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?

Yes this is also true. I tend to buy clothes from places where I know they will fit, so I don't have to trek to the post office to send things back. Going to the post office IS tedious, mainly because along with pharmacies they are the last bastion of Stalinism and are not happy if you don't have to queue for ages.

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

Yep, and you can definitely see it on this thread! People saying they're so busy because they're so thoughtful, caring, sociable and popular, and anyone who isn't as busy as they are clearly has no life 😂

I thought of this thread this morning as I had to attend to two pieces of 'life admin', neither of which should have been necessary to even have to do, in an ideal world. The two took up at least an hour of my morning and did require full focus.

Of course doing a whole half day of things is going to feel like a right pain. Do them as you go along & it doesn't feel like work. I do a couple , maybe 3 at most of things each day, like the items on your list, feet up, with a coffee then go about my day or evening. Saving all of them up so a whole half day is involved is madness. And get flea stuff & wormer delivered monthly, it's way cheaper online . Food shopping & buying clothes aren't admin either tbh.

100% agree @LabradorsInThePond yes online and automation make this easier - but we are all trying to fit more into our lives now so the admin increases and it does seem to disporionatley fall to women

Absolutely this! And why do some posters seem to love belittling others by throwing accusations of "martyrdom" around? It's really sneery and superior and "oh I'm so much better/more efficient/more dynamic than you". On a site where women are meant to be supportive of one another; it's honestly like being back in the fifth form.

@Testina , my son couldn't return the order for two reasons. I've paid for it with my card and need it when returning and he is busy with his gcse exams. I would reckons that's it is usually more than two hours a week dealing these type of tasks. And maybe the fact that everything is done online makes it feel more like a chore. Like work. I'd enjoy much more going to the shops. As the decision would be easier as could check fabric and fit in one go. But I've been finding very hard to find what I want to buy on the High Street.

Flexible jobs/wfh make a massive difference, you can do nowt if your on a ward or have 30+ kids in a class!!!

The other difference is having more money so you dont spend hours looking for cheapest/best value gift/flowers/shopping/insurance etc.

I find not having the luxury of any buffer in the family budget means i spend forever looking to get discounts, best price blue light discount etc....

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

Silly comment.

Life admin is all the secretarial crap your OH doesn't bother his pretty head with and leaves it all to you.

And I am not martyr by the way. Everyone helps out at home. But the admin falls to me and I've been teaching the kids to deal with their own stuff such as telling me when they need new clothes without me having to notice that their trousers are too short or shoes are broken or that there's a deadline to pay for a school trip. But we are not there yet. And checking if mortgage, insurance, etc is about to expire and needs finding better rates is down to me. My husband not long ago didn't even had his credit card on direct debt saying he had a "method" to pay . That would usually result in him incurring late payment charges even though he had money in his current account. So I can't trust him to make financial decisions unfortunately. Before anyone says he is a manchild he is very good at other stuff and pulls his weight in other ways.
I think many of these tasks are also related to the amount of choice we have. I don't think past generations ever had to choose a energy rate, mobile provider or had over 100 different models of washing machine, etc.

You keep saying this. Is this your OH? I can totally understand why people are feeling vexed if they’re the only one facilitating the running of a home, but to categorise it as ‘all the stuff your OH doesn’t bother with’ seems like the problem isn’t ‘life admin’ but ‘useless man child you’re with.’

But if I had a husband who I ‘couldn’t trust with financial decisions’ or who wasn’t capable of normal everyday tasks then yeah I’d feel pissed off. But not because I had to buy zoo tickets or take my kid for a haircut. Because I would be stuck with a useless lump of flesh instead of a life partner.

@Borisisafecklesstoad , Spot on about the money thing. A lot of time is spent trying to getting better rates, discounts cheaper whatever. Spent many weekend hors on my laptop looking for stuff

If that's the case, your problem is not with "life admin", your problem is with your husband.

So the question is, why is your DH so utterly useless and why do you put up with it?

Because mine somehow manages to do all sorts of "life admin" with absolutely zero input from me. He runs a business, does all his expenses, invoices and taxes. He sorts his own MOT, insurance, service, new tyres and car tax. He manages to do food shops, sort bills, send of meter readings, mow the lawn and remember to put the bins out with absolutely zero input from me. He even manages to sort his own GP, optician and dentist appointments!

And that's not bragging - that should 100% be normal behaviour from a grown adult of either sex (disabilities etc. aside, obviously).

I have an exH, folks, but I doubt the majority of women here on this thread are in that position.

Yet it seems they are the ones organising family holidays plus feeding all the DCs breakfast and getting them set for school instead of being able to sit down and just drink an uninterrupted cup of coffee in the morning.

I get the impression that many of the women here share a home with a resident useless man child.

In which case as people said ‘life admin’ is not the problem.

Although to be fair I was a single parent. Without input from their father for quite a bit of it. It still didn’t feel like it was all drudgery and over whelming. But that’s why I think it’s perspective. I saw it all as part of life or parenting.

Well yes, you do it as a single parent, along with everything else that needs to be done.

But what I don't understand is why so many women are clapping themselves on the back for shouldering so much of the burden when there is presumably another adult in their homes who could at least do half of it.

Women here have spoken of getting admin tasks done while watching TV in the evening or drinking coffee in the morning. What is their OH doing while they are busy morning and night getting necessary tasks done? Are they actually giving TV their full attention? Enjoying that morning coffee and planning their workday?

Or is it that the partners of these women do all the cooking, cleaning, and laundry, so it's ok that the women do admin tasks and squeeze them in whenever they can?

Fucking hell, we have gone from Victor Meldrew to the downright pious now.
Do you ever get bored of telling people how it could all be done better? Literally every post gets an instant reply with a full diagnosis from some posters brimming with self importance!

I assume some of these pp literally have no life whatsoever if this thread is anything to go by, so no doubt have no reason to worry about admin!

Life admin is absolutely a thing. All those taks above, I fit round a 50 hours a.week job and a 3 year old. Most are online or telephone tasks that I would.get done at lunchtime, while making the dinner, walking from the station to the office etc.

Just to add, I still take time to my self. I have a quite coffee my myself in the morning everyday. I also take at least an hour a day to go to the gym/have a bath.

My husband does do some of these tasks however.most I prefer to do myself 😆

I read your list and just thought - it's not life admin. It's life!

Some of those tasks are because you then have free time and the finances to go out and enjoy life (restaurant/zoo).

I've never really thought about it beyond just doing what needs to be done.

I work FT in a professional role, am a LP and my ds is disabled so needs me more than the average teen.

They probably do, but again that's not a life admin problem, it's a shitty husband problem.

I'm always surprised on MN how so many people seem to just accept having husbands who do nothing while they run around like blue-arsed flies facilitating it all.

I definitely agree that a big bag of trash for a husband would make all these tasks more difficult. But that’s a husband issue. You’ve got a rubbish husband if you’re trying to do everything and he’s lounging on the couch.

honeybushbunch at risk of derailing the thread, what was your job title when you first started work? In my early jobs I was that secretary that typed the letter but I was also the one called in for the dictation (or, more usually, received the dictation tape) and the one who returned it to the manager for correction etc.We had no "go between". Just curious that's all, I'm finding it difficult to get my head around your role there.

As far as OP goes, I too find it difficult to tackle "life admin" tasks without making notes and keeping lists. Which does make it a task I need to set aside time for and therefore more onerous than I'm sure it needs to be. But I am very bad at switching on and off quickly. A lot of people at work I know do perform the odd personal task on their phones whilst walking from one part of the building to another but I'm not able to do that. When I'm at work my mind is at work and I can, and do quite frequently, forget to order essential meds in my lunch break because my mind can't seem to switch away from work until I exit that door and get into my car! I suppose it's all down to the individual and how they prefer to work.