While attending a course taught by Arthur Foff at San Francisco State University in 1954, Olsen submitted an early draft of "I Stand Here Ironing." Foff was so impressed by the story that he encouraged Olsen—who was often preoccupied with providing for her young children—to cease attending his class and begin writing independently.[12]
Biographers Mickey Pearlman and Abby H. P. Werlock describe Olsen's circumstances while writing "I Stand Here Ironing":
[Olsen] carried her writing with her on the bus, at work, at night, during and after housework: no wonder, she says, the "first work I considered publishable began: 'I stand here ironing.'"[13]
Pearlman and Werlock add: "[D]espite the fact that she still had domestic responsibilities, she was able to spend three days a week writing—and then had to return to work where she took jobs at Kelly girl and Western Agency girl."[14]
The story was first published in the Pacific Spectator and Stanford Short Stories in 1956 under the title "Help Her to Believe." In 1957, the work appeared in Best American Short Stories as "I Stand Here Ironing."[15]
