Exit strategies

[tinyjo]

I've been thinking about it recently and it's occured to me that one of my major mechanisms for dealing with bad, difficult or uncomfortable situations is to come up with an exit strategy. That's not to say that I won't be intending to try and improve the situation or turn it around, although of course you can't always. It just helps me to feel more in control and less stressed to know that if I really need to, I can step back, get away, whatever. It takes the pressure off. I think that's one of the reasons I find myself so uncomfortable with the idea of myself as a parent - there's no exit strategy you can really plan there.

I should do a real life update soon, really. I'll get to it, I promise.

Comments

Huh?

[pinata23.livejournal.com]

What's a real life update? Where do you download them then, I think I need one...
And the exit strategy stuff is a sensible reaction IMO.

Re: Huh?

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Hah! I like that - just don't get them from reallifeupdate.microsoft.com :)

Hmm...

[applez.livejournal.com]

And is being a parent so bad, difficult and uncomfortable? Surely there are rewards in trade for any of those experiences...

Re: Hmm...

[brixtonbrood.livejournal.com]

Well actually, yes, it is that bad. From most parents' point of view the rewards are commensurately high though - I habitually compare it with heroin addiction in terms of the quality of happiness produced and the total f###ing up of your previous life.
But tinyjo has an excellent point; it's much easier to quit heroin than parenthood if you decide the tradeoff doesn't suit you - I guess it comes down to how attached you are to your existing life.

BWAH HAH HAH

[t--m--i.livejournal.com]

iirc the current research suggests that having kids makes people less happy in general due to the tremendous stress. (The good news was that people in general were happiest at around age 70, which gives us all something to look forward to!).

My own observation is that older parents do better (again in general). More experience, more money, more practice at planning and juggling stuff, more time to watch other people have kids and see what works and what doesn't. That said, I know some people who had kids in their early twenties and coped fine, but they were all old-heads-on-young-shoulders types (rather like your good self in fact, tinyjo!).

Re: Hmm...

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

it's much easier to quit heroin than parenthood if you decide the tradeoff doesn't suit you

Exactly, and that's part of what puts me off. As well as using this when things are bad, I often use it to help me feel comfortable about taking a risk - if things went bad I would extricate myself via so and so - but that's just not an option with kids. If you take to it then you're fine but I think I would find the early years overwhelmin - I function particularly badly on broken sleep.

I dunno

[applez.livejournal.com]

Getting rid of the kids is mostly a factor of external social pressures, assuming one makes up one's mind to get rid of them (one way or another). Heroin, on the other hand, is massively rewarding to the addict, and becomes an all-consuming obsession that has shown to break even the hardest-willed person.*

It would be interesting to compare rates of 'broken' families, outright orphans, foster children ... and that of heroin addiction. I would dare say heroin is the harder dependency.

*And yes, I think there are plenty of unloving, loveless parents out there (in general) to borrow a term.

Re: Hmm...

[crschmidt.livejournal.com]

There are times you want to get out, and can't. It's worth it, in the big scheme of things, but once you make the decision, you can't give up, and it's unlike pretty much everything else in that respect (other than major surgery, I suppose. Even tattoos come off with a laser or something.)

Re: Hmm...

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

once you make the decision, you can't give up, and it's unlike pretty much everything else in that respect

Yes, exactly. This also comes into play when I'm starting out on something where if I'm nervous about it, I can calm myself by thinking about well if it all went horribly wrong, I could get out and start again in some way, but when you're a parent you can't - you stay responsible for that kid for life.

Re: Hmm...

[applez.livejournal.com]

I don't think it is any harder than other long-term life challenges, like:

marriage

mortgage

work vs. play

aging in general ... becoming more vulnerable over time without a support network of partner, relations, or children is very difficult, even if you have institutional healthcare.

Re: Hmm...

[applez.livejournal.com]

With regards to marriage and divorce ...

I work from the assumption that one would accept marriage, as one would a child, where failure is unacceptable.

If on the other hand, failure of marriage is acceptable, then perhaps failing one's children is too ... a worrying thought to consider. :-/

Re: Hmm...

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

I see the choice to marry and the choice to have a child as very very different ones. Failure in marriage is acceptable, I would say but I don't think that leads in any way to the idea that failing one's children is acceptable.

A marriage is (or should be) an equal contract between consenting adults. Both parties are responsible for making it work and if that's really not possible in the end then the partnership should be disolved in the least damaging fashion.

With a child though, you make the decision for both of you to bring that child into the world. That gives you the responsiblity to take care of that child for life and you can't step away from that. You're obligated to stick through it no matter what. It's not an equal partnership and that gives you more and different responsibilities.

Note that this view of marriage is part of why I'm not keep on the idea of "always and forever" promises in the marriage vows.

Re: Hmm...

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

I disagree here. I think that the choice and experience of raising a child is *much* harder than marriage or mortgage challenges and work vs play is not even up there. Aging is also a very difficult situation in some cirucumstances but it's not ever one you chose so I don't think it falls into the same category.

Crucially for me, with both a marriage and a mortgage if it becomes too much you can plan an exit strategy but when you've had a child you're responsible for that child forever, with no outs.

Re: Hmm...

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Not exactly but it's exhausting, difficult and frustrating as well as rewarding when the children are little and I would find it difficult on the bad days given that my main strategy for coping with things when I feel like I can't cope wouldn't really be available.

I don't by any stretch think that having children would be all bad but I think I would find it very difficult to cope in the early years because it's so relentless.

Relentless...

[applez.livejournal.com]

That's true ... precisely why I boggle at the single-parents among my collegues. I could never imagine or want to pursue such a lifelong 'project' alone.

Having a partner in those early years must really make a difference - no matter how it's sliced, a division of labour can only help matters.

---

When I consider the stresses of raising children, I can't imagine how the West ever came to the idea of the 'nuclear family' model as ideal - frankly, it's ridiculous. Definitely better to have a sheaf of relations nearby to run herd on them.

Re: Hmm...

[vinaigrettegirl.livejournal.com]

It is, and it isn't, relentless. EVERY parent *thinks* about the Exit Strategy. However, just thinking about it is healthy and destressing. I don't know any parent who hasn't thought, sometimes seriously, of Just Leaving.

However, I am The Typical Older First-Time Mom, and as far as I can tell, unless you screw up your hormones bigtime via your preferred method of contraception, you need not worry about kids for a fair number of years.

You may also - if you do have a kid - have one who sleeps for seven hours or more on the trot from the age of six weeks and never looks back. They do happen.

The extent to which you are responsible-for-life is also culturally and familialy determined. If one's culture allows adult sons to kip at mum's for 40 quid a week, to include laundry and cooking, then you're stuck. If you expect them to support themselves to some degree at a reasonable age, and you raise them to be independent, then you love them deeply but let them loose when it's time.

I wouldn't trade parenthood for all the tea in China, but i did wait until I was ready and had the right partner-in-parenthood, and had accomplished some other life tasks I had set myself. People who have their first babies whilst writing doctoral theses (for example) are, in my view, quite utterly mad :-) but it does happen. I got my doctorate first. You probably have all sorts of other goals!

Your exit strategy thinking is excellent and one which I can see adopting as a more frequent exercise: how liberating your thinking is! YAY YOU.

Also re exit strategies

[t--m--i.livejournal.com]

I remember well-known media tart Dr. Raj Persaud once making remarks in his column to the effect that there were at most 3 ways of dealing with a problem, viz: a) get rid of it b) learn to live with it c) run away from it. And that if any of them worked for you then hey! Problem solved! (As it were). Wise words indeed ;)

Re: Also re exit strategies

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Hah! I like that.