138: Mid-Life Crisis and Reginald Perrin (!)

Very interesting article on mid-life crisis – and even more interesting comments below the line.

Of relationships it says, ‘In her book Male and Female, she floated this suggestion: we should allow two, three or four marriages. “The first,” Jackson summarises, “for youthful passion, your second marriage for parenthood, your third marriage for companionship.” (Jackson ends there. Maybe a fourth for different companionship, once you have had enough of the third?) “There’s nothing to suggest that can’t be all to the same person,” Jackson adds, although if that were true, the relationship wouldn’t have been in crisis in the first place.’

When it talks about taking control and, say, leaving one’s current relationship and going off, ‘It’s not just that there is a vanishingly thin line between authenticity and selfishness, because – especially in a family – there is no such thing as consequences-for-one.’

When it talks about choices that we make in life, ‘Footfalls echo in the memory, Down the passage which we did not take, Towards the door we never opened, Into the rose-garden.’ TS Eliot, Burnt Norton

I have often thought that, ‘A mid-life crisis is a luxury, probably triggered by too much leisure time and exercise; try dealing with a major illness or a something really dramatic, shitty and prolonged at work and you might realise that you didn't need to have one:). First World Problem’

To which another person wrote:

‘I've dealt with horrible situations at work, ending in redundancy, and also major surgery. But, having worked in many, I can assure you that people in poorer countries also experience a similar mix of feelings about aspirations unfulfilled, contentment mingled with regrets, beginning to fear rather than embrace the future - particularly in situations of major generational shifts. People who lost so much in liberation struggles only to see everything they fought for overturned or forgotten. Not just a First World Problem.’

‘Throughout my forties I would often ask,.... so when is this midlife crisis thing going to hit me?

And then it did. One day I found myself in a specialist hospital unit with lots of worried faces staring down at me, and my wife asking nervously of anyone who looked competent, ' Is he going to die?'.

Not the midlife crisis I expected, but a proper, full on, five star, life threatening crisis nevertheless. Fourteen years on and I didn't die, but without wishing to sound remotely sanctimonious - always a risk for us survivors - my 'crisis' did fundamentally change my outlook on......pretty much everything.

'These days when I hear the phrase, 'Is this all there is?', I bite my tongue, and I think to myself, what do you mean, 'all'? Is health, wealth, democracy, education, abundant food, entertainment of every description at the touch of a button, foreign travel, the love and companionship of family and friends....plus, in my case the knowledge that a team of very clever people fought and worked hard to bring me back from the dead. Is this not enough?

'If this is 'all' there is ....then I'll take it, no questions asked, no further explanation needed. Having a crisis? Get ill....very ill....then fight your way back.’

And something I have pondered, ‘One of the tragedies of modern life is that most of us don't have a big enough purpose to live for.

‘We buy in to the message that romance, sex, work or material stuff can be enough. While these can be good in themselves they simply can't bear the weight of our needs to have significance, to be loved and to have purpose.’

‘Isn't that what most of us have kids for, so that we have a purpose? When they grow up and away (although that's getting harder these days as we all know), then the 'purpose' disappears and if you're not careful so does your reason to be.’

And then a passionate thought:

‘Is this all there is?”... If the question ever surfaces you're in (relative) luck, because it means you have time to contemplate and possibly the resources to change route.

"If we all dropped everything to go on a voyage of self-discovery...". This is a voyage that is easy to set upon. The sooner the better. It basically starts with one fundamental question: What hand have I been dealt in life? and its derivatives: What are my strengths and what are my weaknesses? How do i combine these to reach my potential ..or at least increase my chances of survival (as is the case for the many)? What do i actively love doing? etc.

'Depending on the clarity (lots of luck and tutoring needed here) of the results of such a self survey, one can slowly form a toolkit to deal with the ups and downs of real life and discard other peoples' 'models' and fantasies that invariably lead to stupidity and frustration.

‘We all are a product of randomness and we need lots of help and need to help others. We could do well to go short on our mythologies of "hard work" and the "success" of "self made men/women". Those of us lucky enough to feel content, we should be thankful for the gifts nature bestowed on us and pay back with love and consideration for those beings and surroundings that make our lives truly meaningful.

‘Embrace your mid-life crisis! Let it shake you to your core! Because for some, it is an unstoppable force of destruction. Destroying what is no longer relevant or appropriate or necessary. It can come in the form of job loss, divorce, emptying of the family home, nervous breakdown, illness ... whatever. As we gear up to face the second half of our life, jettison what is holding you back before life comes and disposes of it for you. Mid-life crises - buying a leather jacket, buying a Harley, running off with someone 20 years younger than you - I guess these are all possibles but I think of mid-life crises as an existential even spiritual breakdown where we are asked to put ourselves back together again in a new fashion. It can be horrendous, but if embraced and faced can be a devastating force for positive change.’

137: Self-Awareness

She asks me the other day, ‘you like children and enjoy sport – why don’t you do some coaching like many other dads?’

There are two main reasons.

I suppose in years gone by I would have been afraid of the time commitment away from the family. As I’ve shared before, a couple of successive evenings out due to work and there would be stress. Does she really not remember that history?

But I now play sport on the week-ends and so I’ve overcome that particular qualm.

Then I went on to say that – without any false modesty – I have never considered coaching (or mentoring at work, for example) because I have never considered myself to be very good. I would struggle to be a counsellor for example – taking that level of responsibility.

‘I think I would be a good counsellor,’ she responds.

Really? Given that she is just about the most judgemental person I know. That she has treated her husband and son like shit while being all sweetness and light with friends (and a harridan with customer service people who can’t answer back) is an unlikely background for a counsellor. ‘I might do what E. does and become a Samaritan.’

I suppose people can be different inside four walls and outside and she is a good friend to her friends. Good luck to her.

136: Bits and Bobs

During the week we are sleeping in different rooms as, otherwise, I struggle to have a peaceful night because of her snoring - my snoring does not seem to affect her.

Anyway, I was watching some TV and went into our bedroom to wish her goodnight and she said, 'I was looking for a receipt for the extra cereal packet you bought - so I could return it. All your stuff fell out and so everything is in the wrong order in your wallet.'

Bollocks.

Yes, I had bought some extra cereal but I checked the next morning and it had already been returned. She was clearly going through my wallet which was in my trousers that I had left in my room. What was she trying to find? A secret tryst of some sort. Sadly, there is nothing and so nothing was found. I obviously did not address it with her in any antagonistic way or, indeed, in any way. What's the point.

Because, also, you see, I am at a point where I really don't want to play the game of who is 'right' and who is 'wrong'. It really doesn't matter. Though life these last couple of years since the Magic Turnaround has been fine, I just have no feeling and while this blog is very useful to record points, it is for my own benefit rather than to weigh the scales. It is what it is and when it comes to split, and I do hope that that time will come, I will not feel the need to justify my actions.

Update May 2019
Perhaps I had been hasty in my judgement. That extra box of cereal had been lying about in the car rather than returned. Am still not convinced though - she could have easily used her receipt to return the box I had bought?

135: Sex and Marriage

I wrote some time ago - Testosterone - that I had been having trouble with the sexual side of things. 

Looking back, it was August 2015 that we last had penetrative sex and nothing happens down below when I am next to her. Since 2016 I have tried to give her pleasure in other ways but that's stopped since January 2019. In all our years of marriage, I was usually the instigator and post-sex, I was often met with the comment, 'satisfied?' So, bollocks to it. If she instigates I will react but, otherwise, let it be.

Over the counter viagra ads sometimes pop up  on the TV and she looks at me out of the corner of my eye but I really can't be bothered.

July 2020 update: Coming up the 5th anniversary of no-sex on my part. We sleep apart during the week anyway - as her snoring disturbs my sleep and we have come to that arrangement. On the weekends, we sleep in the same bed and, now and again, she will want sex. But, nothing happens with my 'machinery' - so, I provide some pleasure in other ways and that's the extent of our sex life.

And, you know what, I am not interested anyway; the mind and spirit are gone. I have had a testosterone test done again and mine remains marginally low - there appears to be no reason why everything should not work. But it doesn't and that may be down to psychology. Don't really care.

134: Usual Rubbish .... but also Good

Son has been on holiday this week due to half-term holidays.

This Sunday - yesterday - I took our son to football, arranged lunch, cooked in the evening for part of the week, got dinner together, watched some football on TV with our son.

She mainly faffed about all day - admittedly booked up a holiday to Spain (!) and did some clothes washing and drying.

She talked about a trip up to Manchester for a special treat for our son - to visit Manchester United's training ground - but then got down to doing it just as we were settling down to watch a show at 9 pm.

Then - this is Sunday evening, when there has been no school for a week - she starts to iron our son's clothes for the next morning; I had of course offered but been declined.

Really? A whole week and everything has to be on Sunday evening after 10 pm??? Of course, old receipts all over the floor in the study  continues. As I've said repeatedly in the past, it is not the actions, it is the hypocrisy.

She is now coming out with things like, 'I don't like change' when for months and months she agitated for our son to change school precisely FOR a change!

She speaks admiringly of her brother - rightly so - about how he does not take himself seriously despite being very successful. Look in the mirror, please!

On the 'good' side, she and our son seem to be getting on better. All three met up in the centre of town for dinner and came back on the train. On the walk home, he stayed with me a while and then caught up his mum for the rest of the journey - this would not have happened before.

133: Good enough - a philosphy

Every life is, or could be, a series of self-justifications. In previous posts I have written about the good fortune I have had of a good level of earning which has helped me - so far - to provide and support.

But I have also been told by my wife that I should be ashamed of not having had pay rises. One of my motivations to take redundancy some 15 months ago was for the substantial pay-off - which funded 3 new bathrooms, a new kitchen and house decoration.

Where does the feeling of 'good enough' morph into laziness?

An interesting article here.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jan/12/i-accept-myself-just-as-i-am-the-rise-of-realistic-self-help

Then again, the self-reinvention narrative was always a bit suspect to begin with. For one thing, it’s by no means clear that it’s possible to transform yourself through the simple application of individual willpower: wherever you come down on nature and nurture, it’s undeniable that we owe much of our success or failure in life to our circumstances, and to luck. Then there is the infuriating psychological quirk of “hedonic adaptation”, otherwise known as the happiness treadmill. Succeed in improving your life, and the improvement will soon become part of the backdrop of your days, and thus cease delivering pleasure; to recover that sense of vitality and zest, you’ll have to reinvent yourself again, ad infinitum.

For a while now, that hyperbole has been losing ground to a spirit of anti-utopianism – of accepting yourself as you are, building a good-enough life, or just protecting yourself from the worst of the world outside. 

At the core of Gawdat’s “formula for happiness” is the venerable observation that happiness equals reality minus expectations: in order to feel distress because your life is lacking something, you must first have had some expectation of attaining that thing. (My life lacks a 70ft yacht, but this causes me no suffering, because I never imagined I’d have one.) The argument is not, as progressive critics of self-help sometimes imagine, that disadvantaged people need only stop expecting anything better in order to be content. Some expectations – a reasonable standard of living, healthcare, fulfilling work, social connection – may be entirely rational. But seeing the truth of the formula acts as a kind of sieve, allowing you to separate the handful of things you genuinely want from life from those you’ve been socialised into believing you should want. The latter aren’t worth the pursuit – and if they are the reason you’re trying to invent a “new you”, you’re better off sticking with the old one.

And, of course, there is the danger:

The new crop of anti-perfectionist self-help books are an important counterweight to the conventional message of self-reinvention, which is that there’s no point at which it makes sense to be satisfied with your situation and finally relax, since you could always benefit from acquiring more money, status, education, and so on.

132: Same old, same old

Today is a Monday.

Last week, for three days in a row, I came home to just a complete mess at home – stuff in the sink, clothes all over the place, cooking not done ….

And I don’t really mind – am not exactly hugely organised myself.

But the issue is that she leaves things till late and then is all stressed about working till late – in addition to lecturing others on being conscientious!!

Someone who does not work – as in a profession, to work till 10 pm is a travesty.

Last night, mainly because of her as, left to my own devices I would have gone to my room and bed, I sat down to watch some TV with her. 9 pm. She has to choose that precise time to do ironing and scan documents. Both could have been done earlier or later but this need to create drama and then resolve seems to be a habit.