100 Post Challenge #2: NaNoWriMo19: A Reflection

I did not win NaNoWriMo this year. I've never won NaNoWriMo come to think of it.

I'd like to find the people who decided National Novel Writing Month should be in November and kindly ask them to move it July or August. November just doesn't work for me. Firstly, I'm a teacher. Parent teacher conferences are in November,  report cards are also usually out at this time (We are doing them later this year for whatever reason). My husband's birthday and our wedding anniversary fall within a week of each other during this month so typically that is two days of totally justified family time. Finally, not that it is an issue this year, but in NaNoWriMo's of the past I was busy preparing for my regional qualifier for Irish dance. Important dance classes, competitions each weekend, extra practicing, all leading up to the big weekend before Thanksgiving were dancers of all ages in New England would compete for a chance to qualify for nationals or worlds. Add Thanksgiving prep, the day itself, in years past I would go shopping on Black Friday, and you can see why I was lucky to crack 15,000 words in previous years, if I attempted it at all.

This year I was lucky to have some time off in the beginning of November as my maternity leave was coming to a close. I also had lots of ideas where some years I've had nothing planned. Honestly, I was working on something totally different for NaNoWriMo like days before November first (almost 9,000 words on that project so that makes me feel better. This year was also different in the sense that I was attempting NaNoWriMo with an infant. I knew going in that it was going to be tough, but wondered if I would have better luck because of different responsibilities. No dance but a lot of typing with one hand while I held the baby in the other, but I really don't see this year as a failure.

My final total (There is still about an hour and a half left but I'm not feeling it anymore today) was 37,243. Some days were better than others. One day I got over 8,000 words another day I got only 500. That's almost 40,000 words that I would not have gotten if I hadn't tried at all. I also knew going in that this story was going to be more than 50,000 words and was using NaNoWriMo as more of an accountability challenge, and with the exception of this week where I stopped pushing because I was getting stressed out, I wrote everyday (With a few exceptions like hubby's birthday)  Add the word count from my previous project and I was almost at my goal. Not too shabby for having a baby 11 weeks ago.

I'm going to keep working on this WIP as I believe it has a home somewhere out there. It won't be ready to pitch on Thursday for PitMad, but I'm hoping by March as this is technically a new draft of an older story. I will definitely be attempting NaNoWriMo20 and trying to write everyday has truly proved to me that I'm in the wrong profession so I consider that a win in it's own way.

Did you accomplish your NaNoWriMo goals? Did you learn anything whether you finished or not?

Yours in Writing,

Kay Bennson