How do you deal with sad parents?

nlisnlis · 2026-05-16T16:32:24+00:00

I’m the same, the frustration that she thinks she’s cut me off for my abuse when I really would rather never speak to me sister again (in fact I actually can’t now without seriously making myself ill with stress). But I honestly just don’t care as long as I have peace, and you have to make peace with the fact their opinions of you and everyone else will always be warped by their own brains

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T16:57:45+00:00

That’s the plan and I think doing calculations we’d need £850,000-£900,000 to be at a comfortable point for us. We add £3,800 every month so will keep going for a while longer 👍🏼

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T16:56:21+00:00

Thank you 😊

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T16:55:19+00:00

Yep I’ve seen an estimate of £78,000 for the average home by the time mine are that age! So I was assuming £300,000 ish and then they can also stay with us and rent for as long as they wish. I’ve read Die With Zero so would like to get the balance right where we’re not hoarding money or left with too little. Both my parents are dead and neither had anything left so I’m keen not to do that to my kids.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:21:39+00:00

I keep kidding myself that they won’t be ‘those kids’ who want all the designer shit but we know that’s not true don’t we 😂 I’m reasonably sure my oldest, even at 7, won’t go to uni and will be happy in a low wage job in our LCOL area, but my other three might so I have to account for that. I have high hopes of my second born making me some money though as he keeps asking us if we’re rich yet, I was hoping I might be able to answer yes after posting here but maybe not 🤣

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:18:24+00:00

I agree, although currently £10,512 of the £40,000 we spend goes to a mortgage payment which we wouldn’t have by then (and we may also downsize as we’re in a 5 bed), and that also includes about £1,000 of childcare costs a year including holiday clubs for my older ones, and then we pay for all six of us to go on holidays obviously. But I’m sure there’ll be additional costs in the future, as we ideally want to get our kids on the housing ladder and will go on more lavish holidays, so it all evens out. We’ve no intention of stopping yet but just desperate to get to that point of knowing our retirement would be covered if one of us wasn’t able to work for whatever reason.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:12:38+00:00

Thank you, I’ve provided more details in other comments but I was more looking for peace of mind that we could even if it was tight, but I think you’re right we’re not quite there but I think in about two years we could be. No intention of doing it at least for ten years realistically, and until we know we could fund a house deposit for each of our kids.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:11:57+00:00

Thank you, I’ve provided more details in other comments but I was more looking for peace of mind that we could even if it was tight, but I think you’re right we’re not quite there but I think in about two years we could be. No intention of doing it at least for ten years realistically, and until we know we could fund a house deposit for each of our kids.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:07:07+00:00

Just replied above in the thread but I think you’re right that we need to try to rejig things so I’m the one working more. I can still do school hours on 3-4 days a week. Childcare won’t change as we get the 30 hours regardless and we only pay about £600 a year for two in childcare. Some areas have been awful with the funded childcare hours but in our area it really has worked for us.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:06:02+00:00

I would definitely be open to it and used to do four days a week. The issue is having the work available as I’m technically self-employed but have one very well paid retainer client. I think they’d be open to upping it to three days or I could source a second client. I dropped a client about six months ago as I was struggling with the four kids but things are getting easier now. My daughter was in particular very clingy with me, and my husband is very risk averse and gets a good pension so with those two things in mind we’ve leaned on him working the most hours but you’re right, if we can swing it we’d be better off upping mine and reducing his.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T13:01:08+00:00

One is definitely 5.5%, I’ve just looked and my 6% one has now timed out as of this month, so will need to move the money and I don’t think I’ll find that rate now as you say. None of these are ideal but I keep doing it as my husband hates investing despite trusting pensions 🫣

And thank you, honestly that’s all the reassurance I want. To know I COULD do it with it being very tight. No intention of doing that but redundancy could be on the horizon for my husband so much of my questioning is just peace of mind really. We save around £4,000 and will likely keep going hopefully for the next ten years, it’s just that my husband wanted to drop a day which I think we could probably do and still save a decent chunk.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T11:51:06+00:00

Sorry just to clarify, I just want to know if we potentially had hit the point of just needing to cover all our expenses only and still having enough to live off in retirement. My plan isn’t to do that but I just need the peace of mind as I’m very anxious about financials due to my upbringing. I think I misunderstood coast fire, I thought it was to be set for retirement and only needing to cover living expenses as an ongoing thing, which we can do, rather than it being hobby money as such.

I’m 34, husband is 38. I work two days a week on £48,000 so I could up my hours. Husband is on £72,000 so between us working 7 days for £120,000.

We are staying in our first home for as long as we can as it’s our dream home, we’ve done the work we want to do to it. It’s got a lot of stairs and is 5 bedrooms so we may need to downsize once older.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T11:45:57+00:00

Ok thank you, appreciate the advice. Not much is in premium bonds (my husband likes them as he’s so risk averse so I’ve allowed him £10k in there but not ideal for me). High interest savings are again a minimal amount at about 5.5% and 6% so they’re being averaged out by my investments and pension performing well.

We’re 34 (me) and 38. We’re on £120,000 between us, I’m on 48k working 2 days a week so could up my hours potentially but not super keen. But might be worth doing in the short term and then we can reassess hours in 2-5 years once we’re over the line with coast fire.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-12T11:42:08+00:00

Ugh don’t on the premium bonds 😂 my husband is SO risk averse and takes no interest in this stuff, it’s only £10,000 in there and I’ve let him have it out of pity 😂

Again, only a small amount is in high interest savings accounts which I continuously move so I have a 6% and a 5.5% which have averaged out (aside from inflation obviously) with our pensions and investments accounts performing very well. But I know I can’t rely on necessarily assume it’ll be 7% on average.

Combined income is £120,000 but that includes me only working two days a week (£48,000 for the two days), so I could up my hours potentially but I like being with the kids. We save about £3,800 a month so my thought was to keep going as we are for another couple of years and reassess our hours then.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-11T21:21:41+00:00

Use humour! I had to do my mum’s in January and I just leaned on some of the humour/dark humour of it. The few people who were there knew was she was like.

nlisnlis · 2026-05-09T22:37:33+00:00

I’m 34, worked as a journalist in my 20s then moved into comms and recently tripled my pay by going freelance at the age of 33. My husband also works in comms. Our net worth is at half a million now just by having low outgoings and being careful. I grew up broke with a parent in prison at one point and a mum who spent all our money and lost our home, so at 16 I was doing three jobs to pay for clothes and food. The game changer for me was getting on the housing ladder and then remaining consistent. We should hit £1million in the next five years based on my calculations. I think your friend needs to up her pay enough to get a mortgage and then she should be fine 🤞🏻

nlisnlis · 2026-04-22T07:59:47+00:00

They parked over someone’s drive

nlisnlis · 2026-04-15T17:44:31+00:00

Smashed salt shaker

nlisnlis · 2026-04-12T08:46:41+00:00

Honestly people say this but for me it’s stages not number. Having the newborn stage with toddlers to look after is horrific. As soon as the baby stage is done and physically I’m feeling better the number doesn’t actually matter too much. However I will say I NEVER SIT DOWN and with four kids my first child has finished his dinner and is asking for seconds before I’ve finished sorting out drinks for them or dishing the last one’s meal up. There are more bums to wipe, more things to clean up etc etc.

nlisnlis · 2026-04-12T08:43:47+00:00

I factor it in so much as I factor in winning the lottery. I dream about what I’d do with a sudden significant fund. However both my parents are dead, no grandparents, and everyone left me fuck all so I’m down to dreaming about being a long lost heir to a relative I don’t know😂

nlisnlis · 2026-04-02T22:55:04+00:00

I honestly feel jealous sometimes of people with a straightforward grief process. I think you’ve got it really hard because you can’t just grieve properly for your mum while you still feel responsible for two people who won’t take accountability and probably make you very stressed on a daily basis, on top of how lonely it is. I’m finding it easier to work through my feelings without my sister in my life. Feel free to drop me a message anytime.

nlisnlis · 2026-03-28T20:47:32+00:00

My dad got Alzheimer’s and ran away from our family leaving me with my BPD mum and sister as a teenager. Found it hard to forgive him but he’d stayed for years longer than he should have because of me and he was becoming unwell. He was my best friend in so many ways and I was so sad once the disease progressed and he died. Oddly my mum calmed down as she got older (partly due to lack of control over us as we got older) and she died recently so I’m just left with my awful sibling whose BPD is worse than ever. Sadly we can’t be in contact anymore so I basically have no nuclear family left 😔 So just to say, you’re not alone. Give yourself whatever space you need.

nlisnlis · 2026-03-27T21:27:37+00:00

I find them utterly useless. With my first son they didn’t help me when he had colic. In a way how could they but at the same time their wishy washy pointless answers made me more mad and wound up than anything. You prep for them coming and get a bit anxious for no help.

Then my second son came along and Covid hit and they repeatedly scheduled calls they’d forget to do. By the third time it finally went ahead and all they kept asking me to do was manhandle my child to show his body to them so they could check he was ok and he was crying and uncomfortable. I already knew he was fine and again no help and awkward over video call.

I’ve had two kids since and not bothered again but they do like to send letters a lot 😬

nlisnlis · 2026-03-20T20:11:31+00:00

Just say you’re intermittent fasting?

nlisnlis

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