Farm Stress

[Susie David]

Peanuts in coke...always remembered the last couple of swigs trying to get the remaining nuts out of the bottle...and that was the major worry of the day.
Make a list of your tasks and arrange them in order of importance and urgegnce:
1. Important and urgent
2. Important but not urgent
3. Urgent but not important
4. Not urgent, not important
I find that when things are down in front of me that most things that I worry about fall into the last catgory. Two and three are easily confused and can be interchanged depending on the conquences associated with action/inactrion. If I spend most of my energy on one and two things get done and I can see the results and have less stress worring about not accomplishing what I thought was important.
Raining today, finally, so inside and barn work some from category two and four....Dave Mc

 

[memanpa]

peanuts in a coke, there was a song with that line in it, i think it was titled I WAS COUNTRY WHEN COUNTRY WASN.T COOL
it may have been reba who sang it but i am not sure , and the "possum" made a guest appearance!
i disagree on the southern tradition statement, was raised in the mid west and we used to do that in high school
don't let it get ya down, go fishing!! don't even have to take bait just get away for a few hrs!!!
hang in there

 

[Beefy]

that would be Ms. Barbara Mandrell, i believe.

 

[Chuck]

When I was in my twenties, I agonized over everything, and worried all the time. All it got me was raging ulcers and lost sleep. I wasted a lot of years being miserable. Please don't do that. If you can't lick it yourself, theres lots of folks out there who can help you learn how to deal with it. You've gotten some good advice here with making lists and setting priorities and the like. Remember, Rome wasn't built in a day- or even a year. I can't say I never worry or get stressed out anymore, but you have to figure out a way to get a handle on it, unless you want to end up in a rubber room. One of the best things I've heard about worry goes something like Almost all of the tragedies, disasters and terrible things that I spent my life worrying about never happened.

 

[Tom D]

I guess I am a forum new-comer... anyhow, I am 21 and think I know where you are coming from. My grandfather owned 100 acres and raised cattle. I helped him out whenever he needed it. Well, after heart surgery, he had a massive stroke the day before he was to be released. He couldn't talk or move his right side. He was one of those tough as nails old breed that is quickly fading away. Since then I have had to take care of his land as best I could with the help of my father and local cattlemen. He passed on last month after nearly 5 months in a hospital bed. I am sure he is in a better place now. Afterall, I can't think of much worse for such an independant person he was than a hospital bed being fed by a tube.

Thing is, I dropped out of college to help take care of his stuff for this semester, and there are many things to be done. I can think of a good $10,000 of repairs off the top of my head, so now I am looking for fulltime work to pay for these things.

This summer has been full of a lot of firsts. I've learned how to do a lot of things.... and have made a few mistakes. The biggest one being feeding range cubes too much. I have to keep the border collie that is part time cow dog, full time pet with me when I go in the pasture to run the cows off from me when I am working on something because the cattle will crowd me, and nudge me and these cows have got some big horns. My grandpa liked em that way. If I am driving the truck, they will box me in by surrounding me on the sides and then run in front of me and hold their ground to stop me on purpose while the ones behind me put their heads over the truck bed and start looking around for the sacks of feed. A quick call to Cody (the dog) and he'll round em up into a tight group and run them a few hundred yards away.

One of the locals is in his 80s and still manages to take care of business like a much younger person. He told me what he lives by and I'll tell it to you as best I can remember. "If there is something you can't do anything about, don't worry about it because it doesn't do any good. Instead, take care of what you can."

Oh yeah, get out and have a little fun. There will be plenty of time to grow grey hairs when you are older..... now I just need to follow my own advice.

 

[flaboy+]

Welcome aboard Tom. Sorry to hear about your grandpa. Sounds like he was fighting all the way is why he stayed so long in the hospital. He didn't want to give in. Tough old fart I would say. I am sure he was a man you looked up to and respected greatly. I am sure you will miss him always.

Yes, farm work, ranch work can be very stressful if you let it. For me it is a relief from other stressful things in life.

 

[Victoria]

You are far from being alone. We have 67 cows, some commercial, some purebred. There is just my mother and I to take care of the ranch and whatever help I can get from my husband on odd weekends when he isn't building our house. The house is currently livable but FAR from done so he can't spare a lot of weekends. I grew up out here left and came back, I missed the cows, the country and the freezing cold nights - well maybe not the last one. Anyhow, we just got into the purebred Red Angus last year and I am trying to learn all about that, trying to work on painting the house and we got flooded 3 times this year which took out nearly every fence we had and filled up my basement three times. On top of that there are the normal things - put the cows in the corral for annual preg testing and they broke a post, the barn needs repairs and I am about out of time - winter is fast approaching.
There are a few things that keep me sane:
1) I'm a Christian and my advice is unless it is a life or death situation go to church on Sundays. It helps keep the perspective straight.
2) Jesus said "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Do today what has to be done today - whatever is most important to do. Then tomorrow do the same thing. Don't worry about what you didn't do. It's pointless. Easier said than done, I know but work on it.
3) Spend time with the cattle. When you are ready to just throw the towel in sit down in the field and watch them graze. It reminds you why you are there to begin with and nothing is more relaxing than cows eating and sleeping.
4)Pray.
5) Remember - The ranch will still survive if most of the things on your to-do list don't get done. Not that you shouldn't try to do them just a reminder it isn't the end of the world if things aren't accomplished at this particular second.
6)Come on the board more often. If you are miles away from neighbours, sometimes you can start feeling like no one else is going through the same thing.
7) Jesus also said "Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" I remember that one too when I start to get stressed, it does me no good to worry. The last scripture that I remember is - God works for the good of those who love him. I repeated that scripture many times when I was under mandatory evacuation from my house trying to get the cows to high ground.
Basically I guess without my faith I would be insane by now. :shock: ;-)

 

[memanpa]

beefy!
think ya are right!!

 

[Rustler9]

Case IH-first, welcome to the board. Stress, I have it and I guess everyone else does from time to time but it's not enough to make me quit. I work a day job then I go home change clothes and start my rounds, have cattle in five different locations. Three are within 2 1/2 miles of each other, one is ten miles west of where I live, the other pasture is 14 miles south of me. I am partners with a friend on a herd of registered cattle, also have a few commercial.

I also manage a small herd (about 30) for a neighbor. Some of our cattle are at the neighbor's place as well. The neighbor actually works out of town and only comes home on weekends. There is no pleasing him and we usually have a few meeting of the minds every two or three weeks. First he wants to sell everything, then he doesn't want to sell anything. When I price his stock it's always too cheap according to him. I have finally started pricing his cows like I price mine, if they sell I take him the check and that's that. This particular neighbor wanted me to buy him some really good cows that were consigned to some registered sales and I paid some pretty good prices for them (not cheap). I didn't know when I was buying them for him that he expected to double or triple his money on every cow. I thought that he wanted to get into them to sell registered seed stock like we do. It takes time to build up a herd and to get people interested in your genetics and start selling your product. I get stressed when he starts in about how he's not making any money (who said there'd be a profit in it?) and how he puts out so and so dollars for feed etc. (so do I). Then to top it off my partner's daughter had a serious four wheeler injury two weeks ago and is paralyzed so they're in Atlanta at a rehabilitation center with her. So I've got all of the cattle to feed and take care of as well as run errands and get his mail, feed dogs etc. Plus, I'm a hand short-had to call another friend to come and help me load a heifer I sold yesterday.

I was stressed Monday when I got home, had to feed everything, run out to a local farmer's place and pick up a load of crushed corn and then come back to see five head out on another neighbor's place. It was getting dark fast, one heifer went everywhere but where she was supposed to (she just couldn't see that open gate in front of her-it's a good thing I didn't have a gun with me). I finally got them up, did a little temporary repairing of the field fence that was busted and got in the house at 8:30. I was supposed to be done by 7:00 so I could go out for a steak with some friends for my birthday. At least I had three good vodka martinis to help calm me down. Anyway, my point is there's always going to be unexpected things coming up and a never ending list of things that need to be done. If we had replaced that old rusted field fence two years ago like we planned the cows wouldn't have been out on my birthday and I could have had my steak earlier but I'm sure we put that off to do something else that was pressing. I guess I wouldn't have it any other way. As in the other posts-take a deep breath and do what you can one thng at a time-tomorrow's another day. And-I always say the cows don't care if you cuss them and throw rocks at them. At least it makes me feel better sometimes.

Tom D- are those Longhorns that you're referring to? That's my breed of choice. Just wondering if that's what you have.

 

[J&T Farm]

Dang, yall are stressing me out reading this.

 

[Rustler9]

Oh yeah, I forgot to add that I like peanuts in my coke too.

 

[Rancher6]

My job stresses me the most. When I am about ready to punch someone in the face (yes when you work for the public you have to smile and watch your mouth, kinda hard sometimes) Anyway when I get mad I just get in my pickup and go watch my cows for a little while. Something about sitting in the pickup with a Dr. Pepper watching cows graze calms me down pretty good. Alot of people including my wife wonder why I work my butt off till dark and every weekend messing with those cows. If it were not for my cows, I could not do my day job. It is real hard for someone like me that grew up on a large ranch to put up with whining, pansy a%$, selfish people that have never done a full days work in there life. I have a little boy that will be born at the end of January and that will be good for me. Me and him have alot of ranching to do :cboy: