The Problem With My Daughter As My Writing Muse

“Will you be OK if I write this?”

The thought had never occurred to me until recently. And as I had been thinking up my next piece, I turned to my daughter in the kitchen and asked her that question.

She kinda laughed and half rolled her eyes.

“Does it matter at this point?”

And she’s right. Anyone who reads my blog, my newsletter, my short story or even my first book can find pieces of my daughter intertwined in some or all of those stories. She’s inspired a lifetime's worth of content.

But she’s older now (turning 20 this year). She’s active on her own social media profiles. She’s an artist and designer searching for her own voice and trying to carve out her own space. She’s telling her own story.

And her perspective will be entirely different than mine. It should be. Even though some viewpoints may intersect, her interpretation of her experiences will not mirror my own, even if she’s retelling the same stories.

While I’m proud and excited that my daughter is on her own journey, it did give me pause to think about what that means for writing…