Is Trading More Stressful Than Having Babies?

Bad Assed Trader:   You may think I have no business discussing babies on a trading blog but there is method in my madness, stick with me on this one.

In “Your Daily Trading Coach” – the book which is currently guiding my efforts, Steenbarger suggests that the reader draws a line representing the peaks and troughs of your life and another representing the peaks and troughs of your trading.  We are instructed to label the troughs with the toughest times of our lives and the peaks as, you guessed it, the high points.

We are then to do the same with the trading line – peaks are the best trades and troughs the worst losers.

For our peaks and troughs we are then required to describe the circumstances, the strengths we used to achieve the peaks, the weaknesses that kicked in and led to the troughs.

Steenbarger invites us to find patterns between both lines – we should expect to see that where we succeeded in life we used our strengths which were also applicable for our great trades.  And vice versa for the losers.

Our next step is to start to recognise the warning signals before the weaknesses actually take hold and direct our behaviour.  This way we can start to prevent the repetition of loss. 

So this advice has led me to reflect on the difficult moments of my life and why they were so tough, to see what is applicable to my trading.  This should help me to identify the weaknesses I need to overcome.

You may think I've listed more than enough weaknesses throughout my blog and isn't it about time to get onto my strengths?  Ah, if only.

But I will come to strengths in time as they are even more important really - it's what gets us to the performance peaks after all.

Back to my troughs of life then.

As I've been around for a while my troughs are quite numerous, but I think the most stressful time was having babies.  

I don't mean the act of giving birth which actually, on both occasions was a peak.  No details here you'll be relieved to know.

I mean the time afterwards, when you are dealing with something unpredictable, uncontrollable, that soaks up your time and money and gives little back initially except being fun to watch - but is sometimes painful to be with.  Is that a description of trading or looking after a baby?

Now I love my baby girls (currently aged nearly 16 and 26) more than life itself but they had their moments when they were tiny tots that personally I found far more stressful than trading.  And I'm someone who has always loved babies and looks forward to seeing more in the family.

When the older daughter was a five month old baby my older sister sat her on the edge of a very high hospital bed and walked away.  She fell forward - slap - onto the hard floor and there was silence before the screaming.  I was distraught to the point where my head felt as though it would burst.  Thankfully there was no damage (babies seem to bounce) but that moment was definitely a trough.  A moment where my responsibility was huge, my control was nil and the situation was potentially dangerous.  

It was compounded stress-wise by the fact that it was my older sister who had caused the problem and my relationship with my sister was that she was very domineering and it simply wasn't done for me to yell at her.  I had to contain my anger, I couldn't allow myself to express it.

How does this relate to my worst trading?  My worst trades are those where I jump in prematurely - where I have failed to work through the possible consequences of taking this action.  When I heard the "flump" of my baby hitting the floor I felt completely responsible - but as though I had failed to see the consequences of letting my sister take charge of my daughter's well being.

The most stressful trades I've had have been those where I was not clear at what point I should come out - whether it was taking a loss or a profit.  When my baby was screaming and potentially badly hurt and my sister was responsible I didn't know what to do.  I was angry but couldn't express it and I was frightened for my baby but distraught to the point of paralysis - I was useless.  I ended up walking away and finding someone else who I knew and trusted nearby to talk to.  In effect I expressed my anger by walking away and punished my sister by leaving her holding this wailing baby.

My younger daughter, darling though she is, was a right puker as a baby.  This may not sound very stressful but it was a big deal at the time.  I'd be woken at 2am to feed her, spend an hour feeding and changing her nappy and be just about to put her, a sleepy tot, to bed when she would projectile vomit across the room, soaking us both in half digested yukky stinking milk in the process.  I'd then have to deal with a crying baby and clear up the mess - another half an hour - before getting back to some desperately needed sleep, still uptight and anxious about the fact that as she seemed to have thrown up most of the milk I had produced for her, may wake again soon hungry and there'd be none left. 

She'd also routinely chuck up in the mornings on my way to work, always just when I'd be in the fast lane overtaking someone on the motorway.  There'd be baby sick coming out of her nose even and she'd be wailing and wet with it all and I'd be trying to wipe it up a scrap of tissue found after rummaging in my bag with one hand whilst steering at 70mph with the other - one eye on the baby from sick hell and the other eye alternating between the central barrier and car in front which incidentally was guaranteed to be breaking sharply at this point.  The car always looked like someone had exploded a balloon full of sick inside.

These screaming, puking babies that cause so much stress at the time when you can't get them to stop screaming and/or puking and when you can't get them to sleep (that's another whole episode of stress I haven't introduced...) do, gradually and eventually stop screaming/puking, start sleeping and then grow up and talk back and give you a different set of stresses.  In my view none of the later ones come close to those when they are tiny and can't communicate or be influenced in any way.  But it takes months and years.  Trades don't generally last that long and are not on 24/7 to the same degree.

How does that stressful babyhood compare to the worst trades? That feeling of being unprepared and out of control.  That's what I aim to avoid in future.

That and puking, falling babies.

Beware: This causes stress like you've never known when trading...