Life admin / mental load - let’s have your outsourcing inspiration!

Hahahaha this thread is unreal.

No one who can afford £100 for a private chef is going to be struggling with life admin!

I used to hate ironing but now find I like it as it gives me an excuse to catch up on TV/film/series without feeling guilty 😁

@Superscientistthank you for the bins suggestion. I already had the reminder of it being bin night on my phone but it had never occurred to me to do a reminder of which bin it is, and I spend a good 5-10 mins trying to track down the recycling calendar which someone is sure to have moved. Hopefully I can eliminate that step now.

Yeah fuck the bloody batch cooking in the moronic slow cooker, bring on Jeeves instead

I'll have a side of privilege with mine if you please

Bloody MN champagne lefties

How marvellous does he also wipe one’s bottom and ‘see to’ DH ? 😉

I was thinking of getting a chef. I worked it out and it was CHEAPER than getting several takeaways a week because we don't always have time to cook.

I disagree that no one ever needs help in life - what a strange point of view.

But back to your observations about my life. Why would I do less of things I find rewarding and enjoyable to free up time to do things I don’t enjoy? I choose to have a high paying job, which then means I earn enough to outsource jobs I don’t want to do, so that I can instead use the time to do the things I do want to do. I prefer to pay someone to do my ironing for instance, (I job I hate) to give me time to spend with my elderly parents/ young children/ doing something I love which also gives back to society.

A repetitive, rough meal plan which cuts down on cooking. We also eat the same thing for two dinners in a row, for example.

A few SOS dinners always in the cupboard/freezer so a meal can be on the table even if you’re back late / arriving home after a holiday / whatever.

If something sounds uncomfortable, unnecessary, expensive and/or frankly even not fun at the point of offer/invitation, just say no then. (Rather than saying yes and dreading it and hating yourself in the weeks that follow.)

I’m baffled by the meal prep videos. I suspect the secret might be irradiated vegetables or no tastebuds

I wish I could do this but I can't. Radio maybe, but I find it impossible to watch TV and do anything else at the same time except eat! Even that is a bit distracting and hard. I'm very impressed at that level of multi-tasking.

I have sent you support (not sarcastic!) I would not be impressed with a PA company that couldn’t use the correct spelling

I am down to 4 days a week now (although still 35 hours) I have teenagers so tend to do all my cleaning etc on my day off. When I worked FT I had a cleaner and an ironing lady. But purely because my partner can be offshore for 2-8.weeks at a time. Loads of companies in my area do gym/protein meals delivered. About £7-9 a serving but I've not tried it. I cna see why people would though. Surely they a private chef gives you more work since you have to order the ingredients etc? I definitely find cooking a way of decompressing so I don't think I'd rate that much. on pay day I do all the bnak transfers to savings etc so all the finance admin done in one go. I just do renewals for things when they are first due. I don't find any of it too taxing but my boys aw 16 and 12 so don't need as much attention as wee ones!

Ha, crossed posts on Charlie Bigham! He'd be thrilled!

Alongside my regular job I work part-time as a childminder and general 'mother's help' for a couple of high earning friends and acquaintances who are really stressed.

I've noticed a few things and here's what I'd say to them, though I won't as it would be rude:

You're trying to do too much. Have more downtime, don't keep on going on holiday/staying with family/having people stay over. You're constantly knackered.

Instead of paying me to batch cook, it would be just as good to buy fancy ready meals, eg Charlie Bingham. Much cheaper and you wouldn't have someone else in your kitchen.

Have more routines and reminders. (I have a list of "things to do on Sundays" eg sort uniform for the week, clean fishtank, and the same for the first day of the month, eg. Look at budget, put air in tyres etc. I'm a single mum so every job is on me).

Take more time for yourself then you might get some valuable perspective on ways to make life easier or just unwind. Your high income could allow you a lot more quality of life than you're getting. Have a bloomin massage once a week.

Have date nights if possible (relevant to the end of my own marriage)

Even though you have a cleaner, get everyone to clear up after themselves, otherwise you're having a couple of tide hours twice a week then living in a mess the rest of it.

That's way out of most people's reach. But for busy single parents or both parents in FT work, I think it helps to use some healthy ready meals like Waitrose curries or Charlie Bigham or COOK, with fresh pasta or filled pasta and a ready made fresh pasta sauce and bagged salad. That way, several dinners per week need almost no prep. Same effect but less expensive than a private chef.

You need a family command centre which in my case is a combination of a whiteboard on the wall, Google calendar on line and a large A4 diary open on the kitchen island. It is very satisfying to put things due on the whiteboard and then rub them off.
For instance you may have an email stating that the house insurance will auto renew on x date, but I personally have to check the money has actually been taken for peace of mind.

I don’t think I’m in the same tax bracket as some of these suggestions but something I’ve found super helpful is used a shared calendar app! We no longer have the “are we busy this day?” or “you didn’t tell me that!” conversations as we can both see and add to the app. If it’s not in the app it’s not happening (or if we end up double booked the one not on the app is the one we don’t do!)

Its particularly useful for things like “did you book the cat into the vets?” because we get notifications when group events are added

You can also add in solo events so useful for me to put in eg hairdressers so DH doesn’t ring halfway through wondering where I am!

making time to invest in relationships with parents who might swap childcare with us

You sound like 'Amandaland'!

Well done you for having the time and brain space for this stuff. Some of us can manage without help and others need help. We’re all different.

We've all capable of doing what we need to get by in life.

I outsource a lot of this stuff because I work very long hours in a high stress job plus do various voluntary roles, have elderly parents needing help themselves and have three kids and a dog

Cut your hours down and chill. Why are you doing voluntary roles when you're struggling to cope?

Stop referring to everyday life as "the mental load" for starters.

We also have the same diners Mon-Fri which takes away any planning. Monday is pasta, Tue is curry, wed is nachos, Thur is sausages and tatties/something out off the freezer and Friday is pizza! At the weekend we make different stuff if we can be bothered.

We use the tasks app to keep a running shopping list and because we eat roughly the same stuff we have a list to buy on Monday and a list to buy on Thursday and then a list for irregular stuff like washing powder and so on.

We have a joint email address which we use for all house stuff so renewals, reminders, quotes, logins etc all go to that email address. There's a Google calendar and Google drive associated with that email which we put all appointments in and save any documents in drive. No hunting for evidence of a no claims bonus or insurance info!

I don't quite understand how a PP divides up doctor and dentist appointments, don't you just make another dentist appointment when you pay for the one you just had?

Well, I think mental load is a real thing. My dp and I both work full time in demanding jobs, but it's generally me who's juggling work with planning dinner and whether to stop for ingredients, thinking about if the dc have their PE kit or lunch money, making time to invest in relationships with parents who might swap childcare with us, noticing whether we've seen gps recently and remembering their medical appointments, and a thousand other things. It isn't nothing.

Luckily my dp can see it, and we've been on a journey together to make things more equal. He uses a lot of reminders on his phone to think about things that in the past he wouldn't have considered.

My tip for this thread is that setting a regular pet food redelivery takes away a job.

I'm a lone parent of 4 so the whole load is on me.
I agree about the online shopping pass. I pay £7.50 a month for unlimited deliveries which helps massively. I pay for someone to mow my grass ( not much of it but still gets out of hand and I hate doing it ).
I'm not a fan of batch cooking but I do prepare a meal in advance of if I know it's going to be a busy evening etc and I can ask one of the kids to put it in oven.
I have had people in to do jobs that I could perhaps do myself but really don't have the time or inclination eg painting the downstairs loo.

See, this is the kind of tip I’m here for. I hate changing the beds. I don’t know how it hadn’t occurred to me to get the cleaner to do it for me. Thanks!