Why are so many people struggling with life?

[Letsgetgoing888]

Not just due to covid, but it’s definitely been highlighted more recently....

But in recent years there seem so many more angry people, stressed people, depressed people, people that can’t control their temper, mental health issues, obese kids, obese adults, people who don’t look after themselves or their kids properly...

I know mental health services are woefully inadequate, but generally as a society we are talking more about mental health, provide benefits, charity support, free healthcare and so much more than in the past.

But more people seem to be really struggling in many different ways, health wise, financially, mentally, emotionally. Suicide rates are higher now than in the past (even pre-covid).

Did they have it right in the old days of stiff upper lip? And if not, why are things so much worse now when there is so much more awareness?

That sounds wonderful Vinyl, but I suspect more of us moved into "flats" without a front door or any heating where clothes in wardrobes were covered in mildew when we first left home.

It is okay 'feel nervous' about a situation, or 'have butterflies' when you are about to do something, or even 'to feel scared' - it doesn't mean "you have anxiety". . Once they tell people "I have anxiety" then it becomes difficult for people to help them see it is normal to be nervous (starting a new job, or speaking in public or whatever) and offer tips and advice.

Well said, me and DH have observed this a lot lately, it seems EVERYONE has to have some sort of 'issue'. It isn't fair on people who REALLY do suffer mental health problems when EVERYONE is depressed, when really they're just a bit fed up (which is normal) and when EVERYONE has anxiety , when they're a bit worried (which is normal. Everything has become a mental illness rather than just a normal state of mind to sometimes have.

Also, being glued to phones and social media is feckin' awful for a healthy state of mind. Why doesn everything and everyone have to be photographed to within an inch of it's life. Live for the moment, enjoy it and stop videoing it all the time. Bloody Kim Kardashian and the rest of the 'look at me' brigade have a lot to answer for.

@KeraB

I was saying that despite all life's miseries and pains, ( throughout history) people might have coped , not because life was any easier, but because misery might have been accepted more as the human condition.
I don't believe life was more simple..... it has always been tough, but different eras just have different challenges.
Sorry to be so gloomy !

@shadypines completely agree with you, I went to the Dr complaining of fatigue everything was fine with my life, I told her that but couldn’t shake the tiredness. I will never forget her words “you are on the verge of a depressive illness” she wrote a prescription for anti depressants and sent me on my way. I was stunned that she did no tests or checks just handed me pills. I was absolutely not depressed.... I was diagnosed with MS a year later one of the symptoms is extreme fatigue

Parenting and the environment has changed enormously. I remember (50 years ago plus) very early on being told by my Mum not to expect life to be fair but to be glad when it was . The corollary was that we should be fair to others. She told us that she gave us enough food, but if we were really hungry , to ask and we could always have bread and dripping. We were warned of the dangers of being spoiled, but did not think of ourselves as really poor. The other indelible memory is one bright summers day when I had not a care in the world she turns up takes me aside and tells me (as an order) "Never ever commit suicide , it destroys families and is very selfish." I said I understood and asked if I go back and play with my brothers. Evidently I got the same lecture as they did. But the world is so different now that making comparisons is probably silly. But perhaps best summarised that our time may have been better and.much easier for parents as we were allowed to be truly children and to learn by failing. Apart from those odd serious lectures from Mum.

People arent not affording homes £100k over budget because they have a £1k iPhone.

My parents grandparents and great grandparents DID have a better standard of living than me/my DCs.

@Sarahandduck18

People arent not affording homes £100k over budget because they have a £1k iPhone.

My parents grandparents and great grandparents DID have a better standard of living than me/my DCs.

I agree, even my parents generation had a better standard because it was pretty much a given you would get a council house so lower rents and it was a home for life. Until right to buy let them buy huge amounts of the housing stock at very affordable prices, nice family homes that were bought for £5-15k were then £100k+ so massive profit to sell or buy a new home.

My grandparents and their parents moved into a nice council house abs stayed there until they died or moved to residential care. Had a state pension at a reasonable age.

Because housing was cheap it was fine for one parent to stay at home with kids meaning no childcare costs- so what used to be a small rent is now expensive private rent or mortgage and childcare.

Now we're faced with high rent/mortgage costs, unrealistic deposits needed to buy a home, needing to save for a pension because we can't assume a state pension will be there when we need it (who can say at 65/70/75 everyone will be physically able to work to afford a decent standard of living?) and with children there is a desire to save for them so they aren't in the dire situation we found ourselves in.

Wages haven't kept up with inflation and now they're frozen again when we're looking at uncertainty around the covid/lockdown fallout as well as brexit.
What difference does a £30 a month phone contract make when we have all this?

"There seem to be a number of people that never teach their dc, that actually, life doesn't always go the way you want it, and that life is unfair sometimes and that learning to deal with that, and learning to deal with being upset about something is a really, really, really valuable lesson for dc to learn as they grow."

That's it in a nutshell, BackforGood.

A good example of this in my own life recently.... DC had bad news and had to deal with it. We had adopted a dog and it didn't work out - older ones were naturally devastated. The sooner children grow up to realise life doesn't go the way you plan, the better. It does help build resilience as they grow up.

I don't shield them from it as they need to learn early on things don't always work out.

Because children weren't taught the basic skill of emotional regulation!! Parents constantly want to rescue their children because they cant cope with their child getting upset! Consequently leading the child unable to control their emotions or have the ability to problem solve in adult hood.

You can have all the resilience and coping skills in the world it doesn’t magic up full employment, secure housing and confidence in your political system.

bluebells I agree, they need a chance to work out things for themselves. All this pandering to children affects how they can navigate their way as they grow into adulthood.

Emotions arent taking as serious as they should which causes lasting effects. One person told me anxiety isnt normal!! I was mind blown.
Anxiety is very much normal it's normal response but people arent taught to manage! They're quickly medicated!! Infuriates me!

I read a paper in an anthropology journal that calculated difference in price of various things across the decades.

The bottom line is that in our parents/grandparents day, essentials (like food, housing, and education) were affordable, and luxuries (like holidays and TVs) were very expensive.

Nowadays this has completely flipped. Housing is now so expensive as to be completely prohibitive to people of the same income level our parents/grandparents easily purchased a house with. There are all sorts of calculations online showing the real cost and cost breakdown between years in the past and now. For example calculating how many hours a man doing a certain job in 1975 would need to work per week to be able to afford to buy a three-bed semi, and the number of hours a man doing the same job in 2020 would need to be able to afford the same house. The difference is astronomical and literally impossible. (In America the same is true for education.) In the 1970s when my parents bought their first house you could buy a house with a small downpayment and easily get a mortgage on just a single salary. Things are very different now.

By contrast, luxuries are now relatively extremely cheap, which can be confusing to the older generation who are used to these things being expensive and rare, things you saved up for and had only rarely or possibly never. So because they don't understand economics, they blame young people for not being able to buy houses on the fact they buy mobile phones and Starbucks, when realistically even if a 20-something gave up all "luxuries" entirely and lived like a monk, they'd probably save maybe £2k a year which certainly wouldn't be anywhere near enough for a down payment, and that's if they could get approval for a mortgage and a willingness to take out a huge mortgage, which is unlikely.

That's a really interesting analysis, Tom.

That is interesting TomHanksintheMoneyPit, thank you. It certainly explains how it is that the different generations find it hard to communicate about these things

i went through uni with no debt, left and went straight into a job and a career, was able to buy a nice house in a nice area

my daughter left uni with 50k in debt, she has a graduate job which took her a year to find and after paying rent she is not left with much else and is constantly being told people in her generation 'have never had it so lucky'

Yes I often wonder about this. All the reasons have already been given above. I sometimes think I'm glad my upbringing was as it was - no central heating, no phone in the house, mum doing washing in a dolly tub, tin bath in front of the fire, etc etc, yes I'm old). We weren't hard up but I guess it was still the wartime mentality of make do and mend, so nothing was wasted. If you couldn't afford something then you went without or saved up. Many now expect everything handed to them on a plate, and must have whatever the latest thing is NOW, no matter if they can actually afford it.

@ginghamstarfish I don’t know how much of your statement is actually true though - and where it is, not much is due to the personal characteristics of people themselves, and how much driven by availability and necessity.

Your point that people went without, or saved up.

Really? Because the phrase “on tick” wasn’t invented this century.

Some people saved up, some people went without. And that’s just the same today - lots of people are not buying things that they can’t afford.

I’m uncomfortable when it’s presented as a moral failing of younger people. (I’m in my 50s, debt free with savings btw)

Credit cards were launched in 1966, and we’re difficult to get. I think if you took 1966-Person and dropped them into 2020 with the same financial pressure as 2020-Person, and with a 2020 credit limit - they’d behave just the same.

I don’t think that older people were “better” at waiting - I just don’t think they had as much choice not to.

I really wish I could see an analysis of debt and bankruptcy in 1960 vs 2020. I have an inkling that if you worked out the % of people who were in debt because “they just wouldn’t wait” vs “unexpected life event” vs “they really had no choice as they needed the car repair to her to work”, you might find that the percentages aligned across the years.

There will always be people making good and bad choices with credit - I don’t think it’s the moral fibre which is different now, but the availability of credit AND how much it is genuinely needed.

Rising cost of living vs rise in wages. Because once upon a time on average you only needed 1 adult in a household working 30-40 hours a week to be able to live comfortably, most families had a stay at home parent. Sundays everywhere was shut for a day of rest and half day closing on Wednesdays, shops shut at 5.30pm culture was mostly 9-5 so most people had more down time, they were home more so had more time to cook proper meals and had more time to spend with their kids and partners. The cost of living is such that it now on average it takes 2 adults in a household working 40hours a week just to get by. Its a very 24/7 culture now with people expected to work longer and later hours so much less downtime and family time. Too little time or to knackered to cook. Takeaway facilities were few and far between, now there are bloody dozens of them.

Smartphones didn’t exist. Kids that were once only bullied at school and had the chance to get respite from it are now bullied round the clock remotely where there is no escape.

Facilities for youths are none existent, entertainment facilities are all now in the city centres rather than local. When I was growing up there were plenty of youth clubs and skating rings and things for kids to do, everywhere had a local cinema that didn’t cost the earth, now they are all big expensive chains miles away from home.

Games are all online, gone are the days you’d get together with friends and all take your games round and play together, half the time kids are playing with people they have never even met as a result they are becoming less social, they are not getting out and getting the same level of interaction they once were.

I also think those that would have once suffered in silence (specifically in DV cases) are more likely to speak out as separation and divorce are no longer the taboo subject they once were.

How can we all actually improve things?

Generational trauma. If the cycle isn’t stopped it just gets worse each generation.

@lardlizard by taking responsibility for our own actions. An stop being entitled, precious and materialistic.

To think of others before ourselves, to be content with what we have, to be kind and generous. To recognise that money and stuff or 'achievement ' (money and stuff) does not make someone a better , more worthwhile person.

@Tara336 that is shocking but not totally surprising at the same time. You would assume if your GP had talked to you a little about your life and perhaps done a few blood tests then common sense would have told them you were not on the verge of a breakdown!! It makes you wonder how many people out there are on tablets they don't need to be on, I bet it's a huge amount.