If you don't consider life admin to be a thing...

I think maybe this is a question of definitions. I've done an awful lot of parental visiting over the last 15 years, not all of it was a joy but it definitely needed to happen. Guess I've put 'things I need to do and/or think' about in the box marked Life Admin. Other people think or act differently. Fair enough.

Yes, I spend a lot of time differentiating between things that are buy cheap, buy twice, and things which are the exact same product packaged up with a different price tag. I wouldn't do that if I was filthy rich probably, I'd just buy the most expensive one and never consider if it was identical to the cheap one. Like celebrities spending £300 on a Labubu whereas normal people aren't going to do that when the £7.99 "Lafufu" from the market does the exact same job of making your small child happy on Christmas Day. 😂

I think your comment about being able to throw money at things is spot on. If you have money to throw at things you don’t have to spend time looking around to find and negotiate the beat prices, or spend time juggling other requirements to fit things around what you can afford. It makes a difference. As an example I regularly have to spend tome ordering car parts and arranging for them to be fitted - financially this works for us as our mechanic is a family member and does the work for free. If I had the money I would get a new car instead and save myself a weekly job. Only one example but it is part of a bigger picture. When our boiler broke I would like to have been able to tell the plumber to just replace it and leave it at that. Instead I did quite a lot of faffing around and got it done for half the price, out of necessity. It’s tome that could have been better spent elsewhere.

It’s always been a thing and, on the whole, the internet has vastly simplified it. People used to need to write letters or go to banks, the post office etc. Now, when it works well, it is a few clicks.

However, if you have half a brain and get organised, it is a couple of hours a week (on average) at most.

What people (including me) object to is when it is made into some huge thing.

I don't see the problem with calling it that. Personally I weirdly enjoy life admin as I like sorting out my finances. I don't have much time to do it and have a toddler so feel likes a break 😂.

This is a very reasonable point. I don't do DH's personal admin, but I have noticed that in our relationship I do the admin my mum used to do (children/schools/birthdays/social/holidays) AND the admin my dad used to do (garden and house maintenance, financial)...

Too late for me but if you're in the early stages of a relationship - think hard about this.

When I say researching, I mean finding out what we've got available in the local area and then working out what day of the week they are on, how much they cost and then looking at the reviews, then contacting them to find out availability and if they actually have space. It took a few months to get DD into swimming lessons and I had to contact several pools before we found one that had an open waiting list.

Don't even get me started on the process of getting an NHS dentist for her.

Re dates in December, she has at least 2 birthdays, she's in a Christmas show with her theatre group on one of the Sundays, she has swimming every Saturday so a Saturday matinee is out, so we're looking at going to at least one of them on a weeknight, which can't be Tuesday or Thursday as she has activities on those nights. And then she is going to a different panto with school and another one with Rainbows so I'd like to try and put some distance between those as no-one wants to go to the theatre twice in one day. Maybe we'd be better going after Christmas.

Sorry, but when you're looking at taking a young child to a climate where you're expecting temps of -30C you'd be an idiot not to do as much research as possible around the best materials to wear, how many layers, where to buy them and what brands are trustworthy, what can be picked up from Primark or Lidl and what really needs to be the best quality. Unless you're a millionaire and can just buy the very best of everything.

As I said, some things, like getting her to decide on a Halloween costume and the finding it for a decent price (after she's already decided and changed her mind 8 times) isn't that time consuming, but it's all those things that add up.

And as I also said, if you find all this effortless then I'm very impressed by your organisation skills as I have always got a to do list running through my mind.

I do not live in a deeply sexist household, we've made a decision that I do the admin and he does more of the practical side of things which works well for us. We're both busy and frequently exhausted because that's what full time work and parenting looks like for a lot of families.

I'd say 'life' is the bit you get autonomy over, with your friends, family or chosen hobbies, which you only get to experience in the time left over once you have earned money to buy the items required to meet your needs and also done all the chores required to facilitate them.

I think a lot of it just organisation. I think my diary carries the mental load so I don't have to.

I rhink, OP, people who use the term 'life admin', do so as they think it sounds important. It's just stuff that needs doing.

So if all this is life admin and not life, what is life?

I'm not being goady either, so I probably label them as "banking and essential correspondence".
When I was growing up, there was no such term as "mental load" and I was taught by my very down to earth parents that I can only truly rely on myself, as far as getting things done goes.
Also sorted myself out for a pretty easy life, which I wanted since teenage years.

It is also about different stages of life requiring different types of life administration and more or less time.

For instance, money management. When we were young and skint, it was a simple matter of ‘balancing the budget’. Once we had children it got a bit more complex because we had to think of investing for both their university funding and our future retirement.

Now we are retired, it takes up a lot more time as we need to decide between cashing in vs keeping invested; if the latter, what investments for a shorter time horizon, might an annuity be worthwhile, should we take tax free lump sums from our pensions… It can get quite complex and requires a fair bit of research and planning.

To be fair, I tried to find the information in my app first but was unsuccessful. And sometimes I just like to hear it from someone rather than read it.

I think life admin is part of the 'we're so busy' thing that people come out with.

They're just chores, that take way less time than they used to thanks to the internet. I mean pet insurance and jabs? That's a once a year job, one of which only needs a few clicks on your phone to sort.

Isn't life admin only really an issue when half of a pertnership leaves it all for the other half to do?

I live alone, for me it's just stuff I have to do.

When my husband was alive I was often infuriated by ending up having to sort his car insurance, buy his parents birthday presents and always having to book the holidays and travel.

I mean some of this comes down to luck, location and lifestyle.

I'm not somehow less organised than my DD's friends' mums where the child doesn't need an EHCP. Quite the reverse! And I say mums deliberately, as SEND admin is largely done by women in my experience.

I didn’t think there was any such thing as life admin until I had elderly parents….then it went off the scale! Being a POA, managing their appointments and care (all at a distance) is time consuming (especially if you aren’t used to keeping accounts).
I managed a team at work, children through school, bills etc without the blink of an eye but being accountable to someone else is much more time consuming and relentless

I'm not sure i've ever rang my bank. I know the last time i stepped foot in one was 15 years ago when we took out the mortgage.

I think much depends on your amount of contact with the state, and the part of it you need to engage with tbh.

I spent 2 years securing an EHCP for my daughter. That was a two day a week job.

I had coffee with a disabled friend recently and she instantly understood. She'd spent months getting a blue badge renewal (not a new one - a renewal - and she's no less disabled than she was the first time).

I remember my dad having a complete nightmare doing probate for my gran. And that was following years of stress for my mum dealing with social services on both sides of a county boundary.

And secondary school admissions are no picnic in some areas.

If you can avoid contact with the education, healthcare, social services, and legal system, I guess you're OK.

Although re-mortgaging can be surprisingly hideous.

I think at different times there is more and less to do. At the moment I sometimes find it a lot to figure out our schedule. My eldest has a fortnightly school timetable including for after school clubs, my kids do 13 out of school and 5 in school activities between them (some of which sometimes shift time/location), they also both do some shows/exams connected with their activities. I’m a cubs leader, OH does volunteering, both of us have quite flexible working but both of us also have times we have to join meetings in the evening. It’s a lot of moving parts to factor in & keep track of day to day. I find not having a fixed schedule that stays consistent is what makes it hard as you have to look at it every week and figure out how you manage all drop offs/pick ups, when is available to get shopping delivered etc. We also constantly seem to have a to do list for the house as it’s big and old and as soon as you repair or organise one thing something else crops up. I also swear I’m constantly getting rid of “stuff” by giving to charity shops or passing on through Olio but grandparents & other relatives are also buying more so we always seem to have too much and things get in a mess. A lot of it is a choice and I don’t object to doing it but for us it feels like quite a lot of work

Oh, and I also nipped out at lunchtime to collect my DS’s Halloween costume 🙌