Getting Started as a Work at Home Freelance Nurse Writer

Becoming a nurse is one of the best career decisions I’ve ever made. I love the flexibility of the career, my patients, and the knowledge I have gained every day over the last decade and more. But, with that comes the ability to have to balance work, family, and personal lives. So, why would I want to become a freelance nurse writer? After my second child was born, I struggled with the fact that I was going to be away from my babies for 14 hours a day.

Let’s be honest or 12-hour shifts are never just 12 hours.

The night shift was killing me and I struggled to balance time with my children. sleep, and my job. I constantly Googled “work at home jobs for nurses”, and couldn’t find the right fit for me. The job I was looking for had to:

• Keep my busy – I like to be busy at my job so I wasn’t looking to be lazy by any means.
• Help patients – I wanted to still help people.

Both these traits led me to the career of a freelance nurse writer.

At that time, I was working a job that sent me on home visits to care for pregnant women in their homes. I educated them about the signs and symptoms of preterm labor and gave them weekly progesterone injections. I loved that job but my husband did not. I understood the reasons why. I was in the worst parts of Cleveland, Ohio that you could imagine and my patients encouraged me to obtain my certification to carry a weapon. That is when I really knew I needed something different. I had to be alive for my kids. I started writing. In the beginning, I wrote for a very little amount of money $5 for 300 words. I posted a gig over on websites like Upwork just so people knew that I could write (I don’t recommend it). But, could I really write? I mean I went to college, but I never was an English major. Then I realized, that’s not what the companies want from me. They wanted my nursing knowledge to be able to help their patients and their readers with medical terminology turned into lay terms. Then, I decided to be a freelance nurse writer. I could do that. I do that every day. How can you start?

Look at where you EXCEL

First, I encourage you to look at the area in which you excel. Some of us excel in nursing leadership and management and some excel and Oncology nursing, Neonatal nursing, Maternal Health nursing, or simply Medical-surgical nursing. See what you would enjoy writing about.

Ask yourself 3 simple questions

Ask yourself three simple questions about becoming a freelance writer.

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