Your great-grandmother’s stories have clearly left a lasting impact on you. Can you share one of her stories that particularly inspired your writing? Jeanette, she had so many stories. As a child, she fascinated me because she was born in 1899, had no electricity, no indoor plumbing, she couldn’t vote, etc. Her mother, my great-great-grandmother, had her own mystery. She arrived in New York City in the 1880’s with a picture pinned to her clothes and no parents.

The idea of it all seemed so foreign and yet, she told them in a way you wanted to listen, even if you’d heard them 1000 times. One particular story she shared was when she and her family lived in Cuba. It was the early 1900’s and her father was a Baptist missionary. He’d left the Catholic church and been shunned by his family for it. One of the things I love about her stories is I can also talk to my father and aunts about them and they all smile. Decades after her passing, she still elicits joy from her words. So powerful. It’s a long-lasting legacy to live up to.

Your career path is incredibly diverse. How have your experiences as a percussionist, actress, singer, waitress, bartender, pre-cook, and trauma nurse influenced your storytelling? So many experiences and jobs have certainly shown my ability to adapt. To figure out how to navigate different experiences and grab those funny moments here and there.

One thing I can definitely say is my journey to this point in my life is I was never afraid to stray away from conflict or chaos. I didn’t actively look for it, but I wasn’t afraid of it as shown being a percussionist. I was often the only female and put up with a lot of sexual harassment, but mostly held my own. Going through all that also helped me draw boundaries when it came to working in the medical field. You have to because you’ll be drowned by the stress of it all.

I’ve brought in some aspects of medicine in most of my books.
Ironically, I didn’t plan to do that initially. I told myself I didn’t want to write about anything medical, but they kept sneaking in anyway. I stopped fighting it and went with it.

Transitioning from trauma nursing to journalism is quite a leap. What motivated you to make this career change? I planned to go back and get my bachelor’s of nursing as I earned an associate’s. While taking a few required classes at a local community college, I saw a sign on the bulletin board that said, “Write for the School Paper. Get Credit.”
I thought, “I’ve written in my journals for years. Written articles and stories. This will be an easy A.”

It wasn’t. It was one of the hardest classes I’d ever taken, but I loved it. I loved seeing how I could improve my storytelling. I decided a bachelor’s degree in nursing wasn’t the only thing I wanted to earn. I could combine the two degrees and become a medical journalist. Back then (this is so old sounding), magazines paid $1-2/word for long articles and I figured I could write 1-2 a month, save some money and eventually transition out of pediatric trauma.

Then the internet happened and the best most freelance journalists got was a byline and maybe $50 an article. But I still loved it. Around that time, I’d also fallen in love with this guy from work. We got married and moved to St. Louis, MO for his fellowship. While there, he said, “Hey, why don’t you go back and finish your journalism degree?” So I did.

With your extensive background in journalism, how do you decide which subjects to write about, especially those related to women’s health and adoption advocacy? This can be cyclical and depends on which awareness months we’re in.

An example would be May is Foster Care Awareness Month, September is Ovarian and Gynecological Cancer Awareness Months, and November is Adoption Awareness Month. With those social tags, I can get more eyes to the articles, but there are also days during the year that also bring awareness like May 8th is World Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. If new studies come out, if some celebrity posts something that could help, or some politician (factually or not) talks about something, I write something.

Your stories blend reality, laughter, and love. Can you walk us through your creative process when crafting a new story? That is a tough one because sometimes, there’s no rhyme or reason for my story, other than it either pops into my head or I see something and think, “I wonder…”

But when I start to flush it out, the dialogue usually comes to me first and I start writing that with basic tags. I can keep track of who’s saying what and build on that. But it’s not organized or well thought out. It’s usually a chaotic ball of ideas that I’m trying to put in some understandable order.

My oldest is a writer and we often brainstorm with each other. One of my besties, Sasha Summers, is an incredible brainstormer. I’ve thrown things at her many times, trying to flush things out.

Then it’s a matter of allowing the story to flow out of my brain and onto the pages. The main thing I always want to have, even if there’s sadness in the story, is laughter. There must be laughter as it’s my favorite sound when it comes from a place of great joy.

Sometimes, I get stuck and can’t come up with anything. One particular scene in my first book was set in a coffee shop. I needed orders to be called out intermittently during the dialogue between the main characters. At the time, I had two little ones at home so my brain was shot. Coming up with creative ways to drink caffeine wasn’t coming to me, so I sat in Starbucks for two hours and wrote down every order they called out. I even wrote down anything I heard over their drive-thru coms.

How do your family and pets influence your writing routine and creativity? One hundred percent. Just the fact they are constant sources of distraction influences me for certain. Sometimes, I have to get creative about when I work.

The summer is particularly difficult as all four kids are home, but the older two have graduated high school so they are pretty busy with work, life, etc. The younger two are in high school so dealing with (basically) four teens can certainly sway good and bad days for creativity. 

My hubs is amazing, but he doesn’t always understand when I’m working. I had a very emotional scene for one of my books and told everyone I needed to be alone to write it. I was in the office, door closed, crying away as I typed and the dog pushed the door open. Then the kids came in. Then hubs shooed everyone out, but he wanted to have a conversation about something before noticing me crying. He got worried and I said, “I’m writing something sad! Get out!”

It all worked out, but yeah, the people around me are still learning when I’m working. I probably need to wear a hat or something that signals not to bother me.

You’ve written on a variety of topics for multiple publications. Which topic has been the most challenging to write about and why? Great question. The most challenging could easily be when I’m trying to educate on a heavy subject like women’s GYN issues or even foster/adoption, but here I’m going to focus on the latter. The process of wanting to adopt is only the beginning of a long road. You have to be willing to put your heart out there, allow it to be completely crushed at any given moment. We said we understood this, but we didn’t absorb the full magnitude of it. We chose to adopt through foster care as we’d weighed other options and decided private adoption and international adoption wouldn’t work for us.

The foster care classes we took were incredibly informative and enlightening, but again, it’s difficult to quantify how much of your soul you bear when caring for a child who might not stay with you forever.
That was our biggest concern.

I used a personal situation in Adopting with the Doctor. Initially, I had the social worker in the book talk about how to connect with a bio parent who was on the fence about relinquishing custody. I used the experience I had, but the book was way too long so that scene was cut. But going back and retracing those interactions, how the fear of losing one of our children sat heavy in my gut was hard to revisit.

As an award-winning writer, what do you consider your most significant achievement in your writing career so far? Honestly, that I’ve been able to complete books, juggle kids, and get laundry done in the same week. Sometimes the same day, but that might be considered witchcraft. Don’t hold it against me.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers who come from diverse professional backgrounds like yours?

A few things.

That you have all these experiences to share with others. Not everyone travels down their life path in a straight line. There are many, many, many potholes and diversions and short-cuts, etc. Sometimes, those experiences make us much more interesting.

Even those moments you might not think are big deals, they could be to someone else. Keep a journal or record yourself. You don’t have to show anyone these things, but everyone has stories to tell. Details are important. Sometimes details are what make the story.

Regarding the craft of writing, be willing to listen to constructive criticism. Get with a writer’s group that’s as serious about writing as you are or take a class at a community college or find an online class.
Find your creative peeps and be willing to help them improve as much as they are willing to help you. And if you have those stories in you, write them down. Don’t be afraid for first or tenth drafts to be chaotic. The point is to get started.

Finally, not everyone is going to like or appreciate what you write.
I’ve been asked by family members when I’m going to write a “real” book as writing romance (apparently) doesn’t count. That’s fine. I’m not writing for them. I’m writing the story I want to tell. If you love what you write, it comes through, but if you’re writing what others expect you to, you’ll struggle and the story won’t have that flair.

BONUS: What is one book you consider to be a comfort read that you will always reach for? Oh man. I’ve read so many but if I want a good laugh, I go with one of the Janet Evanovich books. Any of her Stephanie Plum series, but I’ve also gotten lost in the pages of Stephanie Bond’s, Tessa Bailey’s, Alyssa Kay Adams’, and Avery Flynn’s books. I recently read Kristin Hannah’s The Women and that was a great gut punch and beautifully written. Perfect for triggering a good decompressing cry.