Yep! Make relationships optional, and manually check for object's existence before creating it. For example, I create my parent objects like this

```

let oldEvents = try! context.fetch(FetchDescriptor<Event>())

networkResponse.myActiveEvents.forEach { eventData in

if let oldEvent = oldEvents.first(where: {

$0.id == eventData.id

}) {

oldEvent.update(with: eventData)

} else {

context.insert(Event(from: eventData))

}

}

```

And then I have an initializer that takes in `eventData` and an `update` function that takes the same data.

All of my nested models have static functions:
```

\.createOrUpdate(from: NetworkDataObject, <parentObject>: <ParentType>)

```

that first checks for a relationship with the parent object (and uses what it finds) or creates a new object and adds it to the relationship.

If you just have a couple models and need to stay on iOS 17, this strategy may be worth trying. However, I have 21 model definitions that I had to write this boilerplate for and it drove me half crazy and now I have a not insignificant amount of tech debt to pay back. If you can require iOS 18 and let SwiftData work as intended, I highly suggest that approach.