14 Writing Struggles You Only Encounter When You’re Tired

Tired brains are terrifying. It’s scary up there.

1 You’re either hyper-focusing on your work or you’re playing Candy Crush. There is no in-between.

2. Everything is a distraction except the thing you’re actually supposed to be writing.

3. You start getting random ideas for things you know aren’t good but you can’t NOT write them down.

4. You’ve spelled the same word wrong five times in two paragraphs.

5. It’s like your first language is no longer your first language. Can you even grammar?

6. You’re either typing 100 words a minute or, like, 10 an hour.

7. You start using WAY TOO MANY adjectives.

8. Your brain says “Write!” but you honestly don’t know what you’re even typing right now.

9. Your usage of “like” and “that” has suddenly tripled.

10. All of a sudden your characters are plotting to commit a crime without warning you?? (?????)

11. You can’t keep your eyes open but somehow you’ve written 200 words. How?

12. Everything you write is hilarious.

13. Or it’s terrible and you start questioning whether or not you should be a writer at all.

14. Eventually, you either give up or call it done. Either way, you’re going to have a lot of proofreading to do tomorrow morning …


Meg is the creator of Novelty Revisions, dedicated to helping writers put their ideas into words. She is a staff writer with The Cheat Sheet, a freelance editor and writer, and a 10-time NaNoWriMo winner. Follow Meg on Twitter for tweets about writing, food and nerdy things.


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13 thoughts on “14 Writing Struggles You Only Encounter When You’re Tired

  1. Yes, yes indeed. I’ve managed to sleep most of the day away so I’ll be banging on the keyboard and yelling at the cat (usually to get off the keyboard) all night.

  2. LOL! Point 10 I liked the most. Though I would daresay: “Your characters start dying or vanishing within the same scene they appeared in.”

    In case you like to know: I found you due the #crimefiction page of Margot Kinberg, where Don Massenzio linked me over to this entry.

    Goodbye!

    1. I always appreciate when people give me some insight into how they got here. Thank you for that. :) Also, I have DEFINITELY had that happen to me. “Wow, this is a cool character I’ve created. Welp, he’s dead now. RIP.” #struggle

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