SIL describing herself as "retired" pissing me off

[SacreBleugh]

I have recently retired. I've worked full time my entire career, as well as bringing up 4 kids. I know. Heroic.
My SIL is a SAHM to 3 grown up kids. She's had the odd temporary very part time hobby job in the 30 years I have known her. She is now also describing herself as "retired". I'm not sure why I find this irritating.

Yeah, they always say 'well deserved retirement' and I wonder what they will say to me :)

Wonder if anyone ever asked the Important Man about his childcare arrangements, or if he was just relying on the Important Woman to care for and raise his children.

I wouldn't feel sorry for someone for not having success in the world of work. There's more to life than work.

I’d be annoyed too, the fact is she hasn’t actually retired from anything. I’d start using the word pensioner (even if you’re not of the state age) to annoy her

Parents might as well be resentful of people who call themselves cat mums or dog dads because its not the saaammmme!

I'd be embarrassed to admit something so normal could piss me off.

Once they’re school aged it’s not work. When they’re at senior school it’s definitely not work. If they don’t have any special needs it’s very much not working.

Is an unemployed woman in her 50s really retired though? She can't draw a pension, she is being subsidised from another income stream than people get in retirement which who cares not a problem, but deciding you don't want to/have to work anymore is different from retiring because you are of retirement age.

Well, what is his, is her's, once married. How did that affect how you lived your life? I think that some jealously was at play here.

Let’s be perfectly honest here, if you did not do full-time care of your children, you got help from somewhere else. You did not “parent full time” and “work full time”. You hired someone else to take care of some of your parenting duties for you.

And that’s perfectly fine but let’s not pretend that you did it all on your own.

I wouldn't call a 70 year old unemployed as I wouldn't expect a 70 year old to be employed. Maybe just 'pensioner'?

She might have a personal pension.

it's none of the OP's business really.

Also, whilst you were working, presumably someone else was looking after your children? You essentially outsourced some of your parenting - will the after school club workers / nursery workers / childminders eventually "retire"?

Sometimes the level of bitchiness on these forums astonishes me. I couldn’t imagine caring one iota if a SAHM or occasional
part timer said they were retired. It wouldn’t even enter my head to bitch about it or resent it, I mean why, to what end??

Retired is just an easy way to describe someone of that age who's not working and doesn't intend to do so again. Someone in that position could even have a pension they're claiming, since one doesn't need a job to pay into a private one.

Is an unemployed woman in her 50s really retired though? She can't draw a pension,

Yes she can if she’s 55 and has a private pension.

I think its a bit annoying in the way that calling booking the family holiday and buying birthday presents 'life admin' is annoying. It's about using the language of the workplace to elevate the domestic stuff she did, that we all do, whether we work or not, to a professional level, which is a little undermining of people like the OP who actually were in professional work.

I couldn't be sorry for someone who has lived exactly as they pleased amd may now be living a comfortable retirement, even of that was funded by her husband.

The joke would probably be on me for being pissed by something that has fuck all to do with me 🤷🏾‍♀️.

Ah yes the private pension of someone who has worked a few days in the past 30 years- I'm sure it was big enough to retire on.

Some people do legitimately get pissed off by this too 😂

I didn’t think you could retire from being a parent, that it was a lifelong thing.

She won't even have a full state pension

She may have.

YANBU. What has she retired from? You need a job or career to retire from surely. You can’t retire from being a parent. She sounds annoying as hell.

It sounds like the OP was unhappy at work and she's still unhappy now she's retired.

It wouldn't enter most people's head to start this thread otherwise.

Why on earth? I do not care.
This competition about who is more heroic and hard working is pointless.