The Impossible Juggling Act: Can Women Really Have It All?

What happens when you are trying to be a mother, a worker, a creative, a daughter, a partner… and still somehow expected to find time for yourself?

This was one of the questions I found myself coming back to during my conversation with children's author, illustrator, poet and teacher Andi Dawson on Episode 4 of the Liz Dees Art Podcast.

We called the episode The Impossible Juggling Act.

And honestly, sometimes that feels like exactly what being a woman is.

Juggling.

Except nobody seems particularly impressed by how many balls you are keeping in the air. They just notice the one you dropped.

When does the creative work actually happen?

Andi has a lot going on.

She works in a primary school as a Higher Level Teaching Assistant. She's a mother. She supports her own mum. She's a children's author and illustrator who has published more than 30 books. She writes, draws and creates artwork.

So I asked her a fairly obvious question:

When do you actually get to be creative?

Her week is divided between school, family responsibilities, helping her mum, household jobs and trying to carve out time for her own creative work.

And even when that creative time technically exists, something else can easily fill it.

Her mum might need something.

The house needs sorting.

The children need something.

There is another deadline.

Someone needs taking somewhere.

And suddenly the day that was supposed to be your creative day has disappeared.

That resonated with me enormously.

Because creative people don't just have creative lives.

We have lives.

And creativity has to squeeze itself into them.

The list that never ends

During our conversation, we talked about the enormous list that sits inside your head when you are responsible for other people.

There are the things that need doing.

The things you should be doing.

The things you want to do.

And the things you feel you ought to want to do.

And, for many women, the needs of everyone else seem to rise automatically to the top.

Andi admitted that when she looks at everything she could be doing, the first priority is usually doing things for other people.

Her own creative work comes further down the list.

And that's where the conversation moved into something much bigger than time management.

Because this isn't simply about being organised.

It's about what we've been taught to believe our time is worth.

Why does having time for yourself feel like something you have to justify?

One of the most revealing moments in our conversation came when Andi talked about feeling guilty about coming to record the podcast.

She had made arrangements.

The children were safe.

Their dad was at home.

There wasn't actually a crisis.

She had every right to spend a few hours doing something she wanted to do.

And yet she still felt guilty.

She described that horrible little voice in the back of your head saying:

Is this really important?

And that's the bit that really interests me.

Because nobody had actually told her she couldn't come.

The restriction was coming from somewhere else.

From expectations.

From habit.

From years of putting everybody else's needs first.

From the idea that being a "good" mother means being available.

All.

The.

Time.

The invisible work nobody sees

We also talked about something I think is incredibly important: invisible labour.

There is the obvious work of parenting.

Cooking.

Cleaning.

Shopping.

School runs.

Appointments.

Laundry.

Looking after elderly parents.

But there is also the mental work of remembering.

Who needs what?

When is that deadline?

Has somebody got clean uniform?

What needs buying?

Who needs taking where?

What have I forgotten?

And sometimes the most exhausting part isn't actually doing the thing.

It's carrying the knowledge that the thing needs doing.

That's a very different kind of workload.

And when you add creative ambition to that, it gets even more complicated.

Because creativity needs mental space.

You can't always switch from:

Did I remember to buy milk?

to:

Now I shall produce some profound and meaningful art.

It doesn't quite work like that.

So… can women actually have it all?

We got into the slightly dangerous territory of asking whether women can really "have it all".

Andi's answer wasn't a straightforward yes or no.

Because what does having it all actually mean?

A career?

Children?

A creative life?

A clean house?

A relationship?

Time for yourself?

Financial security?

A social life?

Enough sleep?

Good mental health?

And who decided that all of these things had to be achieved simultaneously?

We talked about how women have increasingly been told:

You can have a career.

You can have children.

You can achieve your ambitions.

You can do anything.

And yes, that's an important change.

But there is a problem when "you can do anything" quietly becomes:

You should do everything.

Because those aren't the same thing.

You can have a career and children.

But if you are still expected to carry most of the domestic and emotional workload, then you haven't necessarily gained equality.

You've just added another job.

Something usually has to give

One of the things I found particularly interesting about Andi's answer was that if she could magically redesign her life, she wouldn't give up her creativity.

She wouldn't give up being a mum.

She wouldn't give up supporting her family.

And she wouldn't actually want to stop teaching either.

But if something had to go, her paid job would probably be the thing she'd sacrifice to create more space for everything else.

And that says something.

Not because teaching isn't important to her — it clearly is.

But because there are only so many hours in a day.

Something has to give.

And far too often, the thing that gives is us.

Our rest.

Our creativity.

Our friendships.

Our hobbies.

Our time alone.

The things that make us feel like individuals rather than useful people who happen to be keeping everybody else alive.

Maybe creativity isn't a luxury

This is where I think the conversation becomes particularly relevant to artists.

Because creative work is very easy to classify as optional.

You can always paint tomorrow.

You can always write that book later.

You can always work on your ideas when the children are older.

When your job is less demanding.

When your parents don't need you.

When the house is sorted.

When you've got more money.

When you've got more time.

Except there is always another when.

And eventually you can wake up and realise that you've spent years waiting for the perfect conditions to arrive.

They probably won't.

So perhaps the answer isn't finding the perfect balance.

Perhaps it's accepting that life is messy and making space for creativity anyway.

Even if the washing-up is still there.

Even if the house isn't spotless.

Even if somebody thinks you're being selfish.

Even if you only have an hour.

You are allowed to do something because you want to

I think this might be the biggest thing I took away from my conversation with Andi.

We don't always need a justification for doing something creative.

It doesn't have to earn money.

It doesn't have to become a business.

It doesn't have to be productive.

It doesn't have to improve us.

It doesn't have to make us better mothers, partners, employees or human beings.

Sometimes we can simply do something because we want to.

And perhaps that's one small way of reclaiming ourselves.

Because we aren't just mothers.

We aren't just partners.

We aren't just daughters.

We aren't just workers.

We aren't just the people who remember where everyone's PE kit is.

We are individuals.

And some of us are artists.

And that part of us deserves some space too.

Listen to the conversation

This was just one of the many rabbit holes Andi and I went down during Episode 4 of the Liz Dees Art Podcast.

We talked about motherhood, creativity, invisible labour, feminism, raising confident children, the pressure placed on women and why so many of us struggle to give ourselves permission to create.

And, naturally, we laughed quite a lot along the way.

Because sometimes if you don't laugh while juggling all the balls, you'll probably cry.

Listen to Episode 4 of the Liz Dees Art Podcast: The Impossible Juggling Act — A Conversation with Andi Dawson.

https://youtu.be/InjEoMSsVr8?si=-4hgyrRbnkyqeCzv