to think some retired people completely forget what it’s like to be working full time?

I agree! My retired family members expect me to pop in the car for a 2.5 hour journey each way with a toddler, pets and a household to run. I think they have forgotten how hard it is.

I wouldn't single out retired people. They have for the most part been that young, working person at one time in their lives.

Quite a few of my neighbours are only in their 40s and 50s, and don't work at all. The one next to me is single, and works a few hours a week, maybe 1-3. She spends the rest of the time trying to engage the rest of us in chatter. I prefer to wait until she's gone out to take the bins out, as she lays in wait for anyone to appear, runs out of the door, and you're stuck. Same when I return from the dog walk. I WFH and don't allow myself many breaks, and those which I do are very well-timed.

It's those who have never worked who I find hardest to deal with in the sense you're referring to. Not retired people. Yes the latter can also tie you up while on a lunchtime walk, but they are always so respectful.

But pensioners are older to logically speaking they must have thrown the first stone in this argument ;) ;)

And pensioners are fed up of you judging them.

I really do cringe at the term ‘life admin’. Reminds me of the equally ick inducing ‘mental load’!

😂😂😂😂

Absolutely! Its their stage of life. Add to that , that they are lonely.

My mother complained last week that i didnt call her for three days. I said "it was a very busy time at work". People of that age don't think about work at all because they don't work.

For me it’s more reflected by when parents say “shall we just pop over for lunch on Tuesday and go for a dog walk” when I have a 30 minute lunch break and by no means time to walk their dog with them. I mean it’s endearing that they have lost total concept of the work week but I also just have to laugh because my parents were TOTAL workaholics with zero time for us as siblings.

that said, I’ve also noted, and give my parents a lot of slack for, their new, lower energy levels. A battle on the phone with the GP receptionist seems to knock them out for the morning, and they do maybe one activity in the afternoon. But that’s ok - it’s their new pace of life - I just can’t meet it right now!

Excuse me. I’m 72, it was perfectly normal for us to have had two working parents. Not only was I working full time when I was 60 but I was also running two houses and managing my parents’ care and finances and doing all their shopping. I know very well what it feels not to have enough hours in the day.

Well, I'm not the OP, but I've just had a conversation with my mother that I have very frequently, where she keeps putting off a plan that was her idea and which will take up maybe a couple of hours in total because I mention something that I'll be doing in a week's time which she seems to think somehow blanks out an entire week. This time it was 'Well, we can't do that this week' on Sunday evening, about something that would take about two hours, because I was going to be going away overnight the next Saturday night. It's as though she thinks I need to have a week in which I have literally no other engagements to take a trip to a local garden centre.

If it’s really sudden it could be a vitamin deficiency rather than just ageing. It’s worth seeing the GP to check.

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"What other people think of me is none of my concern"

Repeat ^ as a mantra until you really believe this OP - its liberating.

Our NDN makes up paranoid stories about people on the street. One is a drug dealer, another is creating porn and the 90 year old is a secret raging alcoholic who is a drunk driver... Her evidence for the latter is the fact his dog is called Whiskey.

Yes I absolutely agree and what makes it worse is that many of that generation also didn’t ever juggle all this with 2x Ft working parents so they have absolutely no understanding at all. Plus the cost of living stuff - that we all feel like we’re running so fast on a treadmill only to go backwards every year.

Suck it up. We are circling the drain…

My dad is like this. Frightfully busy as he has to make a phone call. Suggesting you do X en route to M&S is “complicated”. But he is 85 and on balance, doing pretty well. He struggles to understand how we for everything in…. Which is just life.

I'm looking forward to being retired in 10 years and forgetting all about what it's like to be working full time. Why wouldn't you?

I won't be having a 2nd round of doing childcare either.

My Dad suddenly started ringing me in working hours after he retired. I panicked at first, thinking it was an emergency, and it would be him wanting to know what we wanted for Christmas!

Oh totally understand.

My bugbear is that I volunteer in community groups. I also work 45-50hrs a week and have 3 kids. The retired folk on the same committees are so pushy trying to get me to run more events (I already do several) Even when I say a polite no they push back and make snippy comments ‘if you want something done ask a busy person’

I’m totally mentally exhausted, physically drained, leave me alone and run your own book sale!

Completely agree. An elderly relative said she has a ‘hell of a week’ ahead and will be rushed off her feet as she has a vaccination appointment on one day and a gardener coming round to trim the hedges on another.

Another retired relative rings me up at random times during the workday for a chat, oblivious to the fact it’s working hours.

I think the reality of working life is something easily forgotten once you retire.

I remember thinking how on earth did I do everything before I retired. It just seems impossible in retrospect. And no I don't think I'm really busy now, but it is lovely not to be.