To be jealous of Amanda Owen (Yorkshire Shepherdess)

[AliceAbsolum]

Her life just looks amazing. Yes obviously hard at times and not perfect. But 9 lovely children, she's gorgeous, kind husband, successful career, meaningful job and being able to spend time outdoors with her family. All the animals and space.
What I'd give for that life!

I have had experience of SCBU and I will judge if I like thank you, I don’t need your permission

Then you should know better.

I think there is so much to admire about the whole family, their values, what they teach their kids, how they interact with them. The relationships their kids have with each other. Their work ethic. I think Amanda is an amazing woman, and Clive is a great Dad. However I struggle to understand why they just kept having kids and not using contraception. They are providing for them, but that many children in the modern world is just crazy.

Love this series. The children are so lovely..the parents done a good job and all go to school. Don't think the youngest (Nancy) was ready last year and seeing her in series 5 she benefited from an extra year with her parents

I didn't know the dad also had - what? Another 2 kids? So he's fathered 11 weans? If he lived on a sink estate the programmes they'd be making about him would have a slightly different angle, wouldn't they?

I just realised there were two children from his first marriage. His daughter from that marriage seems to be pretty bitter, although it seems her mother left Clive .

Are they a bit like the Radfords? As in the first series is a nice insight into their lives, but then it becomes more about them as a brand.

Maybe the mean comments about Amanda come from Jealousy because she is happy and her kids....all 9.... are happy.
She married Clive 21 years ago and the age gap is large.
They are in different stages of life really.

Clive was divorced before he met Amanda so an adult step daughter is not really a step daughter imo.
I love watching the kids interact and I never see kids so happy while not clamouring for material goods.
I don't care if some moments are edited out But you can't tell me those young ones are acting! They are happy.
They don't moan at their mum to do everything for them. And they love being independant.
Clive is a wonderful father to them and that is something mnay kids would love, a Dad who is with them and loves them and talks to them.

I think Amanda has done a great job with her brood and I wouldn't care if we don't see the "bad" times.

Are there a lot of mean comments? The meanest I can see is that she has become just another instamum. Which is the truth.

I am not at all jealous of her lifestyle, because I would hate it. I do find it fascinating, and I am a bit in awe of how easy she makes it all seem. However I am very well aware that we only see very edited highlights and the reality may be very different. I do think all the kids seem lovely and all seem to get on very well with each other. It’s very sad if they have split up, and I hope they can work it out.

I do think we have seen the last of the TV show though - obviously if they have split up then they won’t be able to make the programme any more, but even if they stay together I still think it’s finished - the end of the series last week definitely had an air of finality about it, more than just a usual end of series feeling, with lots of looking back at previous years.

@ChessieFL

I am not at all jealous of her lifestyle, because I would hate it. I do find it fascinating, and I am a bit in awe of how easy she makes it all seem. However I am very well aware that we only see very edited highlights and the reality may be very different. I do think all the kids seem lovely and all seem to get on very well with each other. It’s very sad if they have split up, and I hope they can work it out.

I do think we have seen the last of the TV show though - obviously if they have split up then they won’t be able to make the programme any more, but even if they stay together I still think it’s finished - the end of the series last week definitely had an air of finality about it, more than just a usual end of series feeling, with lots of looking back at previous years.

I thought it was very poignant when Clive and Amanda walked through the field talking about the last of the kids going off to school and Clive said he'd go one way and Amanda should go the other.

I thought it was very poignant when Clive and Amanda walked through the field talking about the last of the kids going off to school and Clive said he'd go one way and Amanda should go the other

Yes! I noticed that

All their kids are stunning looking

Apart from the quad bike riding with no helmets ( which is a huge bugbear of my dh's,he always mentioned it when he sees it in telly) what are the other dangers on the farm people have noticed,it's been mentioned a few times? I rember the pony being lifted and brought back in the land rover

@NeverDropYourMoonCup the farmhouse didn’t have any heating, I had an electric blanket for warmth and ice inside the windows.

I’m sure living on a council estate isn’t the most pleasant but I genuinely don’t think it is in anyway comparable to the graft that upland farmers put in.

My husbands family farms in the highlands, have an generator for electric. Most upland farmers aren’t living some life of luxury.

Kids riding a quad bike with no helmet is shockingly neglectful.

@MrsPelligrinoPetrichor things like climbing up tall, potentially unstable piles of bales. Wandering around a farm yard when machinery is working and lorries many turn up for deliveries. Bound to be chemicals around somewhere. Workshop with all the tools. I could go on. Farms are not playgrounds. Having said that, children often love helping out and it's important they can, but supervision is needed.

[quote littlemisslozza]@MrsPelligrinoPetrichor things like climbing up tall, potentially unstable piles of bales. Wandering around a farm yard when machinery is working and lorries many turn up for deliveries. Bound to be chemicals around somewhere. Workshop with all the tools. I could go on. Farms are not playgrounds. Having said that, children often love helping out and it's important they can, but supervision is needed.[/quote]
Presumably they are supervised though- camera team are there. What makes people think they're alone when they do those kind of things?

Quad bike no helmet was bad but nothing else bothered me

I just get that impression! What happens when the camera team aren't there, which is surely most of the time? Maybe I'm wrong but they come across as quite free-range and there are pros and cons of that on a working farm.

There's loads of things that kids are only allowed to do when their parents are around,aren't there?

Clearly they've survived so far!

They must be pretty careful or there's no way they'd have got to the ages they are in one piece! I did notice Reuben wearing a helmet in a recent episode- thank God.

I cringe at the little ones raking in flip flops and strappy sandals!

Farmers don't have higher rates of mental illhealth than the rest of the population, it's purely access to means (guns) that makes their suicide rates so high. If we all had relatively easier methods, the rate of suicide in the general population would increase.

@AliceAbsolum

Farmers don't have higher rates of mental illhealth than the rest of the population, it's purely access to means (guns) that makes their suicide rates so high. If we all had relatively easier methods, the rate of suicide in the general population would increase.

I’m not sure this is the whole picture, obviously opportunity is part it, and would increase the success rate of suicide attempts, but there are a lot of stressors and loneliness is rife (particularly in older single male farmers). Vets are another industry with high suicide rates, one explanation is that death (euthanasia) becomes normalised as a solution to seemingly intractable distress/suffering due to the routine practice in animals. I imagine farmers are likely to have a similar mentality.

Also, Amanda was shearing with huge dangly hoop earrings in a recent episode. Just waiting for a sheep's foot to catch them! Maybe they were just for the cameras.