To not understand claims that life admin is 'not a thing'

[LabradorsInThePond]

I keep reading this on MN threads about organisation, time management etc. And that the life admin tasks of renewing insurances and checking mortgage rates can't take up that much time. But I spend a huge amount of time in the throes of life admin. We live a pretty normal, busy family life. I work 4 days in a professional role and can easily spend the 5th day (or at least half of it) in the throes of dreaded life admin.

My list tomorrow extends to twenty three separate items. None of which involve renewing insurances, but they do include buying clothing items (Scout shirt etc.), paying instrument hire, photocopying medical reports for school, booking airport parking, collecting worming tablets, booking a restaurant, buying zoo tickets, arranging a delivery of flowers for mum's birthday, an online grocery shop, buying a thank you gift, arranging a birthday party, booking a roofer, buying new windscreen wipers, emailing the GP, updating kids' Nimbl cards, finding a way to teach DS about dividing decimals, paying various people online etc.

None of these are yearly tasks, and next week there will be another 23 items to complete. It is relentless. DH does most of the house and long-term financial admin and he's also executing his father's too-complicated will, which makes my 23 items look like peanuts.

Do we just have an over-committed life, or does anyone one else find (what others consider non-existent) life admin burdensome and time-consuming? What am I doing wrong here?

Christ in heaven, some of the martyrdom on this thread!

Claiming the life admin is relentless and giving an example of having to apply for a passport... that's something you have to do ONCE every 10 YEARS! It's the absolute opposite of relentless!

I don't know how some people function.

Whoever is stuck doing the passport, it is likely to take you at least 10 years just to get through to the post office! 😁

*passport office

I do this stuff too but I enjoy it- I’ve chosen to do it so it’s not some awful burden, it’s just my life. It’s the choosing to do it and then whingeing about it that I don’t get.

Things like, how exactly do you ring the doctor and get an appointment booked in five minutes flat?

I can book an appointment with my GP online and get seen within a week. I can also order repeat prescriptions online and get them collected within a few days from a pharmacy of my choice.

Finally, two things - does anyone’s partner (assuming you have one) help with the life admin? If not, why not?

Yes, of course he does. We each do our own life admin and have deliberately chosen not to have children so our entire life isn't taken over with tasks, activities and running about after them, lol.

And, when you’re watching TV whilst arranging care home stuff, making appointments for hospital tests or chatting with family on the phone to arrange restaurant trips, how do you keep up with the plot? Or actually, you know, relax?

Those things take maybe 15-20 minutes a week for me, so it's hardly taxing and I don't find that it takes away from my ability to relax either? I don't know, I just don't find organising meals out or booking tickets online stressful, so I just do it while I have the TV on and I consider that part of my down time.

But I've also deliberately set up my life so that I have as little "admin" as possible. I run my own business and keep it to part-time hours so I have plenty of time to myself. My bills are all paid by direct debit and insurances are set to renew automatically unless I choose otherwise. I chose pets (cats) that involve very little input day-to-day and while we also have a dog, he comes to work with me and I can walk him as part of my work too. Food shop is done online and I have the same slot each week etc. I also chose not to have DC as I didn't want my life overrun with school runs, activities, holiday clubs, numerous appointments for other people etc.

Clearly lots of people want kids and lots of animals and love that kind of life, and of course that's absolutely fine, but many don't seem to want to accept that that life is naturally going to come with an increased amount of work, "admin" and time-consuming tasks. The more children and pets you have, the more work there's going to be.

I generally (disabilities and illness aside) think life is as busy or as stressful as you make it, for the most part.

Wow I'm not sure how some people function as adults.

Even if you work 60 hours a week, you should be able to slot in these admin tasks here and there. Get a grip.

@WorriedWoking

My gp you can book on the app service. So literally half a minute. Must be a pain in the bum to have to phone them though. If you need regular appointments for a long term illness can you speak to the surgery and explain the issue with getting through?

I wouldn’t say my husband ‘helps.’ I don’t really like that as a phrase. To me it’s a bit like ‘oh my husband helps with housework and babysits too.’ I just see it as him doing normal things that need to be done. So if he made a doctor appointment I wouldn’t see it as helping, I’d see it as him making a doctor’s appointment. If that makes sense!

I do this stuff too but I enjoy it- I’ve chosen to do it so it’s not some awful burden, it’s just my life. It’s the choosing to do it and then whingeing about it that I don’t get.

Well summed up, IMO.

It's obvious that having multiple children and pets is going to involve an increase in your workload, and that if you choose to hand-make costumes and take them to multiple activities each week, then that means even more work again.

It's not that there's anything wrong with having multiple kids who do multiple activities, or with having five dogs and horses etc, but at least accept that you chose that life and therefore, to some extent, you chose to have loads of admin and appointments and to lose a big chunk of your free time.

But you’ve still had to do them?

it doesn’t matter what you call them, they’re still things that need doing and you have to spend time on.

I haven’t seen anyone complaining that the tasks are onerous or that individually they take hours just that they do add up. It doesn’t matter whether you do them on your lunch break or while sat on the sofa or if you set aside time to do them, they still get done somehow

That sounds incredibly tiresome.

You're berating someone else because their teens might be doing things they don't particularly want to at times, yet you're the one saying holidays are "strictly family time", whether anyone else likes it or not.

Bizarre way to think...

I'd also rather be at the Trafford Centre that sweating on some Greek Island being forced to enjoy it, but each to their own.

I completely agree. 😂

Some people are just naturally or have learned to be more efficient. Usually, when you are very limited in time to start with, you manage to find ways to do things well quicker.

I helped a friend moved last week. I started following her plans but after 1/2 hour, I couldn't take it any longer how inefficient she was. I suggested I took over the organisation of it. As a result, we were finished half as fast as if we continued her ways. She was amazed how quickly we got down with it in the end.

I had no choice but to become efficient working FT, with 2h travel a day, single mum, no help at all from family. I couldn't have coped otherwise.

Totally agree with this.

What always surprises me on some of these threads is that people who've outsourced (or have relevant tech) seem to complain all the more.

For example, "pay the cleaner, do online shop, load the dishwasher" should take a lot less time and energy than "clean the bathroom, go to Aldi, do the washing up"- which many people do habitually without it being a massive burden.

I really need to know because being able to do this one thing alone would vastly improve my life. I’m lucky if I can even get through to my doctors in fifteen minutes, let alone book an appointment that work won’t prevent me from attending, oh and that’s even going to take place this month. Some of you must have amazing NHS facilities in your area, or do you go private?

Yeah, it takes ages to get through to our GP too, but I just stick the phone on speakerphone while I'm waiting and get on with whatever else I'm doing while I wait. So the actual conversation with the receptionist only takes a couple of minutes.

Obviously, there is an issue if your employer won't allow you to attend routine GP appointments, but that's not really a life admin issue, is it? Our GP offers telephone consultations these days, which typically take 5 mins max...easier to fit into the day than ever before, I find. They're usually happy to work around any work meetings etc that I might have booked in for the day.

Honestly I think executive function skills exist on a spectrum. Some people are great at them, some people aren't so great, some people's are impaired by ADHD or autism (hi!) etc etc. I get life admin done but I reckon I'll always be on the left hand side of the bell curve for it. Which is fine by me.
What's not fine by me is all the people on this thread with their fake concern ( "how DO you function") or insults ("blithering idiots"). If it's not considered polite for me to berate people who are less academically intelligent than I am, I don't think it's polite for other people to act like I'm a mouth breather for finding filling in forms marginally more stressful.

I can understand why people find everything a chore if they phone everyone to do things rather than doing it online, as you can never get through and once you do you speak to someone who is reading from a script, can't help, and puts you through millions of security questions. But that isn't a "life admin" problem, that is a customer service problem.

I generally (disabilities and illness aside) think life is as busy or as stressful as you make it, for the most part

Indeed and by having one child only, no pets and doing everything online as far as possible, I've made life as stress-free as I can.

I’ve noticed though a big variation in the admin involved in something like ‘childcare’. When DD was in nursery we paid the same amount every month by direct debit and TFC. It just worked without having to do anything and only had to think about it once a year when prices changed, plus the quarterly TFC eligibility check. So that’s 4 x per year for TFC, once in 4 years to set up direct debit.

DD starts school and goes to wraparound. This is on a ‘contract’ booking so automatically booked for us, but the amount varies per month so have to log in to TFC (a bit of a palaver as MFA and need to be on my computer) monthly to pay it, plus the eligibility confirmation which never seems to coincide with that log in. Holiday club is booked online ad hoc, then transferred from TFC. So you’ve now got faffing around with TFC many times per year, holiday club to book 6x per year (not forgetting organising it around annual leave), plus all the school log in to consent to things, send money via ParentPay, remember packed lunch for a trip etc.

We relocate and the new holiday club doesn’t take online bookings, so we now have to print off a PDF form, fill it in, either scan/photo and email back or return it in person. Half the time they don’t acknowledge it so you have to email again to check you have a place. The amounts for this hol club vary per day depending on what they’re doing so you can’t just do £ x days, but add up all the random bits and then transfer the money.

I’d never have expected it to be so varied in terms of time and brain space.

Medical appts also very variable to book - in our previous location the GP had an app, you booked through it, they rang you at appointed time, arranged to see you in person same day at GP hub if needed, sent prescription to pharmacy. Very easy and straightforward, and took seconds to arrange.

GP in new location can only be contacted via this dreadful online form which they turn off at evenings, overnight and at weekends! It goes on for pages and starts with a picture of the body where you identify where the problem is - I recently got in touch because of fibroids causing flooding periods and had to select ‘tummy’ as the site of the problem, then go through several
screens about stomach problems like diarrhoea before I could select ‘menstrual’! It takes about 15 mins to get through the form for a reasonably computer literate person. If you ring up they just read through the same script after being on hold for ages. It is so much worse and so much more time consuming than the GP in our old location. DH has complex health problems and many prescriptions and he’s having to take so much time getting it sorted.

@vivainsomnia @TambourineOfRepentance Absolutely agree. Those who think these are huge tasks are those who have no other responsibilities.

Where does it stop? Is getting a glass of water life admin? Buttering your toast? Getting dressed in the morning? It's unbelievable.

OP I do a similar thing to how I manage my emails at work - so if something can be done in 2 mins I do it there and then. I then spend 30-60 mins one evening a week doing any admin type stuff that takes longer than that.

I used to work part-time and found random admin was creeping into my 'free' time (actually time with DD) so I switched it to that evening slot. I try and do the lengthier but less often tasks like insurance comparisons and checking up on pension contributions in that slot too.

The evening slot works better for me as I don't want to be on my online banking etc in public and I find it hard to concentrate with DD around talking non-stop!

And I try to plan ahead so if I'm going into the city centre shops (we go about once a month) I'll look for presents/cards needed for the next month or so when I'm there, which avoids last minute panic. I try and avoid shopping on Amazon so that helps with that too. And I have regular things in my basket for the supermarket online shop and a recurring delivery slot so that only takes about 15 mins per week to actually organise.

@pucelleauxblanchesmains makes a good point about executive function skills.

Smart but scattered is a good book if you've not heard of executive function and want to understand more. The authors have a website:

www.smartbutscatteredkids.com/

The self quiz flagged up my lowest scores were in planning, organisation and working memory. This did not come as a surprise to me. These are the very skills involved in keeping of top of all these little jobs. I would bet those people who do not struggle to keep on top of life admin are stronger in those skills.

Perhaps we need to accept we are all different. Some of us will find planning and organisation difficult. Some of us won't.

1. Some people have large families where no one else pulls their weight.

1. Some people equate busyness with moral rectitude and quite like feeling martyred.

1. Some people find executive function difficult and organising tasks nigh on impossible, e.g. those with ADHD.

On balance most people struggling with life admin probably could do with a bit of sympathy and support. (Just not the category 2s - they're annoying 😆)

The hilarious wankiness of this thread continues.

Nobody said doing the passports was a constant chore. (Actually it’s once every 5 years for kids and if you had them at different times the renewals come up at different times, so the 10 years thing is an exaggeration of reality.) What people are saying is that small, relatively easy tasks of that magnitude (or often smaller) can pile up until they feel like they’re a lot.

Nobody said they shouldn’t have to do it.
Nobody said it was not part of normal life.
It should also be perfectly acceptable to say ‘sometimes the housework gets on top of me’ without a million people jumping on you to say how excellently they manage their own housework and to deny that washing or cleaning is a chore.

It is also pretty well established that juggling work, a home, family etc can be really hard going.
That juggle can make the relentless emails to school, family arrangements to make, doctor’s appointments, renewals and purchases, etc etc, feel overwhelming.

How can anybody deny somebody they don’t even know the chance to say ‘I find this tough sometimes’? Is this the level of horribleness we have stooped to now, where nobody is allowed to find anything remotely difficult or annoying without an army of horrible women pointing out their failures to them?

The overbearing privilege of it all is just unbelievable

Some people equate busyness with moral rectitude and quite like feeling martyred

Yes. The constant "she's a busy mum". Not all mums are busy! I'm not. Maybe I am a lazy slattern and should be