Why is 21st C life so stressful

Each century has its own stress. My great grandmother's stress in the late 19th/early 20th century was making sure there was food on the table for her 5 children after her husband died. He was a labourer, so no pension, life assurance or other means of support.

That was real stress MOnica. Rather like my many times great grandmother who had her baby baptised and buried her husband in 1809. I would say annoyance with computers, which pales into insignificance, comes from impatience. I had horrible stress when I was working - I can cope with computer saying ‘no’ now and again.

My grandmother was the widow of a miner. She was left with four children of her own, and four from his first wife, who died of exhaustion. She had a coal ration but not much else. A very hard life

Doesn’t bother me ftm420 I suppose I am used to it happening occasionally, most of my interactions online/phone are pretty smooth.
There are other areas of my life causing me a degree of concern involving real people.

If I have to login to any more 'portals', I shall fall through one! The pain you go through, submitting your email, your ID and a 4 digit code to generate a one-time-code that never arrives, having already had to ask what my ID was [I don't have my account set up yet, so why would I already have an ID?]. All to get your invoices refunded.

It's not the processes you have to go through which are the actual causes of the annoyance, it's the scammers and hackers who make all this extra screening necessary. This is a huge industry which is making life more complicated for us all.

Something I say often ftm420.

Yesterday I spent hours trying to get through to someone regarding my new contract for gas and electric.

Then it was my broadband contract, replying to an e-mail I had received saying my contract was about to expire. I don't have a mobile contract but they kept putting me though to people who wanted to upgrade my mobile account.

After about 90 minutes the issue still wasn't resolved because there were two issues and they could only deal with one at a time, two days apart. Even though they e-mailed me saying my contract was about the end- the actual expiry date was June- so they told me to ring back in a few weeks!

Then it was my TV license- they thanked me for renewing it in an e-mail but no money had gone from my account. Again, I was worried the license hadn't actually renewed so I rang up.
It isn't due to be renewed for three more weeks!

Of course my mum and grandparents had very stressful lives but that sort of thinking doesn't help people who find negotiating on-line contracts and e-mails very difficult and stressful, maybe not in the same way but these things can be very challenging for some of us.

Trying to change the house and home insurance turned out to be a very lengthy business as we thought it would be better to speak to someone on the phone.

My Dh spends whole days trying to insure cars, houses etc.
It’s a very stressful nightmare.

“Last week I bought a new vacuum and attempting to register a guarantee online proved impossible. I spent a few hours on this and ended up so frustrated, stressed I finally gave up.

Every generation has pressure and impossibilities I d rather be worrying about a forgotten password or a difficult signing in online than WW2 and my children being sent away for their safety or shovelling coal out of a coal shed every day to keep the house warm or washing the clothes by hand each week carrying hot water upstairs to have a daily wash in

These online things are just annoyance similar to seeing a bus pull away just as you get to the bus stop they can happen to everyone
Just a tad dramatic to say you are going through ‘pain’ to work computer stuff out
Thank your lucky stars you only have computer annoyances

Thank your lucky stars you only have computer annoyances

But we don't know that.
There could be a lot going on in people's lives which are worrying, painful, distressing, so if dealing with everyday matters such as paying bills, sorting out insurances etc, is less than straightforward, it can add to the stress.
These things should be simple and straightforward. There were different difficulties to face years ago, but the Man from the Pru would come to your door every week or month, you'd pay him and he wrote it down in your book.
Simple.

Even I can remember thst from when we were first married!

Maybe the stresses of trying to sort something out online these days is contributing to the mental ill health of the nation. I’ve never spent so much time using up so much emotional energy on resolving issues that should be a simple matter of talking to someone. Round in circles you go when you can’t talk to someone. Press 1 for etc…..
I’ve had some very difficult personal problems in my life but the stresses and strains caused by these issues was very different these issues caused by crap technology and saving money on customer care. It’s the powerlessness of it all.

Frustration and anger seem now to be a daily occurrence.

Sometimes computers/iT can so infuriatingly illogical!!

I agree with Allira and Ayse.

I think that trying to compare the stresses of our g.parents, etc and our own is rather like comparing apples and pears.

Okay, I do not have to take in washing (when already doing it - by hand for my own family of ten children - like my East London g.mother), but there is no doubt that stress caused by modern, technological living has a great effect on our lives.

I am pretty fortunate in that my son-in-law living close by will come over (when he has time) to sort things out for me, but this week alone have had problems with my main television, - and, YES it is important to me as my main form of entertainment as I live alone.
Then my home contents insurance,which I would normally allowed just to automatically renew, changed companies and sent me an email saying it would take payment from a credit card that I no longer used. Could not amend this on line as the 'new' company had not yet set up an account for me. So, a telephone call. Five minutes replying with phone keyboard and 'We have now found all your details', then a wait to go to a person - where all my details had to be re-done 'so we can be sure we have the correct account'. All I wanted was to give them correct card number so they could get their money!!! He even asked me how I prefer to be addressed - and (exasperated), I said 'You can call me Beezlebub, if you like, just please take this new card number!!'. Took 20 minutes of my time to manage to do that.
Look back at my parents retirement in 70's 80's. Their retirement state pensions gave them enough to live on, with a holiday each year. They were well served and looked after by NHS, no central heating, but had those horrible parifin heaters which were cheap to run (and smelly), The flat was always warm. They had never learned to drive or owned a car, used free public transport. Television was simple, buy it or rent it, take home, plug into electricity, and use a cheap indoor aerial for their three or four stations. Yes, they had survived the serious stresses of the war and prior to that unemployment of the thirties, but their retirement was a very stress free time. (I think)!!!!!
I do love my technology -ALexa, Smarttv, Hive and central heating, wifi, the internet, smart phones, etc. etc. Fine - when all working, but as soon as something plays up, I yearn for a more simple life.

Mr Brown from the Prudential,so much more friendly and reassuring than a computer or a phone call saying Press 1 to hear about our services, Press 2 for a quote, 3 for sales, 4 if you wish to make a claim or 5 to speak to an operator then 🎶🎵🎶🎵🎶 for half an hour.

I said 'You can call me Beezlebub, if you like, just please take this new card number!!'.
😂😂😂
Hope your telly is ok now, Franbern, we had problems a couple of weeks ago but we think it was to do with transmission.

It’s very very frustrating! Bit not the end of the world! Chin up

Franbern

I think that trying to compare the stresses of our g.parents, etc and our own is rather like comparing apples and pears.

Okay, I do not have to take in washing (when already doing it - by hand for my own family of ten children - like my East London g.mother), but there is no doubt that stress caused by modern, technological living has a great effect on our lives.

I am pretty fortunate in that my son-in-law living close by will come over (when he has time) to sort things out for me, but this week alone have had problems with my main television, - and, YES it is important to me as my main form of entertainment as I live alone.
Then my home contents insurance,which I would normally allowed just to automatically renew, changed companies and sent me an email saying it would take payment from a credit card that I no longer used. Could not amend this on line as the 'new' company had not yet set up an account for me. So, a telephone call. Five minutes replying with phone keyboard and 'We have now found all your details', then a wait to go to a person - where all my details had to be re-done 'so we can be sure we have the correct account'. All I wanted was to give them correct card number so they could get their money!!! He even asked me how I prefer to be addressed - and (exasperated), I said 'You can call me Beezlebub, if you like, just please take this new card number!!'. Took 20 minutes of my time to manage to do that.
Look back at my parents retirement in 70's 80's. Their retirement state pensions gave them enough to live on, with a holiday each year. They were well served and looked after by NHS, no central heating, but had those horrible parifin heaters which were cheap to run (and smelly), The flat was always warm. They had never learned to drive or owned a car, used free public transport. Television was simple, buy it or rent it, take home, plug into electricity, and use a cheap indoor aerial for their three or four stations. Yes, they had survived the serious stresses of the war and prior to that unemployment of the thirties, but their retirement was a very stress free time. (I think)!!!!!
I do love my technology -ALexa, Smarttv, Hive and central heating, wifi, the internet, smart phones, etc. etc. Fine - when all working, but as soon as something plays up, I yearn for a more simple life.

I agree, different stresses, but to some just as difficult

We have life much easier than our grandmothers and great grandmothers
It's not stressful to me, stress is different for each person as is how we deal with it .

Although it has its virtues (we are all online here for example),I think technology has become a source of great stress for so many people these days. It’s as if it’s added another layer on top of all the other every day stresses that have always existed in one form or another. In our attempts to make things easier, we seem to have made a number of things a whole lot harder! On top of this, there’s the addiction aspect to a lot of online stuff, especially for younger people and those that are more vulnerable.
I don’t know what the answer is. I try to balance the amount of time and effort (and frustration) on these issues, with good old natural living, ie being in nature, having peace and quiet and having time away from screens.

Life was v hard for earlier generations.Was it more stressful though? After all the challenges they had were those previous generations had had & were shared by those around them.There must have been days where they were absolutely desperate, but did they have this constant background stress from needing machines to do every little thing, & from constant change & decisions & arguably living in a sharper elbowed society?

I despair!

I understand your frustration with the digital world. I recently applied for a casual job as an exam invigilator but as it is in a school I had to fill out a form with my full employment history including all gaps when I was not employed. Apart from the fact that the form didn't have enough space for my extensive career, my computer skills are a bit limited so I lost the partly completed form once, redid it and got to the end then managed to lose it again. I finally completed it having worked out how to make extra space for the extra 20 years worth of employment history, and submitted it. I hope it was worth it as I lost most of a weekend on it! I've been retired for nearly 5 years but am needing to increase my income a bit with the way things are going. I didn't expect to have to jump through all these hoops ever again. Hopefully this will be the last time!

I don't find the 21st century any more stressful than the 20th.

Perhaps because I can use a computer and rarely run into the difficulties you describe, which admittedly are infuriating.

When I run into them, I exit the site, and go back to it later, if it can wait. If it can't I simply phone and get some bright young man or woman to help me through the problem.