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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To absolutely despise Ireland?

123 replies

Barbielovesken · 11/02/2012 13:26

I hate it. I hate absolutely everything about this country. All we do is work and work and for some good measure, work a bit more.

Any benefits to this? Absolutely none. We dont go anywhere or do anything and don't see each-other as when ones off the others working and vice versa. Just to keep our heads above water. To pay more and more and more taxes and take more and more pay cuts that we see absolutely nothing for.

It's relentless.

I am just 26 years of age and swear that the life has been sucked out of me by the hell hole that is this country. I hate it here and we can't leave - we're trapped here.

OP posts:
Original poster
Barbielovesken · 11/02/2012 14:46

theparanoidandroid genuine question - how do you suggest I "get off the mat and sort myself out"? How do I "do something about it"? Because I work full time, my dh works full time and then he works another job part time at night. Up until last year I was studying at night for my law degree at night while my children were sleeping so I was trying to educate and better myself.

I'm genuinely curious.

OP posts:
DarrowbyEightFive · 11/02/2012 14:47

Ireland went a bit crazy in the 1990s and right up to 2008, when they worked out the hard way that there was a price to be paid for the Celtic Tiger. TBH it is Ireland's own fault for not working out that a bubble is followed by a bust - property was horrendously overpriced and has now just boomeranged back in the other direction, hopefully over the next ten years it will balance out to its true value. The misery now was caused by greed then. Yes, the health system is shite - why on earth did nobody set up a decent system in the years when the money was there? But the Irish have faced much worse in the past - this is hardly a potato famine - and it's a nation that can produce great stuff creatively when under pressure.

TheParanoidAndroid · 11/02/2012 14:52

get back to studying. Sell something to pay for it, or go on a reduced rate with your mortgage (everyone else has!), so you can get a better job in the future. Thats what I'm doing.
You can't just wait for someone else to come along and sort it all out for you. Get on with it yourself, whatever you need to do.

And to the "its all your own fault" brigade, shove it up your hole. People aren't economists, and most of us didn't get rich in the boom, we worked and bought family homes same as everyone does around the world. If we'd have known we'd be stuck in houses worth 25% of what we paid for them we would have done differently, but we took advice from experts and got burnt. So we suck it up and get on with it, but really don't need to hear how we should all have known what would happen and we deserve all we get. Hmm

southeastastra · 11/02/2012 14:59

can you not apply for a student loan to finish the final year, or do it in the open university (though i have no idea how that works in ireland). things will get better :(

Haziedoll · 11/02/2012 15:10

YANBU to feel the way you do, I didn't realise that you had to pay for visiting the doctor and medicine for children. I thought things were tough here.

Get a student loan and finish your degree. You are young and have a bright future ahead of you. The Law degree is the passport to a prosperous future for you and your family.

ilovemydogandMrObama · 11/02/2012 15:13

It depends on your comparison. True, if you are comparing Ireland to the UK, then yes, it's better in terms of free at the point of delivery health care and education AT THE MOMENT.

But if you compare Ireland to the USA, you would probably have an excess and co payment not to mention prescription charges and god help you if any needed admitting into hospital. When I was in the USA visiting family, DD1 needed Ventolin and had to pay $35.00 for it which I wasn't used to!

edam · 11/02/2012 15:16

Sorry life's so shit.

Paranoid, dead right, except that the economists themselves were party to the mess. Plenty of economists working in financial services helped to cause the crisis. Feckers.

HoleyGhost · 11/02/2012 15:17

YANBU, but you do have options

You are in negative equity, so you should be considering bankruptcy. I hear the process in the UK is quicker, so look at the option of doing it here.

You have choices, not the ones you wanted to have, but you are still in control of your lives.

lolaflores · 11/02/2012 15:23

You could leave. Post the keys to the house to the bank. Pack up your stuff and get the boat. We did in the 80's. It was so unbearably shit, whilst charlie haughy was stuffing h is account with money that was not his, my mother, a widow a cleaner in the hospital was paying 60p in the pound tax. Go figure. Ireland is always undone by its nepotism, corruption and buddy systems. Leave and stay gone, the view is much better from afar.

MoreBeta · 11/02/2012 15:24

Barbielovesken - quite frankly you would be better stop paying your mortgage and using the money to finish your degree and walking away from your house and your debts. Your house will never be worth what you paid for it for many years and the bank will be loathe to repossess it anyway. You might as well live for free, finish your degree and leave for the UK or elsewhere. I have friends in Ireland and I know many people are doing just this.

Indeed, Ireland as a country needs to default on all its debt and exit the Euro. It will in the end without question just as Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy surely will.

There is no point in Irish people trying to pay off their own an dtheir country's debt and it is imoral to force them to do so when the bankers were bailed out with taxpayer money.

lolaflores · 11/02/2012 15:26

Oh and my mum and dad left in the 60's went back in the 70's and were pretty well disillusioned by the place. my mum in particular and she wasn't going to sit back and watch the whole shitty process start again. ireland works for a few people. very few.

TheParanoidAndroid · 11/02/2012 15:30

You can't just go to england for bankruptcy tourism, you actually have to move there. And if you stop paying entirely and move its really quite easy for them to find you, and then you owe the mortgage, the legal costs, and all associated costs, with interest.

Ireland is not going to default and it certainly isn't going to leave the Euro. Don't be listening to these foreign armchair economists, they haven't the first clue.

NormanTebbit · 11/02/2012 15:31

Oh it is tough for many, many people at the moment ( and others seem untouched by the economic downturn)

Question is - do you weather the storm or jump ship abroad? Do you have skills? Could you emigrate?

I am so sorry you had to walk away from your studies, that's a bitter thing, can you get a loan? But also is there work in Ireland as a lawyer right now?

HoleyGhost · 11/02/2012 15:32

what MoreBeta said

quit being a passive victim, you know the game is rigged against you so stop trying to follow the rules so obediently

NormanTebbit · 11/02/2012 15:34

Can you rent out your property?

NorthernWreck · 11/02/2012 16:50

Wow, I had no idea that healthcare in Ireland was not free at the point of delivery. I sort of think of Ireland as being very similar to the UK.

I think you are really young, and If you did just fuck the fuck off with the mortgage, pack up the kids and your mum and start again somewhere else, you would recover financially while still being young, and it wouldn't be the end of the world.
Don't listen to people who say "thats life, get used to it".
It doesn't have to be, and you sound like you have the inner determination to get out if you want to.

ZZZenAgain · 11/02/2012 16:59

YANBU it sounds crap but honestly loads of people would still give their right arm for what you have : 3 beautiful children, a house (warts and all), extended family around to help and money coming in. I don't mean to be twee, we all know most people in the world are worse off and I read you loud and clear : it is all one big ceaseless grind.

Hope a window opens somewhere for you

FlangelinaBallerina · 11/02/2012 17:24

It's understandable that you're fed up. Things are hard in Ireland now. The fact that lots of other countries are also in recession is hardly going to make you feel any better. Of course things would also have been shit in your parents generation, and many before that. And lots of them felt like you did and left, too!

aldiwhore · 11/02/2012 17:59

YANBU to feel utterly pissed off that all your efforts bring you little return and there's not much quality of life. YANBU if you are sick and bloody tired of hearing 'well we're in a recession', YANBU to think THIS SUCKS.

YABU if you think its something inherently Irish, you don't have the monopoly on working your guts out for feck all.

I'm not sure its a case of growing up messymammy she's just ranting, its nigh on impossible to see the great things when you're angry... I think its more a case of 'calm down, plod on, you're not alone'.

Garliccheesechips · 11/02/2012 18:35

You might think you're in dire straits but I had to leave Ireland for economic reasons and now I must raise my child without the support of my family and friends. I miss my parents every single day. Family does visit me and I cry every time they leave. I have a lovely DP and PILs but it's not the same.

I think you need perspective. At least you can stay.

MULLYPEEP · 11/02/2012 18:54

If your house is worth 25% I'd seriously consider giving it up. At 26 you could shoulder the blacklist for a few years. Save a deposit, pay your fees, get a plan and bolt.

lolaflores · 11/02/2012 19:02

Yeah, you know what and heres the thing. Why in the name of fuck did everyone in ireland need to build their own houses? Why? What the fuck was that all about? I seriously did not understand this drive to build yer own. Mental it was. Parts of the coast road from Galway to Clifden fucking destroyed with ugly over the top builds. Most them belongiing to my cousins to be honest but the sense of entitlement about it was flabbergasting

TheParanoidAndroid · 11/02/2012 19:09

it doesn't work like that here, mully, its a different country with different laws.

MrsJoeDuffy · 11/02/2012 19:10

Barna is destroyed Lola. always that that when I drive through.

HoleyGhost · 11/02/2012 19:19

oooh the ugliness of some homes! The sense of entitlement those peons had, building their own homes! How very fucking dare they

Hmm

Lolaflores are you pleased that so many are in negative equity now? Economic devastation will kill off their flabbergasting sense of entitlement.

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