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Original poster

SIL describing herself as "retired" pissing me off

695 replies

SacreBleugh · 12/11/2024 18:07

I have recently retired. I've worked full time my entire career, as well as bringing up 4 kids. I know. Heroic.
My SIL is a SAHM to 3 grown up kids. She's had the odd temporary very part time hobby job in the 30 years I have known her. She is now also describing herself as "retired". I'm not sure why I find this irritating.

OP posts:
godmum56 · 12/11/2024 18:57

SacreBleugh · 12/11/2024 18:14

She's late 50s. None of her children live at home any more. She leads a leisurely life.

I'd call that retired. She isn't involved in caring for her children and doesn't intend to return to work. Why does it bother you so much? Its a word.

Fetchthevet · 12/11/2024 18:57

Birdscratch · 12/11/2024 18:47

Once they’re school aged it’s not work. When they’re at senior school it’s definitely not work. If they don’t have any special needs it’s very much not working.

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That's why I said when they are young.

Dramatic · 12/11/2024 18:56

SacreBleugh · 12/11/2024 18:41

She's worked maybe 7 or 8 days in the last thirty years.

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I was going to ask you how much she worked, I've had a part time job since my kids were born and tbh I don't have any plans to go back to full time, I'm going to class myself as retired when I stop working but I imagine that will be well past 65

Artistbythewater · 12/11/2024 18:56

Birdscratch · 12/11/2024 18:47

Once they’re school aged it’s not work. When they’re at senior school it’s definitely not work. If they don’t have any special needs it’s very much not working.

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I would consider cooking, cleaning, washing, helping children with homework and organising work to some degree actually, because we do pay others to do it - just because you don’t value it. I don’t suppose a school aged child just sits there like a statue and the mother sits with her feet up watching Netflix. Ofc it is work.

TunipTheVegimal24 · 12/11/2024 18:56

SemperIdem · 12/11/2024 18:44

It’s almost certainly easier without the added hassle of an actual job! Especially when they reach school age and there are many hours a week of time to oneself involved.

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Yes, but you have extra help if you've outsourced some parenting. I doubt OP was cooking dinner for four children, stirring the pot with her left hand, whilst simultaneously typing with the right.

Also, both OP and her SIL have achievements. Why does it have to be a competition for the Woe is Me awards?

Sockss · 12/11/2024 18:56

Some posters need to educate themselves on private pensions.

LikeARunnerHo · 12/11/2024 18:56

ohtowinthelottery · 12/11/2024 18:33

I haven't been in paid employment for 25 years. I had to give up work to become an unpaid carer. I did that for 17 years until the person I cared for died. I didn't return to work. My previous employment afforded me a final salary pension which I started receiving this year.
When people ask if I work/what I do, I tell them I'm retired. What else am I going to say?
Would I annoy you too?

How is that the same thing?

Daysgo · 12/11/2024 18:55

Impossible to see your annoyance as anything but jealousy of what u think of as the easier life she had . Just enjoy your retirement fgs.

pepperminticecream · 12/11/2024 18:55

Coolasfeck · 12/11/2024 18:26

I get what you mean OP. I wouldn’t be annoyed just mildly irritated. What does she think she’s returning from? Her circumstances haven’t changed. She’s just gotten older.

I know a woman who I expect to do the same. She’s a SAHM to two school aged kids. She asked me how I was and I told her work was full on at the moment and that with the kids meant I was a bit all over the place. She empathised saying she was also tired with the kids and working! By work she meant her chores! I was thinking what type of new crack is this woman smoking?! She will defo claim to have retired when she reaches 65!

You don't really know what her day to day looks like though do you? I am currently (mostly) a stay at home mum to little children (I occasionally take on freelance work when I want to) and I can guarantee that what I am doing at home all day with my children and our home is far more than what most working mums are doing when they are at home because I have the time to do those things and treat being an at home mum as a job. I am not doing simple chores and then relaxing, it is full on. You shouldn't be judged for working, nor should you think you understand what the day to day looks like for a stay at home mum either.

BunnyLake · 12/11/2024 18:54

So the nanny looking after children can retire but the mother looking after children can’t, is that right op?

SoiledMyselfDuringSomeTurbulence · 12/11/2024 18:54

Flowerrrr · 12/11/2024 18:50

Ah yes the private pension of someone who has worked a few days in the past 30 years- I'm sure it was big enough to retire on.

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You don't need to be working to pay into a pension, and a person can draw a pension without it being enough by itself for them to retire on. It's a thing.

Gwenhwyfar · 12/11/2024 18:54

Flowerrrr · 12/11/2024 18:47

Is an unemployed woman in her 50s really retired though? She can't draw a pension, she is being subsidised from another income stream than people get in retirement which who cares not a problem, but deciding you don't want to/have to work anymore is different from retiring because you are of retirement age.

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She might have some state pension from before she had children. I think you need ten years of contributions to get something?

BeatsAntique · 12/11/2024 18:53

I can see why. To retire, you have to retire from working. She’s never really worked. The most accurate thing to call it, just in my personal view, is that she’s a housewife. But it seems hardly anyone describes themselves as that anymore.

Lady of leisure, kept woman, independently wealthy (if that’s true) would all be better than retired.

smooththecat · 12/11/2024 18:53

I tend to assume that anyone who says they are retired is over state retirement age. Often people will say they’ve taken early retirement if they’re under that age.

Trumptonagain · 12/11/2024 18:53

I've a sibling that hasn't worked since their early 20's, now mid 60's but still insists they've "paid their dues".

Leave it be OP...it's not worth giving it a thought.

Birdscratch · 12/11/2024 18:53

CheekyHobson · 12/11/2024 18:48

Let’s be perfectly honest here, if you did not do full-time care of your children, you got help from somewhere else. You did not “parent full time” and “work full time”. You hired someone else to take care of some of your parenting duties for you.

And that’s perfectly fine but let’s not pretend that you did it all on your own.

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My mother worked pre DC and went back to work when her youngest was 5. She worked as a teacher full time and paid into a full state pension. It meant that she had 7 years of not working and decades of working. We never went to any kind of childcare. This was in the 80s. My grandmother went back to work full time when her youngest was 11. Working mothers aren’t a new phenomenon.

MrsPinkSky · 12/11/2024 18:52

Flowerrrr · 12/11/2024 18:50

Ah yes the private pension of someone who has worked a few days in the past 30 years- I'm sure it was big enough to retire on.

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How do you know her husband didn't pay into her retirement fund?

Dweetfidilove · 12/11/2024 18:52

@SacreBleugh , you're retired from work and she's retired from child-rearing. Two different, but equally important jobs.

YABU.

yossell · 12/11/2024 18:52

I've never really thought of "retired" as a success term, so I'm not sure what the problem is. Seems just a simple and clear way to describe her relationship with work.

BunnyLake · 12/11/2024 18:51

So what would you prefer she said OP? What would make you feel happy and content regarding her status?

Lentilweaver · 12/11/2024 18:51

TunipTheVegimal24 · 12/11/2024 18:50

Some people do legitimately get pissed off by this too 😂

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Why on earth? I do not care.
This competition about who is more heroic and hard working is pointless.

MrsPinkSky · 12/11/2024 18:51

BunnyLake · 12/11/2024 18:49

Sometimes the level of bitchiness on these forums astonishes me. I couldn’t imagine caring one iota if a SAHM or occasional
part timer said they were retired. It wouldn’t even enter my head to bitch about it or resent it, I mean why, to what end??

It sounds like the OP was unhappy at work and she's still unhappy now she's retired.

It wouldn't enter most people's head to start this thread otherwise.

Mainoo72 · 12/11/2024 18:51

YANBU. What has she retired from? You need a job or career to retire from surely. You can’t retire from being a parent. She sounds annoying as hell.

Sockss · 12/11/2024 18:51

She won't even have a full state pension

She may have.

KimberleyClark · 12/11/2024 18:50

Sia8899 · 12/11/2024 18:47

I’d be annoyed too, the fact is she hasn’t actually retired from anything. I’d start using the word pensioner (even if you’re not of the state age) to annoy her

I didn’t think you could retire from being a parent, that it was a lifelong thing.

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