped. Our kids (like me) are neurodivergent, and they thrive learning at home. Headphones are necessary.
But we wanted to be sure we needed more headphones before we spent the money.
For me, even with our life of relative financial security, money is a trigger for anxiety. It goes way back to childhood, and it will not let up. I’ve tried; my therapist has tried. Each session, she would ask, “Can you pay the mortgage this month? Your bills?” and I would say, “Of course.” And she would ask, “Then what are you worried about?”
There was, and there remains, no answer to that question.
During the search for the headphones, I opened a drawer and discovered a snarl of fine white cables—an innumerable number of earbuds, their tangled state the obvious explanation for why the kids weren’t using them. I sat down to untangle each pair one at a time, clean them with a little bit of Windex on a cloth, and wrap them into neat bundles.
After the fourth pair or so, and only partially through my task, I started thinking about how long it would take before the headphones were snarled again.
I turned to my spouse. “I feel like Sisyphus.”
“Which one was he again?”
“He pushed a boulder up a hill over and over, and it kept rolling back down.”
***
I’m a writer. I write books. It used to be that I wrote a lot of books, essays, and stories. Endless words, just flowing like Niagara Falls.
And then, one day, the words dried up. Around the same time, my anxiety spiked, worry took hold of my mind twenty-four-seven, and would not let go. It was mid-2020, and I just could not write anymore. My writer friends posted on social media about how they were writing so much during this time at home, and I wanted to throw my laptop into the pond with the snapping turtles across the street.
But there could be no throwing. I still had projects due. I am a writer for a living. I couldn’t stop because of the pandemic. The thing is, my body had other ideas. It just shut down.
Then, on October 1st, 2021, I awoke feeling certain that something was amiss. I sat up quickly and grabbed my phone. No messages. Looking at my calendar, it seemed like an ordinary day: overly full of responsibilities with no time for the afternoon nap I knew I would need but would have no time to take.
I could not shake the sense that something was terribly wrong.
The bad feeling kept nagging me even after I headed into my office. Did I have a doctor’s appointment that I had not put on the calendar? Did one of the kids? Was the vet supposed to come and see the pets? Something was missing, something important. But it was just beyond my reach.
And then, like a too-bright camera flash, there it was. On October 1st, 2021, the final manuscript of my most recent book was due to my publisher.
Frantic, I texted everyone involved—my co-author and also my co-editor of the series of which the book was a part. I refused to believe that we had made such a huge mistake. Surely one of them would have remembered this important deadline. Surely, we couldn’t have, as a group, fucked up so royally.
Reader: Indeed, we could have.
My co-author and I had diligently worked on the book for a year. Then, once the pandemic hit, we had to stop and frantically transform our courses into high-quality online learning experiences. Then, shortly after, we started teaching. The book slipped into the shadows of our psyches. On October First, we had a woefully unfinished, unedited pile of pages.
In the urgency of pandemic teaching, we had simply forgotten the deadline.
I offered to call our editor to ask for an extension. Thankfully, our editor gave us one month to finish the book. We really needed three months, but that would have pushed the book’s production deadline beyond what the publisher could tolerate. During that one month, my co-author and I, each the primary caregiver of two children and people with full-time jobs, wrote and edited and wrote and edited until we nearly fell apart. My co-editor of the series, a single parent with a full-time job, pulled more than her weight, editing the book multiple times to help us meet the deadline.
Finally, at six a.m. on November 1st, 2021, I woke early to do one final read and then emailed the pages before my kids woke up for school. After I sent the book, I felt a wave of relief, Sisyphus finally pushing the rock over the mountain in Tartarus.
But I also felt other emotions: helplessness in the face of our mistake with the deadline. After all, we had a team, a good, thoughtful, responsible team, and all of us had dropped this ball. If we together could not manage a project, then what hope is there that I can do one alone?
I also felt exhaustion because writing that book on such a tight deadline—a deadline caused by my own negligence—had taken every bit of energy I had. I did not know how I would ever be able to do that much work again. And I wasn’t exaggerating. I meant ever.
I would like to toss aside the very concept of productivity forever. To reject the word from my vocabulary. To lie about all day and read and scribble in my notebook and worry about nothing. To play with my horses and dog and cats and kids and spouse and never, ever worry.
What a magnificent life that would be…
If you’d like to read the rest of the chapter, upgrade to a paid Substack subscription. Which leads me to…
Big Note to Readers who have stumbled across this blog: This piece was originally published on my Substack, The Misfit Manifesto.
Just this month, I have added paid subscriptions as an option for my Substack. Most of what I write will remain free. Also, I have priced my subscriptions as low as Substack will allow. I do have a “Founding Member” option that allows those of you who are inclined to support me more to pay more—you get to choose.
Here are the benefits for each tier.
Free Subscriber
This letter for the outsiders, the misfits, and the beautifully complicated.
Access to the subscriber group chat. I love the group chat.
Paid Subscriber
My letter on creativity and neurodiversity, including paywalled longer pieces, early/insider access to works-in-progress, and my backlist.
Access to the group chat and the power (the power!) to start threads on the chat.
Access to my writer community on Zoom (coming soon!) and discounts on workshops I teach.
Founding Member Subscriber
You get all of the benefits of a paid membership, plus one signed paperback book of mine of your choice every year that you are a founder. Email me the title you would like, and confirm your username on Substack.
:: We don’t find ourselves one day. We are in a constant state of discovery, and that’s a wonderful thing.
Dear Friends,
For the past six months, I’ve been working with a career coach. Technically, she’s a speaker coach, but she does so much more than that. (And yes, even moderately successful writers like me need coaches from time to time. Her name is Erin Loman Jeck.) For about 3 months, we did all of this behind-the-scenes work building my platform, figuring out my goals, and making a plan to achieve them.
And then, at about 3 1/2 months, I had a breakdown. I realized that everything we’d been building toward just was not me.
I didn’t want to do the work we were setting me up to do. I didn’t relate to it, and I didn’t enjoy it. I thought this work was what I wanted, but I was wrong! 😱
I wrote about my breakdown in my journal for, like, 100 pages, then made a document with bullet points because no one could possibly make sense of all that rambling, not even me.
Then the worst part came. I had to tell my coach during our weekly meeting that everything we’d done up to that point needed to be chucked.
After I shared my revelation with her, she just laughed. “This is totally normal,” she said.
“What?”
My coach is also a trained therapist, and she practiced in a former life. She told me that with her patients before and her clients now, inevitablyat the 3-month point,everyone goes through this…breakdown…I was going through.
It was nothing so minor as an identity crisis. I had a complete identity breakdown.
Why? Because she forced me to examine myself and my career more closely than I have in years, and I realized I was on a track that I didn’t want to be on.
So, she’s helped me pivot. It’s been some work to do this pivot—which, I might add, most of you probably won’t even notice. But internally, my entire worldview has shifted.
Whew. Agonizing. Exhausting. Thrilling. Pivots are hard.
And then I had another realization. Something bigger.
Life, itself, is just one long series of pivots. Pivoting is another facet of living. We shed past selves and become new people all the time. If we are lucky, we are in a constant state of self-discovery, and that’s a good thing.
My latest pivot could be influenced by my upcoming birthday: I turn 50 in June.That’s a big one. For a long time, leading up to this birthday, I dreaded growing older. I feared it. I feared dying. I felt like my life was over.
(Hello, “existential crisis” and also “the human condition.”)
Part of this fear and dread was driven by our youth-obsessed culture. You’ll never see me read a 30 under 30 of anything. In my twenties, I was a semi-alcoholic, idiotic twat. Why on earth would I take advice from a 20-something?
All of the things I know now? It is incredible.
This most recent pivot was less like aiming for a new goal and more like coming home to myself. The self that had been there all along, underneath all of the things I believed I needed to accomplish in order to be worthy and successful.
But, I realized, none of those accomplishments make a person worthy or even successful.
Worthiness based on external metrics success (like the bottom line), the things our capitalist society use to measure a person’s value, are not the things I value at all.
I am lucky that I get to write for a living. I am lucky, and I am grateful.
My mantra for this month of turning 50 is this: Welcome home.
Love to you,
Katie
Big Note to Readers who have stumbled across this blog:
Just this month, I have added paid subscriptions as an option for my Substack. Most of what I write will remain free. Also, I have priced my subscriptions as low as Substack will allow. I do have a “Founding Member” option that allows those of you who are inclined to support me more to pay more—you get to choose.
Here are the benefits for each tier.
Free Subscriber
This letter for the outsiders, the misfits, and the beautifully complicated.
Access to the subscriber group chat. I love the group chat.
Paid Subscriber
My letter on creativity and neurodiversity, including paywalled longer pieces, early/insider access to works-in-progress, and my backlist.
Access to the group chat and the power (the power!) to start threads on the chat.
Access to my writer community on Zoom (coming soon!) and discounts on workshops I teach.
Founding Member Subscriber
You get all of the benefits of a paid membership, plus one signed paperback book of mine of your choice every year that you are a founder. Email me the title you would like, and confirm your username on Substack.
:: There’s something special in that freedom we feel when writing certain kinds of stories. And I hope that when people read the book, they feel that freedom inside them, too.
Dear Friends,
Back in 1999, I enrolled in the Master’s program at the Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars, with a focus on literary nonfiction.
In the years since then, I’ve published many books, but not one was literary nonfiction.
And then, just last week, I submitted the manuscript to West Virginia University Press for my literary memoir, An Autistic Girl’s Guide to Horses.
I feel like I’ve accomplished something incredible (writing a literary memoir), but also that I’ve come full circle, back to the writing I always wanted to do, when I was just twenty-two and enrolling in the Hopkins program.
Of course, of course, I’m proud of the other books I’ve written. They are my life’s work. They help people. They change the world. (I also really like writing my romance novels, and there is a new trilogy coming soon.)
Writing AGATHA (I give all my books pronounceable acronyms), though, was a journey through something else altogether. It was a chance to go back to my roots.
And it was a chance to tell a story that I want to tell—without restrictions. To tell a ripping good story, to make jokes, to be free in a way I have never felt with my other books.
There’s something special in that freedom we feel when writing certain kinds of stories. And I hope that when people read the book, they feel that freedom inside them, too.
Of course, writing something so deeply personal inevitably causes some anxiety. After I wrote the first draft, I reviewed it closely to make sure that I was fair to all the characters of the story (whose names have been changed, but still)—because no one is only bad or only good. We are all human.
Even Darth Vader.
Look for it in 2027.
Speaking of anxiety…
Register now for my FREE, 1-hour, online masterclass on anxiety and accommodations in higher education. It is useful for teachers, parents, students, administrators, and anyone else who wants to learn more about anxiety (is it really on the rise? Is it really real? Spoiler: yes) and accommodations for students.
This is just a short note to let you know that I’m traveling the next few weeks and giving talks in three different states (whew).
If you’re near any of these locations, I’d love to see you there!
The first:
“Your Kid Belongs Here: Parenting Neurodiverse Children” hosted by the Orange County, California, public library. 11 am PT, March 7, 2026, Clifton C. Miller Community Center, 300 Centennial Way, Tustin, CA 92780.
The second:
“Building Resiliency: Health Approaches to Anxiety” hosted by the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. 3-4 pm CT, March 11, 2026, Faculty Q&A (this one is for UWO people only) and 5:00-6:30 pm Campus Discussion (this one is open to the community) Reeve Memorial Union, 748 Algoma Blvd, Oshkosh, WI 54901 (Reeve 306 & Reeve Ballroom)
[Note: I didn’t pick that title. As many of you know, I have strong feelings about the term “resilience” in the context of mental health. But I’m very much looking forward to speaking about anxiety on campus among both students and faculty.]
The third:
“Reckoning with Neurodiversity and Mental Health in Higher Education,” hosted by Rock Valley College Keynote. 9 am CT, April 2, 2026. Physical Education Center, 3301 North Mulford Road, Rockford, IL 61114-5699. This is part of their Professional Development Day. I’ll also be leading two breakout sessions.
After the event, I’ll be staying in Chicago for a couple of days, so if you live there, I’ll be there in a coffee shop or bookstore. Where are my Chicago people at?
And, I have some WONDERFUL news:
My literary memoir, AN AUTISTIC GIRL’S GUIDE TO HORSES: HORSES, HORSE GIRLS, AND THE LOST GENERATION OF AUTISTIC ADULTS, was just signed by West Virginia University Press. I’m beyond thrilled. I love WVUP and its literary arm, and I couldn’t be happier.
:: This morning, my online writing group came together like we do every Friday, and we were all feeling the same way: overwhelmed, exhausted, drowning. My wise friend Lisa Cooper Ellison said, It looks like we’re all in the muck. Muck. Yes. That was exactly the right word.
Dear Friends,
This morning, my online writing group came together like we do every Friday, and we were all feeling the same way: overwhelmed, exhausted, drowning. My wise friend Lisa Cooper Ellison said, It looks like we’re all in the muck.
Muck. Yes. That was exactly the right word.
Then Lisa suggested that we all take a moment to briefly describe the muck, name it. Then immediately after, name what we’re grateful for.
It was like a spiritual cleanse. A release.
For my part, my muck is this:
(1) I’ve been overwhelmed with the quantity of work that I’ve taken on. So much work, I don’t know where to begin. As someone with AuDHD, this feeling of intense overwhelm can lead to my not knowing where to start and avoiding the work completely.
(2) Then, at the same time, I feel like my work is pointless. I feel like I’m on a hamster wheel going nowhere fast. That the payoff that might come from all of this work is so far in the future it might never come. I’m shouting into the void. And this feeling is compounded by what I see as failure after failure (friends, the rejections from lit mags alone. I haven’t published short writing since this time last year.)
And of course, there’s the pointlessness of trying to do all of this work when the world is (still) on fire. Fire, everywhere. I know that art still matters, indeed it REALLY matters, in the face of injustice. But does MY art matter? Should I change what I’m doing to make it matter more? (Which sends me back the #1.)
And these things are only my professional life.
What it comes down to, for me, as someone with my neurodivergent traits who is also a human living on earth in 2026, is this:
I feel like I’m only as good as my last win.
I feel like any rejection is more powerful than any success. Failures LOOM. Successes fade.
I feel like if my books aren’t earning money or my essays don’t have the imprimatur of a magazine, then they’re not worth reading. Publishing an essay here, on my blog, is a failure.
If you’re paying attention, you’ll see all of my hauntings lead to one place, summed up like this: What I produce equals how valuable and how lovable I am as a human being. I spend my life running away from a voice that whispers incessantly, You are not good enough.
Which, of course, is bullshit.
If you are in the muck, I recommend you try what we did today. Get out your notebook or preferred writing method and then write:
A *brief* list of the muck. Don’t dwell on it—just name it. Write “Muck,” underline it, then list it out.
A list of everything you’re grateful for. Beneath the muck, write “Grateful,” underline it, then list it out. But when you dive into what you are grateful for, don’t hold back. Write and write and tell stories about sledding with your kids and nieces and nephews on that amazing snow day, and how your kids are sensitive and loving and kind, and how your puppy has become your friend, not the same friend that your dog who died last year was, but a new kind of friend, and you love him too.
Times are dark. We need to focus on our gratitude more than ever.
A Reminder: Free Masterclass THIS Monday, “Navigating IEP Meetings with Confidence”
For those of you who are parents of neurodivergent kids and those kids attend traditional schools, I’m giving a free, online masterclass on how to navigate IEP (individualized education program) meetings with confidence. It is 1 hour long with a Q and A, on Monday, Feb. 9, at 1pm ET. If you can’t make it, you can watch the replay that I will send out by email.
:: IEP Meetings are for everyone, traditional and homeschool alike. Let me help you understand how to navigate them better.
Dear Friends,
This letter applies to you whether you are a parent or not, and if you are a parent, whether your kid is neurodivergent or not. Too many of us have struggled through school meetings, ending up emotionally wrung out and feeling helpless.
I really dislike feeling helpless.
I’m talking in particular about meetings for Individualized Education Programs (IEPs). Sometimes the “P” = Plan in common parlance.
The deal is this: Meetings at school about how your kid is not performing up to expectations is hard, no matter what.
As one reader of my Psychology Today column posted on social media, When school administrators and teachers are sitting around a table (6-8 of them), talking about your kid’s failures and struggles, it can feel like they don’t see your kid’s strengths or how wonderful your kid is. It can feel like an attack on your parenting, your family, your child. Of COURSE that’s hard.
And Lord help us when they call us in because our kid is “acting out”—say, shutting down in class or even having a meltdown.
In kindergarten, my younger kid used to hide under the desk. The teacher called me in for a meeting. I couldn’t help saying, “Did you ever ask him WHY he’s hiding under his desk?”
And in my head I was thinking, “YOU. IT’S BECAUSE OF YOU.” What do kids do when they’re scared? They hide. Ugh. That was the year my kids both started seeing a counselor. My younger kid said, “I want to make her (his teacher) happy, but I don’t know how.”
My heart BROKE.
I digress. IEP meetings. They’re tough. They’re supposed to be a collaborative effort between schools and parents of disabled kids to help create a learning experience that supports and challenges the kid.
But too often, that’s not how it goes. I literally can’t remember an IEP meeting that I did NOT weep through, until we started homeschooling. And I’m a lawyer, law professor, and researcher in disability and neurodiversity! If it’s hard for me, how does it go for everyone else?
Wait, did I say “Homeschooling and IEPs”?
Yes! It is your federal right to an IEP even if your kid is not enrolled in public school. There are lots of reasons why non-public-school-attending kids would need an IEP. If you need standardized testing accommodations, for example (think, SATs and ACTs). If your state provides services for disabled kids, they often require IEPs. (North Carolina, where I live, does.) If your kid is heading off to college, the IEP is evidence that services should be continued into the college environment.
And so on.
But the thing is, IEP meetings are hard for most parents. They just are. You feel alone. You feel attacked. (Sometimes, you are attacked.) You feel confused by the process. You feel ignored because, There-there, we know best—even though you know your kid better than anyone. Collaboration goes out the window.
I want to be clear about something. As I write in YOUR KID BELONGS HERE, in a world where things were fair and just and equitable, schools would have enough resources to support disabled/neurodivergent kids, and parents wouldn’t be pitted against schools to fight over scraps. There is constant, deliberate underfunding of schools, teacher salaries, teacher aides, and EC (exceptional children/special education) programs.
We have to ask ourselves: who benefits if schools and parents are slugging it out in the gladiator pit? Who is watching from the coliseum seats, wrapped in their wealth?
Until we fix this injustice, IEP meetings are going to be contentious. Schools protect themselves, and parents protect their children. It is hard to get over that hump, even though a collaborative approach is what’s best for the child.
Announcement: Free Zoom Masterclass on IEP Meetings
If any of this resonated with you, I am offering a FREE Zoom Masterclass on IEP Meetings for traditional schoolers and homeschoolers alike, in 1 week.
