Does everyone on MN - except me - have a high flying highly paid highly stressful job

[IamtheMistressofmyFate]

Is anyone a hairdresser married to a mechanic? Nursery nurse married to a delivery driver?

I keep reading about women having to go back to work or they'll fall off the career ladder and never recover. Everyone seems so BUSY and STRESSED and high flying. Or they've burnt out and have downsized so they can bake bread.

Is anyone else just pootling along like me - not setting the world alight with their brilliance and ambition?

Shannonrockallmalin (love the user name as I drink my tea from my shipping forecast mug!) me too! Have a degree from a top university, and work as a library assistant. I did work in better paid office jobs, but a combination of bullying at work and mental health problems problems put paid to that. I've worked in a library for 15 years now and love it. I love working with the public (well, most of them!) and the job is varied and fun. I also leave it behind when I go home. Not rich, but very happy.

The thing is, people only post on threads relevant to them. So, if I see a post 'how do I earn £60k a year?' I don't reply as I have no idea! The people that do reply and encourage more people similar to them on this thread- just as this thread has turned out! I do think the demographics of MN are reasonably well-off, most people are home-owners (I'm not but I earn above average salary) and so forth, but within that, there's huge variation which is a good thing as it reminds the fortunate not to brag about it so much!

OP i get why you've started this thread and i certainly agree with you that either the demographic here is skewed. But it's just denigrated into some kind of competitive face-off. Stress pervades most people's lives. Wincing everytime you open a gas bill or the total is announced at Tesco is hugely stressful, even if your job is simple and leaves you enough time for childcare as nd family. A SAHP stuck at home all day with shrieking toddlers, who might have stepped off a ladder, or wonders how they will ever get on one, is stressed. The woman who "clatters around in high heels clutching a flat white" might stand in a hot, crowded tube carriage for 2 hours each day to get to work, given an impossible caseload and expected to work til midnight and all weekend routinely (trust me I know).

I am stressed and I believe other people when they say they are stressed. It's not a competition.

We are a low income family. I have health problems which mean I can’t work, we have ds who has severe autism and dh works full time for minimum wage. Some of the threads on here seem like another world to me!

Given that only 1% of the working population earn six figures I think a lot of people fib!

I run a business but it’s not glamorous exciting or even stressful.
Sure I never get all my work done but like there’s always tomorrow
A job is no reason to be stressed I’d rather live longer
I’m not on big money either

It's the internet. MN is like a school reunion where everyone is adding a bit to their salary/home value/planned holiday. It isn't real.

I'm a single mum. I have no qualifications past GCSE. I earn £8.50 an hour doing admin. I currently rely on tax credits and maintenance from my ex to top up my income.

I am not stressed though to be fair. I only have one child to feed and clothe, I live in a really cheap area so I can manage rent and bills. I have no car as work/school/shops are all within walking distance.

Although it's low paid and quite repetitive my job is not stressful. I work hard but as soon as I step out of the door I can forget about it. Then I can fully concentrate on DS when I'm at home. I feel like I have a really good work/life balance.

The income threads aren't all 100k+ folk though, that's a big exaggeration. Nowhere near. The salaries mentioned are definitely higher than average, not a great surprise as the demographic of this site skews disproportionately middle class. But what usually happens is you get a few of them and sometimes they start getting a bit competitive with each other. They therefore end up being the focus of the income threads because they're taking up a disproportionate amount of space. People pay attention.

Now I've no doubt some posters are bullshitting. There are a couple of out and out fantasists on here, not all of them pretending to be rich rather than poor either. But I don't find it particularly implausible that a site with this reach and demographic would contain a few dozen people with 100k+ incomes either themselves or their spouse (because one starts to recognise the same posters after a while so that's probably all it is) who like talking about it. There are actually thousands and thousands of households in the UK who have this level of income. As someone said upthread, not everyone is aware of the inflation of certain corporate salaries in the past couple of decades.

Incidentally my household income is pretty much bang on median for our family size, so I've no real horse in this race.

emmcan I see what you mean, except I don't avoid MN like I avoid school reunions, because those are no place to be when you're losing at life.

I’m an accounts assistant, pretty sure I could earn a fair amount more if I wanted but it would require paying for childcare (PT currently) and putting my big girl pants on to take the plunge.

DP is a lorry driver. Common as muck we are but we have plenty for rent and bills and are happy!

The one person I know who does earn 6 figures is so down to earth and never talks about it. Rather telling that so many on here love a good brag 😏

It's just like FaceBook. You end up with a mixture mainly comprised of only the things which people are happy to reveal, or the amended truth.

Hence the sense that most posters are successful, rich and busy.

I'm in a medium paid, low-stress job that I like (editor). I don't feel a need to pretend I'm flat-out or ultra-stressed and I'm not going to work time I'm not paid for.

I do think there is a degree of 'competitive stress' where people worry that others will think they must be low status if they're not working every hour god sends, when actually they have a mid-level office job that really isn't that demanding. That said, there are terrible managers, and people like emergency services, docs, nurses and teachers genuinely are under stress.

My other half is digital contractor, so we have periods of stress when it takes a while to find a new contract, but his jobs are usually OK, but being contracts, there is the threat of sudden breakdown/cancellation, which has happened once.

The majority of posters don’t come across that way to me. Yes, there is a proportion of highly paid City workers but to me it seems as if there are a lot more SAHMs, p/t workers or those in ‘average’ middle of the range jobs on MN.

There seem to be more posters, imo, complaining about not getting home until 4.30/5pm (lucky them!) than there are posters complaining about not getting home until 8/9pm.

I work in a crèche in a family centre. Low stress but shit pay and prospects. Definitely looking to get a better job in the near future, DD2 will start nursery school next September so at least I will have reliable childcare during term-time.

Stressful yes, high flying yes, well paid not really -public sector!!

By MN average income standards we should pull our socks up a bit. (Earn less than £100k. Between us
But in real life it is a high income.
Enough to afford a nice house, lifestyle, holidays, car, clothes etc.
It's a bit stressful, especially of late because we've had enough and ready to pack it all in. Luckily we've saved enough to enable us to retire early and aren't really attached to our careers like some on MN.
DH made it to A levels, me O levels then college.
We work to live not the other way round.
I see a lot of threads were people are rich/high earners yet frugal.
That's not us.

Hit post too soon. I had DD1 at 19 and sort of fell into childcare as the hours were ok (crap money though). I’m only really starting to think about a proper career now at 32 rather than just a low-paid job. I’m single with 2 children and plan on staying that way, so I can’t rely on a partner anymore to help financially.

Haven’t figured out yet what I’m going to do, but I’m working on it!

From what I read it seems to be mostly husbands working high flying, high stress jobs and they use it as an excuse to do nothing with their children and get full nights sleep.

use it as an excuse to do nothing with their children and get full nights sleep

Not in my case

But dh likes to be busy and i dont like that at all!!

I feel like a failure career-wise compared to most on here. I earn £24k as an executive assistant to four directors, in central London. It's the highest paying job I've ever had, and I'm 29. No DC yet as frankly I'm not sure I can afford one.
I'm studying for a degree in the evenings and applying for graduate schemes in the hope this will help me progress.

Not in my case either Rufus! DP does all the night feeds! That’s why it shocks me so much.

I'm a SAHM

I'm in what people would consider a high flying well paid job, but I don't find it stressful as I love it. After years of travelling and some long hours, I do normal office hours.

My ex-H was a van driver and I happily worked as a cleaner, office temp and in a chip shop, after the 2 times I was made redundant.

I alternate between teaching part time and being a SAHM. I only teach 2 days a week when I do work so 2 days a week for 39 weeks a year. No TLR for me because I can't be arsed and I'm always going off on mat leave anyway. No fancy career for me. I'm going to baby gym today with a baby and a 2 year old then ferrying older DC about after school and I get to do it all in leggings.

DH is one of your high flyers though. He works long hours but he does vacuum. He can't make an omelette but he makes a good cheese toastie.