..to think that it would have been much better to teach me how to cook, clean and do laundry

[idiuntno57]

...rather than get a degree and postgraduate qualifications to pursue a career.

Because as soon as you have more than a couple of kids so many compromises need to be made that sustaining the family/career balance properly whilst remaining sane is almost impossible.

This isn't a man versus women debate (though usually things do default around gender lines) but a what's the point of creating aspirations which aren't sustainable in the real world?

Now if all I knew were home making skills then perhaps I'd feel less frustrated sometimes.

NB I realise that if I'd learnt more about contraception I might not be having this 'what's it all about' wobble

But yes, your parents should have taught you homemaking skills.

it is a lot of work isn't it?
Sometimes I think the fact that I spend so much time cooking, cleaning, doing laundry is because I'm just not that good at it and had I learnt this and not done CDT (badly made plastic brooch anyone??) it would be easier and more satisfying.

Or in after school clubs?
My friend taught in Ghana, in a village school. The children were on a rota for cooking lunch and cleaning the school.

My mother taught me gardening, she is a dreadful cook, so I taught myself that bit.

both my parents had full time careers. But there were only two of us. And the food was icky.

I have postgrad qualifications. My approach to cooking, cleaning and laundry tends to be of basic lifesaving quality: can we live with it like this? Yep? S'probably fine then.

the other thing is that laundry, cleaning and day to day cooking are dull. Knowing that in a parallel universe I could be sipping a latte, talking about fascinating business STUFF when I am in fact scraping poo from a sheet is sometimes a bit depressing.

Totally realise it is about making beds and lying in them but goes back to the if I thought doing them (the beds) was interesting, satisfying and less self pitying and whiney frustrated

sorry should read I would be less self pitying and whiney frustrated

Oh come on, cleaning and laundry aren't exactly skills that need to be taught or that you aren't 'good at'. Cooking would be useful and I wish I was better at that but bunging a few bits in a washing machine and a bit of hoovering and dusting and cleaning the loo - seriously?

My mum taught me to cook, clean, do laundry, sew and knit before I left for Uni. My DD is 9 she can do basic cooking, she can dust her room and sew already. I intend that she will know how to do it all before she leaves home whatever her path.

kellyElly look at Kim and Aggie. They have turned it into an artform. And apparently enjoy themselves

Well anyone who enjoys scrubbing a loo needs help, but you just get on with it. It's not fun but it's no a skill you learn. Cooking, gardening, sewing etc yes, but cleaning your house and washing clothes is just a time thing. I'm a working lone parent and I manage it. I just do a blitz with the cleaning once or twice a week and the washing machine's on pretty much every other night. Sorted!

Kim and Aggie do it on tv. Its a performance.

Not sure I'd enjoy housework any more if I'd never learnt Latin or ancient philosophy. In fact, I'd probably enjoy it less because the ivy league podcasts I listen to while I clean the floor would go over my head.

Also, why do you feel frustrated? Is it the individual tasks themselves, your job, your children, or the day in day out ness of it all? If you can identify what bits frustrate you, you can work to mitigate those or chcange your mindset.

Do you have a career at all? Do you enjoy it?

I think what you're saying deep down OP is something I've sometimes wondered - if we didn't have all this ASPIRATION these days, would we be happier? If you were brought up to be, for example, a blacksmith, because your father had been a blacksmith, and his father before him, would that make for a happier life?

Certainly there is something to be said for the bonding experience of living with people with similar incomes and outlooks, and in a community where there was a job for everyone.

BUT, I suspect there was a lot of unhappiness in the past that we didn't hear about - a lot of frustrated men who were ground down by a manual job they were unsuited to; a lot of women trapped in abusive marriages they couldn't escape from because they had no money; a lot of young people who had to leave education too early but desperately wanted to stay on etc. Education and a career gives you options and choices, which is why people living in poverty around the world are so desperate to get one.

i never used to give domestic stuff a second thought before DC. Then during maternity leave I did find it all so dull and depressing I couldn't wait to get back to work. I don't think it would have been easier if I'd had no career aspirations: I expect I'd just have found my whole life as dull and depressing as I found maternity leave.

I do agree with other posters that cooking cleaning etc are undervalued but important skills. I am a rubbish cook and it really stresses me out now I have DCs. I wish I'd learnt it earlier in life. Some people make it look so easy, throwing together a yummy lasagne.... It would probably take me most of the day and some tears

Why can't you do these things?
I can. I can cook, clean, iron, re-hem trousers, or put in a dart - basics only.
I am teaching ds1(9) to iron and cook.
I can not see why you can't do the basics.

I think it's perfectly possible to have kids and a job and get everything done. DH and I both work FT. 3 kids at home. No cleaner. No nanny/au pair. No family back up ( parents either dead or live over 100 miles away). Laundry done. House clean. Dinner cooked from scratch every night. I have a degree and various professional qualifications. I don't think they were wasted. But then I was cooking and cleaning for a family of 7 from the age of 13 as well as caring for a sick parent, studying at school and doing a Saturday job so maybe I was just well-trained ? And yes DH does do 50/50 cooking, cleaning, laundry and childcare.

My 3 DC are big now and I have been WOH for a while. I pay for childcare out of school hours and bit of cleaning, but most of running the home I and DH do.

I learned how to clean working as a chambermaid in my Uni holidays.

Someone at Uni showed me how to iron. He'd had a job as a butler in his year off.
DH and I both learned to cook by reading the recipes.
A boyfriend taught me DIY.
I used to be able to change a tyre before cars got too complicated

It's not worth spending too long on this stuff. Bear in mind you were probably rubbish at Physics or whatever when you first did it. Put your mind to it, you will be an expert by Christmas.

The endless tedium of it certainly isn't what I imagined my life to be, when I was at school/university, though I knew I wanted to be married & have dc.

If only it had been explained to me what those things involved, I would have been better prepared for it, I mean emotionally rather than on a practical level. Then I don't reckon I'd feel so peed off about it.

Is that what you're getting at OP?

dancing really asking myself/mumsnet whether the life I have would be easier to get on with on a day to day basis if I hadn't known another and if it is possible to enjoy the mundane stuff if you have learnt how to do it brilliantly.

I had a career which was fun but not sustainable with x4 DC. Now I do a (satisfying) form of what I used to do but sporadically due to the nature of the work.

I'm not unhappy per se. Just musingd on the point of it all. Cleaning poo off sheets provides much time for musing I have found.

scraping poo from a sheet

- see, now I have the asnwer as to why I think both is possible and you don't - I'm afraid that if I was faced with a sheet with poo on it nowadays I would be throwing said sheet away and buying a new one. Appalling I know!

You have my sympathy

project YES (but knowing about stain removal would have helped)

maniac a cheapo fitted sheet costs £14 from JL. That is a WHOLE BOTTLE OF GIN wasted.

Now that really would have me musing on the point of life :-)

I wonder about this all the time.