Last week, I told you all about the glorious life of a freelancer on vacation and how awesome it can be when you plan ahead for that downtime.

But it got me thinking…

…about what could happen in your freelancing business when you unexpectedly have to take time off and you didn’t plan for it.

Let’s talk about how to handle being sick as a freelancer.

Last month, I woke up one day feeling awful. My head was throbbing, I was dizzy, and everything ached. To top it off, we had storms and severe flooding in Houston, so school was cancelled. And all that rain meant the WiFi was spotty, so I couldn’t just park the kids in front of some Netflix for the day.

First-world problems, to be sure, but I still had to figure out what the heck to do about it.

Mama, this is going to happen to you, much as I wish it wouldn’t. There will be a day when everything goes wrong.

You will get sick, your kids will get sick, school will be closed, the WiFi will go down.

And sometimes, all of those things will happen on the same day.

Back in your 9-5 days, maybe you had the option of calling in sick and letting someone else deal with the fallout. But now that you’re a freelancer, you’re the person who will have to figure all of this out — and the best time to do your disaster planning is well before disaster strikes.

Like, right now would be good.

Here’s how to set your business up for success so you can take the occasional sick day without causing a catastrophe.

• Set up systems now. Get systems, procedures, and automations in place well before you need them. Have an out-of-office response ready to go so you don’t need to figure out how to set it up when you have a fever of 101. Know what your plan is ahead of time. Spend a morning working through these scenarios and write down a simple-to-follow procedure you can pull out when you need it.

• Work ahead. Don’t save your assignments until the day they’re due — that’s just asking the universe to dump a freak snowstorm (or insane flooding) in your lap. Get in the habit of finishing things earlier than you need to, so you have time for the minor emergencies that are an undeniable part of life.

• Batch your work. If you’re a social media manager, make sure you have a handful of posts and images in reserve for each client that you can fall back on in an emergency.

• Have a back-up plan. Working in customer service? Serving clients as a VA? Don’t wait until you’re in the ER with your toddler to talk to your client about handing off your duties for the day. Plan ahead for what will happen on the occasional — but inevitable — times you’ll need a day off.

• Suck it up. Mama, I say this with all the love in the world — and I can already see the responses I’m going to get — but sometimes you have no choice but to suck it up and get the job done. As kind and understanding as clients may be, there are times when you will have to honor the commitments you made when you filed for that LLC and signed the contract. This is where having some posts in reserve and good systems can save you — you can do the work for the day with less effort, so you can get back to bed faster.

Here’s the thing, Mama: you’re human. So you will run into occasional human issues, like illness and family emergencies. But when you run a business, you have to remember that your actions affect other people.

But now you know how to handle being sick as a freelancer.Do the responsible thing. Set aside a few hours to figure out what you need to do to keep your business going and serve your clients when you’re sick, and how you can make that happen.