Things have changed so much , so quickly?!

[doodlywoodlydingdong]

I just had my grown up kids around for dinner, not unusual but it got me thinking how much things have changed in the last 3 years. We are a very typical family. I'm 45 , 4 kids aged 13-25. Between me and my DH we have an income of around £34k but very soon it's going to drop by £4k annually.

Three years ago I would go food shopping and buy pretty much whatever I wanted. If I fancied it, it went into the trolley. Full English breakfast every Saturday, big fat roast dinner with a nice joint every Sunday. Two v cheap foreign holidays a year. I enjoyed making our money stretch as far as it possibly could with holiday bargains etc. Christmas was always glorious with loads of food and some nice gifts. Lots of entertaining. fast forward 3 years.

Today I was stood in the kitchen picking the meat off 6 chicken thighs to feed seven adults and a baby. The roast dinner was totally packed out with veg and spuds. Barely any chicken compared to what I would have served 3-4 years ago. I can't stretch to a joint of pork anymore, a whole chicken is a rare treat. So thighs it is. My kids are eating more and more pasta /noodles based dishes with hot dogs as protein. I have to think twice about what is the most efficient method to cook whatever meal it is to save money on the electric. My dogs are now on the cheapest possible kibble I can find. I was actually relieved when my lovely old cat suddenly died (?!) as I wouldn't have to find the extra money for vets fees as she was knocking on a bit. Thats now £ 18 a month I'm saving on litter and food and I feel like a monster for even typing that.

I use the l local food waste project wherever I can, save every penny I can, but ultimately I'm going to have to give up my mobility car as the money would be much better in my pocket . The trade off is that I will then be house bound and that "freed up " money will be going straight to EON from October .

AIBU to have a feeling of almost grief over all of this? It's been very slow and gradual trickling of price increases etc but suddenly it's taken 6 chicken thighs to push me over the edge and be ridiculously angry and upset about how our money can purchase so much less these days?

How could you not know these are very real life scenarios?

How could you not know that such scenarios have a one in a million chance of happening? What an awful way to live waiting for disaster to fall. And, as you can see from the devastation in @Wowyourebitter’s life, no matter how much you plan for the worst, it’s not enough.

I pay £60 per 1 hour online session for our specialist tutor who supports one of our children with a specific learning need in maths. This is a huge amount of money imho however DC has gone from failing maths to being a C almost B student so worth it for us. Suffice to say, online tutoring (particularly in London) is a nice little earner. Even say you charge £30 a session, just one hour week would more than cover your rent.

I agree there have been some terrible ableist comments on this thread. A lot of other posters have commented on having little sympathy for the OP’s financial circumstances as she is paying such low rent for a house so big that she has a whole floor that she has shut off - which is completely different than begrudging people with disabilities getting any kind of benefits.

I have to say I'm pretty shocked - obviously based on this thread I'm just a lot more risk averse but I'd always plan for the worst, while hoping for the best.

I don't think illness, disability or issues with maintaining a well paying job are that uncommon, I really don't. If you have a family of 6, the odds of something bad happening to one person are not that low. The odds of a child being born needing extra needs are not that low when you have multiple children.

Based on these threads and even just the posters on this one thread it doesn't seem like it's one in a million, it seems like a big reality for many, which is why I think we absolutely should learn to plan accordingly and not hope it just won't happen to us...

Way to miss the point. You can only plan so far. You have an example right under your nose of someone who did plan and saved - and is still in the shit.

When I was in my 20s, Critical illness cover was affordable and used to go some way to ensuring that you’d be ok if things went tits up health-wise. At least the mortgage would be paid off. But now house prices are so outrageous even on 2 salaries and therefore insurance is very expensive. Even if you suck up the monthly cost of that, if you need to claim and manage to pay off the mortgage with the lump sum, what about everything else?

How are adaptations to the house going to be covered? Yes, “sensible” people may have some savings to cover that but after that, what then? where is the opportunity to save more for eventualities like the car or boiler dying? What about the general day to day cost of living, for years and years on end? With rocketing inflation? Sky high energy bills where 2 people are at home during the day and the ill one simply NEEDS the house to be warm? If the other partner has to reduce their hours or give up work to become their carer, how is the shortfall in THEIR income get made up?

people can be so very very short sighted and self-righteous and quick to condemn others for “not being sensible.” Every single poster on here should be thinking “There but for the grace of god go I”. Yes, a bit of sense and caution when planning your financial affairs is very wise. But there is a LOT of luck, both good and bad.

We are going to end up like the States soon. I just came back from there and was shocked to see people struggling homeless on the street with major health problems.

@Whyareyouasking completely agree.

Ok I made the mistake of coming back on the thread, and I’ll bite. How much in savings do you think anyone should have before becoming a parent/ buying a house/ renting a house/ having a life? What would protect you if you suddenly lost all your income and chance of future income?

It's not simply about having capital before having kids, it's about having less dependents to support if things do go wrong.

If you have one or two children and everything starts to fall apart you can live in a one or two bed flat with them at a push or temporarily stay with extended family, that is just not going to happen with a family of 6. With 1 or 2 kids you can reasonably expect help from those around you with some childcare if you become ill or disabled, not with 4 kids. With 1 or 2 kids you can get away with a small hatchback car, not with 4 kids, etc etc

Having 4 kids does not leave much contingency.

@Cyw2018 well said. It's not a shock or a surprise to know that things can change/relationships can end/health can fail. Certainly if you can afford children 3 and 4 you can afford savings and insurance first.

Certainly if you can afford children 3 and 4 you can afford savings and insurance first.

And suppose you do that? What happens when your insurance pay out and savings run out?

Ah so however much our savings are, however much we planned ahead and thought of contingencies, because we have four kids it’s all our own fault. Should have had that abortion in 2009 then, just in case dh had an accident in 2021. Missed out on our beautiful gorgeous dd despite having savings, and insurance ( if dh had died I’d be the Merry Widow but he selfishly didn’t, quite). Stupid us.

We shouldn’t really of had any children should we, if we had two and they were a boy and a girl we’d need a 4 bed flat as dh needs his own room, room for vast amounts of very large equipment etc etc. Or would you expect me to sleep on a sofa now?

Also, a small hatchback car wouldn’t fit a wheelchair passenger, wheelchair lift into it etc.

Don’t worry we won’t be taking a council house for you to complain about soon, part of our financial planning was to be mortgage free by bloody hard work and not moving up the property ladder with a big mortgage once we’d climbed it enough to provide a house that fit our needs.

I hope all you sticking the boot in have planned ahead and got as financially stable as we did. Wouldn’t like you to be hypocritical now.

I just find the same themes running through these threads, whether people talk about financial responsibility, benefits, self-care, mental health, obesity, disability, addiction, even staying in abusive relationships. There are always the posters, the bringers of truth and rationality as they see it. Any hint of irresponsibility, any hint of weakness or fault, flaws or imperfection, then the comments begin.

And it always surprises me (It shouldn't but it does).

I don't know if I am envious because their world is always so clear, so black and white or if I genuinely pity them their rigidity, lack of understanding and lack of empathy.

People argue till they are blue in the face how the OP, or other posters are wrong and deserving of their fate, and on a forum, it seems rational. I've temporally bought it at times. But then I remember the messiness of life and the barriers and the challenges people face throughout it. There are people on mumsnet, asking for advice who face much harsher realities than the people who mock them or write them off. It demonstrates the unfairness of society quite well.

There is a young homeless man I know who has more empathy in his little finger that some of the posters on this board have in their entire body. But he can't be here, helping, because he has no resources, he has very little. And in ten years when he has dragged himself into adulthood and (I really hope) has a life, he would be judged by some of you on this forum for not being where you were at that age, for not being perfect.

Enjoy the mumsnet you choose to create, because the ones that see the world more clearly, do not like what they see on here, and won't stick around.

@NC87566 brilliant post, if it wasn’t so personal to me on this thread I hope I could have put it half as well.

I wish your young friend a bit of luck and a lot of support to achieve his full potential.

But your situation would be a hell of a lot worse, more complicated and expensive if you had chosen to have 3, 4 or more children. You didn't, and you are presumably getting help from the state or will do in the future when you have, sadly, been forced to deplete your savings. Whether or not that help is enough is up for debate, and even if it is enough now it won't be next year unless the government make the bold move to increase it inline with inflation (fat chance).

I can feel empathy with your situation and still think that everyone could benefit from making more conscious decisions about their long term planning.

Surely state benefits are designed for people just like you, who have made the decision to live an average live, with an average number of kids, then had something way outside the realms of what can be expected happen to them.

Yes.

Excellent post.

The poster you are quoting does have 4 children.

Think i misread there that you had a boy and a girl (ie 2 kids), seems you do have 4 kids, sorry but it would have been easier with fewer kids, not that it helps now, but that doesn't change the fact.

How would it have been easier? How could our long term planning have been better? Have you actually read my posts? Other than to get the number of kids I have wrong? I’m genuinely interested not being goady back. You keep saying how horrendous a decision having lots of kids is but you have not yet given me a valid thing I have done wrong to attract your replies.
I really wish I’d trusted my instinct and not come back on the thread, but now I have I’m interested, upset and angry.
Your lovely finishing line is a corker

@Cyw2018 what savings do you have? Do you have a mortgage? Do you have family you could move in with who would let you do 50k worth of adaptations to their home if you had to sell yours? Could you buy a WAV ( that’s a wheelchair accessible vehicle) because there is a year wait to get one on mobility? A small hatchback doesn’t cut it. Did I say I needed any childcare? In fact did I say how old my kids are?
Unless you answered - a very large amount, no, yes, yes to the first questions you can get off your high horse and sort your own life out before having a go at people on a forum.

We have a mortgage left of approx 80k on a our small 70sqm cottage which cost us 450 ish a month. We (I) have approx £70k equity in a BTL (my old house from before meeting DH, equity built up from a 5% deposit when i was 21) plus some other savings in mixed investments, so enough to clear the mortgage if we needed to. We have one kid, won't be having another for a variety of reasons, but certinely would never have had more than 2 (I guess 3 if a second pregnancy was twins) but this is one of the reasons we wouldn't have another DC as we couldn't fit 2 more in our house and at 41 odds of twins are pretty high. I had 15 years of NHS experience / pension built up before having DD. So yes I have a plan to be mortgage free if I had to, and we have a downstairs bedroom and bathroom. I waited to have my child, yes there is risk of diminishing fertility associated with that, but it was a risk I was willing to take for financial stability.

As for the vehicle accesible vehicle, my Mum managed to purchased a second hand berlingo with a ramp, within 2 months of my Dad being diagnosed with a brain tumour, and then easily sold it again less than a year later after my Dad died. Same with an electric wheelchair (eBay). So I expect I'd manage.

Based on your current situation and life experience, if you were to sit down with you child when they are a young adult and have a heart to heart about life planning, career building, family planning and financial planning, what advice would you give them?

So you have enough savings to clear the mortgage. What about to live off? Could you live off your savings for two years? At a decent standard of living, not the standard mumsnet thinks disabled people should live at? You happen to have a downstairs bedroom and bathroom, do they have room for a hoist, commode , changing bed etc etc as well as wheelchair etc or would you need to widen doorways, remove the bathroom wall for the hoist track etc etc,

You chose to be financially secure and stop at one child. We chose to be more financially secure than you and have four children.

You still have not explained to me how my situation would have been so much easier with only one child. Please do.

Do you know what my advice has been to my young adult dd? It’s “sod being sensible, enjoy life, work hard but play hard. Buy the house of your dreams, buy the car of your dreams, go on the holidays of your dreams, because you never know when your life as you know it can be snatched away so make the most of every second and every penny”

Wishing you, your husband and children all the love and luck in the world. That's advice we should all take really. By all means don't be reckless and prepare for hard times. But at some point you just have to live.

Thank you.

I’m not proud of my reactions to these posters, they’ve made me as judgemental as they are and I’m stopping now, it’s not me to be like that. That poster and the previous one I replied to just made me see red with their attitudes that they had made so much better decisions in life than me, and they would never have my situation because they’re so amazing. Just wanted to try to explain to them that they’re not actually in such a brilliant place, but I descended to their level. Apologies to everyone.

You are not the one who should be apologising. Not even a tiny bit.
And your advice is spot on.