Women who "have it all"

[GetAGlance]

I've always been a bit "off centre". Led an unconventional, sometimes interesting life, you could say. But also quite a difficult one. Men have been occasionally interesting but zero support. The same with family.

Anyway, I am now living in a slightly different mileau (more middle class, suburban), and I am noticing for the first time, looking round, quite "sorted" women. By this I mean women who have married well to good men they love who are emotionally caring and financially responsible. Imagine! I am guessing they just they seemed to know what they wanted from an early age - marriage, children, etc. And then went about it the right way (rather than sadness, difficulty and drama). Sometimes it feels a bit strange being in their company, almost as if I am a black sheep (single mother etc), or at least feeling very different.

Anyway, these are new, sometimes uncomfortable, feelings to me, and I am wondering what to make of them. I feel hesitant to post this, but anyone comprendez?

I think this is a really interesting thread. I kind of have a foot in both camps.

My parents brought me up to be academically successful - I always understood why, they were both from solidly just getting by working class backgrounds and saw education as the way out. And it worked - I went to uni, had a professional job and have a nice house in a nice street which I know some people look at and think "she's so lucky". I know I'm reasonably clever and I am confident in a work context.

The flip side of this? Both my parents were emotionally damaged: my mum was knocked about by her father and left home at 16 to escape him. My dad was both a bright, inspirational man and an angry short tempered bully. He had affairs with other women during my teens. Home was always a very cold place with no overt displays of love (though I do believe they loved me). Never any friends round for either of my parents.

I went to uni knowing I would never go back. Whilst at uni I met exH. I consciously chose him because he was so different from my dad. Seemed gentle, fun, had lots of friends, wanted a good career but not obsessed by it.

Fast forward a few years and actually I had married my dad despite my best efforts. Away from uni he gradually became more and more EA, relentlessly critical especially around my looks and social skills, obsessed with money. I realise now that he liked my earning capacity, but not much else. His big need was to be the centre of attention and to be envied by everyone else and he felt short-changed.

After a few years of this I just withdrew, carried on working like a dog and had children so I literally never had a spare moment to myself to think.

Eventually it all fell apart, I had a bit of a breakdown, lost my job, found out he was a long-term cheater and got divorced. I'm happily single now and that will not be changing. I couldn't handle a stressful job now.

So overall conclusions? Yes, the choices I made put me where I am today. I made a bad choice of partner and that has affected my whole life (I'm in my fifties now). It was pure bad luck I met him at uni. If I had been older perhaps I would have been more discriminating.

However, looking back I can understand why I made the choice I did with the knowledge and experiences I had. I did the best I could at the time and I have to feel compassion for my younger self.

My biggest worry now is that my DC will go on to replicate the relationships they have seen.

Of course things could flip. I heard on NYE my fantastic successful colleague and friend has her loyal amazing husband die in a car crash 12 days after she gave birth to their first baby. She had it all till the minute before that.

Please don't be patronising and say people have no idea things can change.

Choosing a life partner is amongst many things - a choice. Yes, all choices have chances of going wrong.

jaago that is so tragic, your poor colleague. I hope she has lots of support to get through this awful time. Really puts everything into perspective

Luck is being dealt a good starting hand, judgement is about how you play the game, you need both to win.

Are you saying I was lucky to find my lovely husband? No I chose him

You are lucky because he chose you too.

Not everything is luck of course. We can only take responsibility and credit for the controllable variables in our life, we'd need to have a God complex to assume we can chose, influence, control and take credit for everything that affects us!

jaagojaago, how awful

Oblamov I think that also changes through time. At 5 it's nearly all due to circumstance , at 17 more like 70/30, by early 20s you have much more control over life choices and can start to overcome difficulties, squander opportunities or make good/ bad choices so maybe 40/60. By your 30s you might start to be defined by some of those choices, but still a fair amount of ability to turn things round/start again, so maybe 50/50. Into your 40s you really have missed the boat for some things, although you could still improve your lot in life (60/40 again). Very few people change their life radically in their 50s but I guess it's still possible....by your 60's the opportunity to grasp the nettle is probably passed, but you can still improve your life.

By luck I understand meeting right person at right time. I was unlucky to meet my ex when I did. I had other choices at the time but he was the one who pursued me lots and tapped into sth the others didn't. I was young, and really quite naive at the time and I made the wrong choice. I own that choice, I don't blame anyone else for it. But that choice is also due to my upbringing and complete lack of self-belief.

To say it's all just hard work is a bit blind (and smug), and imo goes into victim-blaming territory. My ex is an abusive man, he had no interest in working on the relationship. Had I met him few years later I may have been a bit more savvy and less easy to manipulate. Who knows?

Similarly when my marriage ended I met a really nice man who was happy to hang around as friends until I felt a bit more ready. Now, I could have met no-one, or I could have met another shit. I didn't. That, to me, is luck. Of course the way I deal with it after is down to me. But sometimes good or bad things happen for no real reason.

As for making poor choices, I think it's both what Elspeth and AF said upthread, you may come from a good model family or from a bad model family but you have an idea of what you want and what you're worth, and you don't deviate from what you want.

It is interesting. By believing your lot is dependent on luck are you failing to take responsibility for it? Like others who "have it all" mine came from hard work and clear head. No silver spoons or 'luck'. Resilience, determination, optimism, compassion, patience and clear idea of what I wanted from life but not luck.

"You can't help who you fancy" possibly true but you absolutely can help,who you choose whether you decide to sleep with them, get pregnant by them without long term commitment and financial security. You absolutely can decide that a good character is more important than tight buttocks.

You can decide to be a higher earner by getting the right qualifications and giving up other things to do so - and supporting each other in that. A Doctorate instead of a holiday, A levels instead of clubbing every week. You can decide to move to get the best opportunities rather than believing that good job is going to appear outside your front door if "you are lucky".

"I can't because I'm not well" sometimes true but also can be used as an excuse. Certainly with personal experience there are those who respond to health challenges differently. I had chemo alongside a woman of similar age who had her whole family sat around holding her can of cola whilst she sipped from a straw - that was before the first session! I worked through chemo and radio. People are sometimes too willing to become miserable and dependent. Depression is nasty but the answer to mild/moderate depression is exercise (proven effective cure) but people would rather rely on drugs. Bad backs? Best thing is keep going and exercising but people take to their beds and end up buying a mobility scooter. It's often (but not always) choice. You can often not help having cancer (well not strictly true with many cancers) but you can decide how you react to it.

Luck just doesn't come into it - unless plane crashes with husband on board.

Sorry some poor grammar in there.

By believing your lot is dependent on luck are you failing to take responsibility for it?

Only if you believe it is dependent ONLY on luck.

What is this insistence on a false dichotomy?

Why do so many insist that it must be either luck or work? It's both.

You can decide to be a higher earner

If only.

but you absolutely can help,who you choose whether you decide to sleep with them, get pregnant by them without long term commitment and financial security. You absolutely can decide that a good character is more important than tight buttocks

Really? You think that the people here who's relationships have been less than perfect deserve that because they chose tight buttocks over good character?

I have asked it several times but will ask again...I married at age 30, with a degree and Masters degree under my belt. I was with my ex for 3 years before marriage, including one year living together. I was career minded, independent. I had travelled the world, lived abroad for 7 years, speak several languages. I didn't have children with my ex until we'd been together 6 years. He was a decent guy, no alarm bells, nothing to suggest things would go the way they did. We owned our own house, had a small and successful business running having both climbed the career ladder in our respective professions.

What else could I have done? Or what else should I have done to protect myself from him having an affair and turning into someone else over night?

By believing your lot is dependent on luck are you failing to take responsibility for it?

Of course not. I am not an insentient leaf, blowing in the wind. I have been very lucky in a couple of key areas that materially contribute to my life satisfaction. I have a great relationship, a very well paid career and a wonderful group of friends.

A lot of this is due to a combination of Resilience, determination, optimism, compassion, patience and clear idea of what I wanted from life , yes I think I am most of those things. But also sheer luck! Isn't it lucky that I even have those qualities and that they can be leveraged into improving my life so much?

I know many people who are much more hard working or compassionate or patient than I am, and it doesn't necessarily translate into success or satisfaction. I am lucky that, for me, it did.

It seems churlish to not recognise how lucky I am. As if, on top of the lovely life I enjoy, I must also require strangers to recognise my superiority in traits and life choices.

I recognise I am lucky but don't assume any shortcomings in my life have been down to bad luck. Of course a few people have really rotten luck but an awful lot more could do much to improve their lot.

I have asked it several times but will ask again...I married at age 30, with a degree and Masters degree under my belt. I was with my ex for 3 years before marriage, including one year living together. I was career minded, independent. I had travelled the world, lived abroad for 7 years, speak several languages. I didn't have children with my ex until we'd been together 6 years. He was a decent guy, no alarm bells, nothing to suggest things would go the way they did. We owned our own house, had a small and successful business running having both climbed the career ladder in our respective professions.

What else could I have done? Or what else should I have done to protect myself from him having an affair and turning into someone else over night?

This sounds like an actual case of bad luck, and I can imagine it must infuriate you when people suggest you should have vetted your ex a bit better to avoid whatever it was that he did (have I missed it? What did he do?).

I see, he had an affair - sorry.

NC for this...

OP I am one of those women. DH is admired far and wide for his domesticity - he cooks, cleans, co-parents brilliantly and lets me do a very time consuming hobby. We have a nice little house in a rural village and perfect DC.

In reality my "wise" choice of deliberately avoiding the more selfish men I was attracted to has left me still over a decade later not having romantic feelings towards him and I try to just appreciate what I have.

Although more and more recently I keep wondering if I should upset that perfect apple cart to give him the chance to be with someone who will love him and desire him in the way he deserves. I have had sex about 10 times since we got married 6.5 years ago and I just don't know if I should put up and shut up. Talking about it doesn't help, he's broadly comfortable and very accepting of his lot in life.

I think to be in a good relationship all you can do is try and find someone who wants the same things as you and has more or less the same values. Not everyone wants the children/picket fence kind of life (not that there's anything wrong with it if you do!) You need to discuss the big things I believe for this reason and keep on discussing them as you change etc.

I don't understand this 'bad boy'/good husband dichotomy, I don't particularly find the bad boys interesting.

I think you need to stop looking at other people and assuming they have it all together OP and think about what would make you happy personally (and don't assume you have to do things the same way other people have, we're all different).

And aren't you just wonderful Crumbs1

If only we were all like you.

But you make decisions, you live with them. There may be reasons you made them, but you still made them. Don't look at other people who made different decisions and say they were 'lucky' Anothermoomin

Tell that to the people with physical injuries and psychological trauma, suffered at the hands of their partner. I'm sure those are just the comforting words they were looking for.

I have read through the whole thread (posted on the first page), and there are some very interesting points being made.

How much are we truly in charge of our destiny? How much are our choices dictated by our upbringing and environment? How affected are we by childhood? How much do we change through life? Do we still want the same things when we are 20, 30, 40, 50?

I think the above questions have different answers depending on who you ask. Our lives are different, our outlook on life are different. Our upbringings are different, and how we respond to life's struggles are different.

I think to a certain extent it's all in your mind. Your thoughts decide your mood, your choices, your reactions much more than you think. We can "manipulate" our thoughts, negative or positive, more than we think. Think of the cliche "glass half full/empty". Simplified, it really is that simple.

Crumbs, while it is true that you may be able to avoid marrying some losers (always assuming they show their true colours) by this carefulness, and make a relationship survive by your hard work, what you absolutely cannot do is conjure up a man through either carefulness or hard work and make him fancy you.

The OP specifically defined "sorted" as having a good man. You may struggle to believe this, but there are women who do not get offers (and get their own offers turned down) from both tight buttocks and good characters. What do you do if neither of those groups actually want to marry you? That's where the good luck comes in.

As far as I can see, all of my life is a combination of luck and hard work.

I worked hard to get my PhD- but I was lucky to be given the talent and the opportunity. Giving up your holidays and saving all your money doesn't force a university to take you on: they have to believe you are bright enough.

I saved up for 10 years to be able to have a mortgage- but if I had been chronically ill and unable to work that wouldn't have happened, however careful I was.

I have worked hard to stay together with dh- but if he hadn't wanted me, no hard work would have availed there.

I worked hard to bring up a disabled child- but I was lucky to be fertile in the first place and find a decent man who wanted to have children with me.

And I am lucky not to be dead.

I, too, have friends who have had cancer- and a couple of them are dead. Hardly what the OP meant by sorted- but could you explain what they should have done differently?

A friend recently lost her husband (hard-working, healthy lifestyle, committed to his family) from a condition no one knew that he had: how should she have behaved differently?

One girl I knew realised that her young man was no good and made the decision to get away. He shot her dead. How was she responsible for that? What other decision should she have made?

I think the poster was spot on who said some people are afraid to recognise that they don't have complete control over their good fortune.

i have a fantastic supportive relationship but i certainly didn't go after marriage and children from a young age! the complete opposite!

i was/am very independent, i wasn't sure i wanted kids, i spent long periods of time single.

i think because of that i was well placed to know a good relationship when i found one, my life was fine without dh so he had to be a good man to improve on that.
then, i wouldn't have had kids if i thought i'd have got shafted into doing the lion's share. i didn't have a strong biological clock ticking so again i only had ds when i felt we could really make it work as a family with equal roles and responsibility.

I know so many lovely single people and so many long- married shitbags, it's utter bollocks to say luck isn't involved at all. As with most things (everything?) it's part choice and part chance.