To be surprised at how 'together' commenters appear to be

[Usedtobeslummy]

Posting for traffic really.

I started reading mumsnet about 2yrs ago which coincided with when my ex and I split up.

I was encouraged by what seemed to be lots of empowered confident women unafraid to stand up for themselves. I realised my bar was low.

Mumsnet has made me realise I have quite a different bar to most. I grew up in a very chaotic household - parents in addiction with significant mental health issues, frequent police and a&e trips etc.

I'm very settled and have a good career and kids, quite different to my family. But mumsnet makes me realise I'm not quite where the other posters are.

For eg I am really surprised at the zero tolerance for any drug taking, even weed. People (and parents) taking drugs has been very normal to me.

I'm also surprised at how little people seem to drink and lots of people think poorly of people getting drunk.

I was mega shocked that everyone seems to think sleeping in a bed someone else has slept in is incredibly gross.

I change bedsheets for guests but I thought my friends were pernickety. I didn't realise it was normal (I am 40!) The idea of sleeping in a bed my best friend has slept in doesn't gross me out. But I have learnt I am not the norm!

I"m also surprised at how many posters have equal relationships with husbands. Most of my friends work full time, do most childcare and life admin.

I'm sure there are other examples but I suppose I am surprised at wholesome / ordered people seem to be on here. I thought I had my shit together but my bar is still miles away compared to others!

I still find it inspiring. Has opened my eyes. Would love to hear others' views. And maybe to hear if everyone who has their shit together came from a family that also did?

It must depend on the threads you read because I see threads about horrible DHs all the time!

It's the class divide isn't it?

I remember being quite shocked at polar opinions on taking children in prison visits.

I take some of it with a pinch of salt, OP. I know a couple of women in real life who talk all the time about their marriages where their DH takes equal responsibility for organising birthday presents and holiday clubs and all the mental load etc, and any woman who settles for anything less is some sort of surrendered wife with no self respect. But you go to their house and realise it’s all some delusional fantasy, and their DH is slobbed out on the sofa playing video games and totally checked out, ignoring the children and not setting the table etc.

I do know couples where the DH really does shoulder his share of the mental load, but they don’t tend to get on their soapbox about it and try to make other people feel shit if they’re not in the same situation.

I think a lot depends on your upbringing and the norms that you absorb as a child.

I often think of my own childhood as having been happy but quite chaotic. Pretty sure that my mum had undiagnosed adhd and she suffered with depression and anxiety. But compared to your childhood, mine was very wholesome and orderly. Parents had a stable relationship. We were ok financially. No real exposure to drugs or even drunkenness before the inevitable teenage parties, and even then, I knew to keep my distance.

In the same way, I think of myself as being quite chaotic. Also have adhd, struggle with some stuff, my house is a tip etc. But from the outside, it probably looks like I have my shit together - great career, happy & successful dc, stable & equal relationship with DH, mortgage paid off etc. No additions No major health issues, no family rifts, nice stable friends etc.

I still feel like everyone else has got it together much more than I have!

Tbh I've had the opposite experience to you on mumsnet nd I've come to realise how lots of women set the bar really low compared to mine when it comes.to relationships. I was raised in a working class family, dad worked, mum was a sahm. We didn't have much money but grew up in a time of lower expectations and never went without so I didn't feel any different to anyone else. Neither parent had much of an education but they strongly encouraged us and were always supportive. My dad had a great deal of faith in me and both parents instilled an inner confidence even though I was a shy child. I've always known my worth and yes compared to some when it comes to relationships I do have high standards. I knew I wanted a partner in every sense of the word as that was what was role modeled to me. Dh has always been an equal partner and is just as hands on with our children as I am and I wouldn't have settled for anything less. Families are run in so may different ways though and that's fine, I don't think you need to justify it if it works for you and yours.

I don't drink due to religion anyway and I do have a strong stance on drug use as I work with users. I do not wash towels daily. My home is hoovered daily and unlike many on mumsnet I do iron clothes. I would always change the sheets guests have slept in.

You have overcome lots of adversity and should be proud of yourself. You've set your own standards and do not need to measure yourself against anyone else's.

Mn can be wierd. People don't answer their door, shower many times per day, wash towels too often.

The bed / sheets thing wouldn't bother me. Now that ds1 is at uni, all beds get washed weekly as usual, but if I am snoring / can't sleep Dh will go to ds1's bed. The next night I might. I don't feel the need to change the sheets every night.

Mn cleanliness is wierd. If I have time I empty the bin, put on a load of washing, send eufy hoovering around, then the place looks semi reasonable, so I sit down and mn for a few hours. MN'ers are highly clever and witty.

I read a good thread about a current legal case, eg Post Office, where legal boffs explain it simply and clearly to numpties like me. Then I read a funny thread like Lenin porn, and I laugh at how clever MN'ers are with their one liners.

What's not to like?

I agree with @Imgoingtothebeach :

Imgoingtothebeach
I find Mumsnet like some alternate reality sometimes. I don't know anyone like it real life.

Agree.

I disagree with: @healthybychristmas -

"But what do you mean you don't know anyone like it? You don't know anyone who changes the sheets six times a night or you don't know anyone who has a drunken husband who is absolutely fucking horrible to them? "

Nope. I don't.
Most of the people I know in RL, either closely, or acquaintances, or colleagues, are more middle of the road/ just ordinary, trotting along, with minor shit / irritants. My friends dd recently diagnosed, I've got a bad back and fighting the hospital, normal shit like that.

I’m very together, is what most people would say. But home is a bit of chaos because young kids and full time busy jobs means some level of squalor. We let the cleaner who comes fortnightly do the hoovering and bathroom clean. I do sweep the kitchen meals every night. I don’t make beds. There are piles of washing around. Conversely, we eat mostly pretty home made and they always have clean clothes. I find life admin painful and exhausting on top of my usual load. I have zero exposure to drugs in my usual life and not much to people getting drunk. Most families we know have both parents fairly involved in their kids lives.

Everyone has areas where their normal is someone else's unrealistically high standards and vice versa. I don't think people are lying, we're all just different.

And how much of it is down to nature and nurture? (Or found from reading msnet).

it’s just what you are used to is isn’t it. Auntie calls my mum posh, my mum has standards, she like a tablecloth on for every meal, she has a lovely shiny dinning room table. I have a rustic, crafted on, pine top table, in the early days I always used a tablecloth, then life got too busy and I stopped using them and wiped the table, far quicker than washing it and having to iron it, but if mum came for dinner on went the tablecloth.

but now I’m over forty, the tablecloths are in the back of the airing cupboard and I don’t even get them out for mum (I do for Christmas). I decided I was old enough to do things my own way. Sometimes I read msnet things and think I like that idea, way of thinking, way of doing, so I adopt it.

My parents both smoked, I didn’t, they only drank alcohol at home if they had a party, I drank wine with home meals most of my life (until the battle of the bulge).

we shape our own lives, we don’t need to be like others, my thoughts are as long as we are happy and not causing unhappiness to others can be just as we want to be. (But I’d be mega grossed out if I had to sleep in someone’s else’s sheets).

For many different reasons, none of which are really worth trying to figure out.

Social media of all flavours and descriptions entices people to fully disclose, over-share the minute details about their life and feel that they have to have an opinion about everything. And distort things to make themselves look and seem better.

The art of survival is to read things posted on line with an open mind and not over invest in any of it. Focus on improving your own life experience and only go on social media when your frame of mind is stable. If you're feeling vulnerable or down about your life, best to stay away, it messes with your brain.

When you have come from an abusive childhood or neglectful background it is truly eye opening! Your ‘normal’ is so different to others, and with that insight you may look back and realise that your experiences were very messed up.

What you thought was bog standard, is actually abuse. What is every day life is actually toxic and unhealthy.

Having to question, then unpick your base assumptions, adjust your world view, then change your behaviour is a lot. Especially when you are doing so to give your own children a better life, just when you have achieved it - you realise there are several more levels to go!

Ultimately our lives and environments shape us.i always post completely honestly. I can’t see the point in posting lies.

That’s why MN is so great, it can give a world of different views and ideas, and has helped me no end, I feel it gives women confidence to trust themselves too, it’s obviously life saving at times for some.

Compared to other social media platforms Mumsnet is quite ' wordy' so I think it attracts a lot of people that are more literate than those that use tik tik/ instagram etc and probably more middle class people so that's were the Judgy, wholesome bias is coming from ...

I am very sad for the posters who assume it must be made up when people say that they have an equal relationship with their partner, have a tidy home and/or don't do drugs nor are related to anyone who does drugs

I hope things get better for you.

Please don't accept being mistreated because of a misconception that it is normal and therefore to be accepted.

It is far, far too normal but that doesn't mean that things cannot get better for you.

I am often impressed by people’s responses and how eloquent they are. So I definitely agree.

Similar in rl too OP.

I have friends who are warriors and put up with zero shite. The are completely together, have happy fulfilled lives, those around them are similar.

No addiction, no alcohol use, no abuse or DV. Just hard working, raising family going on holidays, moaning about not getting the washing out due to the rain. Nice normal strong, together folk who I love.
I surround myself with them, I collect and keep them close.

I feel I have reasonably high standards but there is always something on MN that makes me question that. I've never smoked or done drugs, rarely drink and have what I thought were high standards of cleanliness and unusually for MN I iron!

When I read the thread this week about a poster thinking washing tea towels with underwear was disgusting it made me question myself although after thinking about it for all of a few seconds I really can't see a problem with that.

I agree with this!

I had no idea of the stuff some women are prepared to put up with to have a man - any man - in their life. I'm not being superior - I genuinely don't understand it, but reading posts on here has opened my eyes.

I categorically do not have my shit together!

However I do have a very equal relationship.

Many of my much higher achieving friends have their shit together but don't have equal relationships. I think men often take advantage of women who are that capable. The kind of men that do that wouldn't put up with me, so there's no chance I'd be in an unequal relationship. It is pure luck that I found a good man.

I think the opposite. What chaotic lives most people on here live and how low the bar is with shitty men. I don’t know anyone who would put up with the kind of treatment I repeatedly see on here in real life.

Honestly

The bed sheets .. i think its fine too 🤫

The drinking... i love a drink but now i have 2 under 3 its just not worth it

Agree woth @LouH5
Re The amazing equal dh

i can only surmise its delusional smuggery, they are oblivious to whatequal loads look like, have serious "help" or they are actually full of shit. What annoys me is i bought into it.
My dh was carefully selected. He is better and more engaged than pretty much every other father i know out there. He does NOT do 50 more like 30...
Mothers are primary carers, they just are. Its the reality for over 95% of standard couples. I'd have been much more at peace for the last 2 years if i just knew this going into having kids...instead i felt like if i did enough... if i lay down the law enough... if i was X enough... miraculously it would be 50/50. He does do a lot and is a good man but i do more.

I discovered MN around 5 years ago, and it has helped me so so much.

I grew up in a really disfunctional family, my mum/mums side of the family (who raised me) are pushovers/quiet/get on with it and dont make a fuss type.

I found myself following the same path when it came to bad relationships, settling for a career I didnt truly want, and letting people walk all over me.

Reading MN posts of women in similar situations and the replies gradually gave me so much more confidence and a sense of reality, and encouraged me to take a step back and really assess the situations I was in and whether it was good for me or I could do better.

It sounds really silly writing it out, but I wouldn’t be where I am now, with a wonderful DH, self employed career, or a beautiful baby on the way, if it wasnt for reading MN threads and giving myself a kick up the bum to change my life and not accept shitty situations/men/jobs for the sake of a quiet life.