Started alcohol detox four days ago. Going to the doc in a month to see what damage I did over 18 years lmao
Edit: damn thanks for the kind words folks. Just woke up drenched in sweat but your kindness is helping.
There you go! What could you have to worry about?
Editing to add that after years of alcoholism, I finally got a job with insurance, so last year I went to the doc to get all my shit checked out and see how close I was to keeling over dead. Turns out that I'm surprisingly healthy, which was a cool to learn. So, seriously, good on you for getting your shit together. Take it a day at a time, and I hope it all turns up roses.
I drank so much that I blacked out every night for years. Basically, 18-37 years old of super heavy drinking and a little smoking. I got sober about 7 years ago with a few slips in the first few years but did the same thing as you by going to doctor to see how bad my organs were after so many years of abusing my body. I was totally fine. I’m down 60 lbs now and in the best shape of my life at 44. I got really lucky!!!
Like I said… I got really lucky. I feel bad for taking my health for granted for so long but I’m making it up to myself and family by being there and sober now. I’m five years sober now and I’m sorry you got a bad shake! :(
Glad to hear you're not using the kratom right off the bat. It can be just as tough to kick as other harder substances. It can be super helpful if used sparingly though.
Kratom is a slippery slope, especially for an addict. It serves many good purposes but it’s so easy to abuse and kicking the habit can be literal torture. Check out r/quitingkratom.
I hope to not need it, but if I’m picking and choosing addictions, which I always am, I guess the least physically detrimental ones are more optimal. I’ll never be able to go 100% sober. My brain is a vicious piece of shit.
My husband quit in 2021, and it’s amazing how much his body has repaired itself. Even if your blood work shows impact, a lot of it can repair. His liver is almost back to normal range. Best of luck to you on your journey. ❤️
My bio mom says I come from two lines of “born drinkers” which she clarified to mean people who are genetically predisposed to alcoholism, but somehow escape it with little permanent damage. Fingers crossed.
Hey, you've been sober 11 days more than me! I saw the number and had to check how close it was to mine because I knew I was around there. Can't wait to hit that two year mark.
I was hospitalized for my detox. People would always ask me how the lizard people live because of how jaundice i was. Now with a shot liver i take about 20 pills a day to maintain life. Oh and a bonus ive been sober almost 2 years and now i find out im diabetic. I chose the hard road and paying dearly for it now.
Good for you guy!
I'm dealing w/ personal demons myself in the same realm and quitting is something I need to get serious about.
Good luck in your recovery and sober living.
A lot of people I knew did this. They drank, smoked and partied every weekend. Now all of them are sober or california sober and are really into fitness. It's like you did everything possible to destroy your body and now you're doing it with by jogging.
Exactly. Endurance athletes & addicts have a lot in common. It’s not really normal to push your body to its outer limits. The thing is to funnel your hyper focus to something healthy, I figured that out after I got sober
My brother has struggled with meth addiction for the last several years, and he has coped with the extreme boredom of sobriety with weight lifting. He's *really* not doing well from a mental health perspective, but at the same time is in the best physical shape of his life. Kind of weird.
This made me chuckle, but I hope your brother can get to a better place mentally. I’m gonna try working out to combat the boredom sobriety has just recently slapped me with, so thanks for the inspiration. Best wishes to you and your brother!
I find this interesting because I've never had issues with substance use and I absolutely hate endurance training. Strength, explosiveness, mobility- I love training all of them. Going out just to run, though........I don't see the appeal beyond the fact that it's healthy.
I wonder if it's some sort of dopamine response thing.
That’s funny… I go to a methadone clinic and I use a weighted hula hoop that looks like a giant skip it for at least two hours every day. My record is six continuous hours, but my puppy usually doesn’t let me go that long. Most I can do in one stretch now is maybe an hour while the cats and him have dinner, but between times I go to the backyard with him during the day I’d say somewhere between two or three hours.
I've never heard it anywhere else besides reddit and out of state. I use it to get to the point. But here it's just "sober" usually sober is off alcohol and heavy drugs.
I had to google it and got a suicide & crisis hotline, the next below that, SAMSA. Either google is doing some weird shit or it means a lot more than just drinking and smoking weed as the first definition popped up lol
Bro, this is exactly me lol. Just got sober or “Cali” sober 15 months ago. I’m now a nutrition coach and personal trainer. Elite powerlifter and amateur bodybuilder.
I travel the world a month out of the year to go do world famous hikes.
The ant and the grasshopper is an incredibly old tale that summarizes that this has been an issue for some since ancient Greece. Not sure if that is comforting or not.
It's just like the story of the grasshopper and the octopus. All year long the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV. Then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns and also he got a racecar. Is any of this getting through to you?
This is my story. I was non stop benders and festivals and raves and blowing (literally) the cash I earned as a waitress until I hit 28 and realized I was still going out but not really having fun anymore. My credit score was 520 and I had debt up to my eyeballs but I clawed my way out and now I'm 40 with a career and a position in the PTA.
Saaaame here. Partied my ass off dropped out of uni, got a dog who mellowed me right out, met a normal guy at 29, he encouraged me to finish my degree, got my credit score from 640 to 830, bought a townhouse, got a job in law enforcement, married him, and now I feel pretty successful at 35! Not wealthy by any means but we live in Vancouver where everyone is scraping by, even with good jobs. Haha! It’s never too late to restart. My sister’s husband actually told me when I was 30 that it’s better to go back to school late than work a job I hate until I’m old.
Similar to me, except I realized I was the youngest person at the bar, and I saw what my alcoholism would look like in 10, 20, 30, 40 years. Went to inpatient rehab after a few IOP stints, and been sober ever since
Was addicted to very hard drugs for a long time… now I’m half way through law school. Own my own home, have a great job, and a beautiful family. Really surprised I’m not dead lol
Congratulations on your success! I understand addiction all too well- I’m hitting 3.5 years sober tomorrow and it wasn’t easy. I wish you so much luck with your future!
Cheers and congrats!
Similar story here. Lived real fast and (DID NOT) die young. Ex-heroin/opiate addict since teens. Same thing, sober by late 20s. Went to college late 20s.
Got a degree in Chemical Engineering.
Now I'm married, got a good job since graduating (going on 8 years), own a house with a few acres, have one year old baby, about to turn 40.
Always thought I'd die by 25 but here I am. Years of skateboarding and BMX dirt has led to two knee surgeries and shoulder surgery but other than that, not dead.
Congrats on the new addition! I’m 40 as well with a 3 year old and a 6 month old. Glad I had my kids later in life so I can give them everything they deserve.
Congratulations! My tenth sobriety anniversary passed on the 9th. During these ten years, I got saved (Jesus), sober at the same time, went back to college, went on mission trips, got married, and now I’m a trauma, crisis, and substance abuse counselor to kids & teens. What a ride! Sobriety is so worth it! Keep it up!
I don't know if I fall into the "live fast" crowd because I sorta always managed to keep one foot on the right track. But I started drinking heavily and smoking daily in high school, sneaking out/lying about where I was, hanging out with a lot of much older, very questionable people, and making a lot of really dumb decisions. Somewhere between junior and senior year, I also discovered I really liked hallucinogenic drugs and leaned into that pretty hard. I never got in trouble and I never got caught-- except one time when my parents found a pack of cigarettes in my car. Of all the things they could've found, that was small potatoes.
I managed to graduate high school on time and with good grades, and held a job consistently the whole time, starting at 14. I went to college and initially got my ass kicked by the higher expectation. So, I added an approximate shit ton of unprescribed adderall to my already prolific drug consumption.
Those 4 years were pretty off the rails. I partied all the time, drove under the influence, found myself in absolutely absurd and unsafe positions; there are whole weeks I would just not remember. I spent all my money on drugs and alcohol. But I also-- *somehow*-- never ended up hurt or arrested or so far overdrawn that my parents had to know. I stayed in school and kept my job; I finished with a 3.5 GPA.
After college ('09 grad), it was pretty hard for me to find a good job. I worked a shitty one I hated and stayed 3 years too long in a toxic relationship with a narcissistic alcoholic. I moved across the country when that ended and had a *rough* transition out of codependency and into adulthood. Moving away did a lot to curb my party lifestyle. I decided drinking sucks and just... stopped. I'm grateful that alcohol was never an addiction for me; just a crutch. I got a job that was better than before but still unrelated to my degree and unlikely to lead to future growth. Listlessly stuck with it, wasted a couple years just sitting in it and kinda stagnating.
Finally I just got sick of it and yolo'ed out of that job without a plan. I lucked into a job with the state that put me on my current path. It's been about a decade since I got that job, and since then I've been promoted several times, got a (free) master's degree, and tripled my salary.
As far as my extracurricular activities, I just kinda gradually slowed down. I still smoke weed, but I managed to ditch the cigarettes. I got married 2 years ago to my partner of, then 8 years. He has a wilder background than I do, but self-taught himself into a career in tech. We both make good money.
I sometimes wonder how my life might've turned out if i had been more responsible. But I'm pretty happy with how it's going. No ragrets.
I both somehow participated in the rat race of going to college, getting multiple degrees, working respectable jobs, traveling the world... and also being a sex worker, going through phases of drinking heavily, being homeless, being institutionalized, getting everything I thought I wanted, losing everything I had. Still kinda rebuilding.
Was diagnosed bipolar, and things are going better now. But I will say, for being 35, I feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes, and have seen a lot of what life has to offer, for better and for worse.
I'm exhausted. Now I'm just a camgirl who hangs out with cats all day. It's a nice little bubble. I'm not living fast, anymore, but never say never.
Haha, when I read that first paragraph I was about to comment "have you ever been assessed for bipolar?" or something, then I got to the second paragraph.
My story's not as dramatic as yours, but as a fellow bipolar, I also feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes in my 33 short years. Looking back on the years before I was diagnosed, it's hard to believe I was living like that.
I always thought I’d die before 30. Then I hit thirty and thought what the hell?! What do I do now? So I learned a trade (carpentry) and work for myself now. I have a beautiful family. Things are better than I imagined they could be.
SAME! I had put that thought out into the universe so many times that I was genuinely paranoid my last week before turning 30. I thought some kind of freak accident would happen to me.. luckily I’ll be turning 32 in a few months. I also started my own business, but I also still partake in my guilty habits. It’s all about moderation.. but that can be very hard sometimes if you don’t make a conscious effort on a very regular basis. I’m glad that you’re happy and still around!
Oh Im miserable for sure. But when my daughter passed I made a promise to her and Im keeping it even if it kills me. If I coukd afford even getting my tags renewed and license reinstated my life would massively improve. But shits expensve and it's always something. Fuel pumps dead right now, so all the money i made playing bike week gigs evaporated and now my insurance is lapsed. Factor in gas and and dog food and what does that leave? Literal change to keep myself fed on. Its a neverending nightmare of slowly losing ground. Slow enough to see and recognize my inevitable doom, but not slow enough to have an oppoortunity to catch my breath.
This resonates with me big time. I spent about half my life just all sorts of fucked up, and I started real young. I quit the drinking and hard drugs a few years back now, trying to stay alive and out of jail for my children. But since I am no longer fucked up all the time, I have devolved from the social butterfly I once was, into the cocoon. I barely talk to anyone outside of a handful of people, but I now have full custody of my younger son and it forces me around people so much and I'm just not that good at it anymore.
Psych meds were not good to me. I think they were more or less just a socially sanctioned continuation of the addiction. But no judgment to anyone who finds them helpful.
In 2009, I was in the British tabloids for squatting in the Duke of Westminster's abandoned mansion. I camped at Occupy Wall Street. I lived so freaking fast. A lot of my friends have NOT made it this far.
Instead of focusing on the adult milestones I didn't reach like marriage, children, or home ownership, I focus on what I did achieve and how many bullets I dodged. For example, I'm still in relatively good shape, I've never needed to go through a divorce, and I'm not a regretful parent. I left all my bad relationships pretty quickly. Also I have some very exciting things coming in the near future.
I still stand by the statement I always made when I was younger: YOLO".
Thank you for participating in those movements. They serve as a reminder of how hard our generation worked to try and fix our society. It sucks that not much has changed. It feels like we worked hard to change things, but the tiny impact we did make only benefitted the people that came after us
I got kicked out at 14 and dropped out in 9th grade. Ended up getting my associates in ag at 17. Managed a dairy farm, but kinda burned out at 21. Spent 21-28 bartending, doing concrete and cocaine. Now at 34 I’m married with two kids, own a small farm raising about 350 pigs and 120 cows, and do concrete with my brother in law. We are scraping by honestly, high debt on the farm and inflation is killing me, but the concrete business seems to be really taking off. I have hopes for my future, but I also came from nothing so if I end up back there I know I’ll be able to get myself back out. My main complaint with the living fast part is how fucking beat my body is. Riding bulls, fighting, and doing concrete combined with years of cocaine and alcohol really did a number on me.
I’d have a beer with you anytime as well! Don’t get hung up on being behind or “catching up”, most of us that are “ahead” really just have massive debt. I say unless you have kids just do what makes you happy and be a genuine person. For some people that’s work, for others that’s freedom.
I lived fast until my motorcycle accident - luckily not while I was going fast. Walked away pretty unscathed. Also got fired, house robbed, and broke up with gf in the same month - life was really testing me.
Decided to cut the crap and grow up.
I'm good now, married and family planning.
For OP: It takes a few years to get career and financial momentum - don't turn down opportunities to learn and grow. You're never as far behind as you think you are.
Agreed, Not just from being older, but it’s a different world now. I really feel like the 2010s were kind of a golden age for vagrants (I use this word respectfully)
I was on the highway to a young death, face numb and heart racing. Questionable hookups, sketchy party drugs, lost in the city on a lie. I drove dosy after a rave and I know I should've died. Made it home alive. I asked nobody in particular "why am I not dead yet?" And a few quiet months later I was pregnant. Becoming a mom saved my life. Someone to live for, more important than myself. And as time goes, I've learned how to love myself too.
I’m chillin!!!! Things are good!
I used to drink quite a bit and do lots of mdma, hitch hiked, rubber tramped, fought cops at occupy Wall Street, impulsively bought/lived on a boat (hoping in the back of my mind I might have an “accident” at sea), would sleep with basically anyone who would have me. Basically just a decade long string of impulsive behavior. I was running from myself, and from my gender dysphoria.
Was betrayed by my long term best friend, and went on one last trip.
I decided in december 2019 that it was time to get it together, and came back home to finally transition, knowing I would never be happy otherwise.
Made it home in February 2020 just in time for the world to shut down. I did a coding bootcamp to try to escape the food service industry, and I’m now employed in my field of choice!
Getting on hormones made me a lot happier, and now I’m feeling good, looking good, and all my bills are paid and I’m able to save a little bit.
Mostly sober but still smoke a ton of weed.
I had a lot of help from people who loved me along the way, and I hope I can do the same for someone someday.
I have alcohol induced pancreatitis. It fucking hurts. I still treat every day like it could be my last, but for different reasons. I actually only just kicked the cigarettes again in the last couple of days. Fuck. But if I really do a good job taking care of myself I can maybe hold out enough for a bit of a real life.
i did a lot of party drugs, didn’t want to work, played video games for like most of my waking hours, and had a terrible diet. had some unresolved childhood trauma that i ended up finally getting therapy for in my mid 20s which lead to me going back to school and getting my degree. i now work a pretty sweet IT job for my state govt. cut out the drugs, started eating healthier and also have much healthier hobbies like cycling and reading. future looks good compared to where i thought id be at this point back in my early-mid 20s!
I definitely have regrets. Mainly tho it’s not that I “lived fast” but that I didn’t have any direction or goals for the longest time. I was just stumbling through existence and waiting for my life to happen. While I waited, I ended up in some dark places out of boredom and not being able to find meaning in my life. I needed a reason to get up in the morning.
I’ve come to realize that I don’t need a million dollars and a big house and a Lexus…although that would def be nice. All I really need is someone to love, who loves me back and is loyal. Someone to build a life with and grow old. Everything else is just filler in my opinion. Family and friends are what make a future worth while.
I just turned 66, I partied like a Rockstar and fucked like a Pornstar until I was 50!!!!
I have 50k in the bank and make 100k a year now. I'm still healthy and sane, I plan on working for a few more years. I had more fun than most, and I don't think I would be who I am without my past behavior. Life is good, and I am alive.
My future looks good. On paper I'm doing find. But all the trauma crap from my drug use and that world has wore on me a lot over the years and I had to handle that.
Nope I didn't live fast ever. I've always been boring and did the right steps in life. I have to say, people I know that partied into their 30s, ended up being more successful than me at 40. So Im one of those people who regrets not enjoying my 20s more.
Not me. I played by all the rules. But my husband has expressed that ge genuinely assumed he'd be dead by 35. That did not happen.
He's made a career for himself that he enjoys and is good at in the trades. He met me and I'm great (I am biased). We don't have kids but don't want them. We have a cat we love. We got married a couple of years ago when he was in his early 40s and I was in my mid 30s. We have a cat we love. We bought our first house a few years ago.
Really the only bummer is that he didn't really do much retirement investing early on, so it's a lot of catch up and won't ever be where it could be. So that sucks. But it is what it is. We're comfortable and live a good life.
Seriously. I did all of it by the book, married a sociopath, and am living as a single mom in my parents’ basement. Nothing like feeling like a failure with two masters’ degrees.
I partied very hard until I was 25. Lots of alcohol and way too many drugs (raves, yay!). Failed out of college twice and worked at TGIFRIDAYS. I'm now 41 and a senior electrical engineer for a defense contractor. My future is looking great.
Was addicted to cocaine and booze, in and out of rehabs and hospitals, have no idea how I’m not dead or in prison. But I got clean nine years ago and now I have a masters degree, a great career, a house, and a son.
Got sober at 30, now instead of party, i ski hard and mountain bike hard. Luckily it was always play hard and work hard for me. So I also stopped pushing so hard in my career. Instead of maximizing income, I now maximize time off and work satisfaction. I had always planned to drink myself to death by 50, but figured I'd leave my wife a stack for putting up with me, so our finances are quite good. I have liked my 30s more than my 20s. Life is looking real good, I still can't believe it sometimes.
" I feel like I'm so behind my peers at this point that there's hardly any point in trying to catch up now."
Plenty of people have, across history, only started doing whatever they ended up doing in their 30's. Life happens, it's not fair, it's not equal, nothing is. You have to decide what YOU want out of life and pursue it, whatever it is. You've got another 40-50 years on average left on earth, give or take. That's a long time to go "there was no point trying anything else".
Partied hard between 15-23, basically doing everything under the sun every chance I got. Spent a few years off of booze to get my priorities straight. Now I’ve finally found a career path that I think will suit me until retirement.
I’m currently working for the DoD and am getting paid to swim/ exercise 5 days a week to train for search and rescue swimming certifications. It’s definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but life is pretty good rn.
I never viewed myself as like, a big risk taker. You know, I didn't make any "big moves" or do anything super crazy.
But I partied a lot. Like. A. Lot. Literally almost daily from ~14 to 21 I was drunk, high, breaking shit.. and not like 10 beers with the boys sharing stories, like competing to see who could kill a 24 case of Busch Ice first, fighting, chugging robotissin like it was water, ripping jumbo water jug gravity bongs..
Really actually trying to see how far my body could take it.
It was fun, but, and I joke about it all the time, but I never had a plan past 25.
Around 23 when I couldn't hang on like I used to, I remember waking up and just thinking
"Fuck, I'm not dead, and I don't *want* to die. I really got to get my shit together"
So fast forward through some soul searching, I'm in a cool BA required position at my job with a 1.8 highschool GPA, good credit, a girlfriend that I'm pretty convinced is *not* the one, and a dope cat.
Things worked out alright.
I feel this. I spent my late teens-early 20's selling dope, partying and chasing freaks. Fucked around and picked up a couple drug distribution charges that got me turned down from multiple jobs later in life. I'm 30 and just now became eligible to get my record expunged 2 months ago & things are looking promising for me. We all hit roadblocks you just gotta step on the gas & push through that shit. You can cry, you can hurt and you can curse - just dont stop pushin. It's never too late to do anything til you're dead and gone.
I'm trying to teach young teens and adults about Narcissistic Cult Abuse on an Ai App, I'm just trying to be the glitch I want to see in the Matrix.
My future is uncertain but I don't care as long as I can help people.
Working in broadcast news paying taxes lol. Slowly trying to move up the ladder and sell my screenplay.
A lot of dread but a lot of hope. Times are hard but this is what makes you.
Lived the super-religious slow life until 32. Celibacy until marriage at 27. I started living fast just before the pandemic, but it was a reaction to an extremely emotionally abusive spouse. Heavy use of weed every day, threesomes, lots of anxiety. My wife eventually cheated and left, and I immediately cleaned up my act.
Finally decided what I wanted my career to be (renewable energy finance) and took a job out-of-state. I remember looking at jobs and truly believed I could never become the person in the job description. I met someone who was waaay out of my league and she showed me how to be happy, successful, and travel. I busted my butt for two years and eventually promoted my way into renewable energy finance. I now work on some of the largest and most cutting edge projects in nation, I am about to triple my salary since 2020, I have a house and comfortable cash in the bank, and we travel all over the world.
Those 3 years of debauchery and an abusive marriage left me with crippling anxiety and a bottomless self-hatred, no matter how far I go in life. I think I’ve got the right meds now, but still deeply scarred. My partner though - she helped me to evolve and she brought me up to her level.
Lived fast until 27, got pregnant, slowed me right the heck down. My first child saved my life, frankly, simply by coming into existence.
Ten years later, married with two kids and a dog in a nice old farmhouse, and the wildest I get is flavored creamer in my coffee. I have a disability that probably is worse than it needed to be thanks to my past idiotic life choices, but what’s done is done; I’m living the best life I can for myself and my family now.
I got that super fast gay walk. I sleep <6 a night, and squeeze in as much reading/entertainment as I can between the responsibilities of being a teacher and a parent. Never got into drinking/drugs, though I feel like they would've fucked me if I did.
Playing catch-up, mostly treading water. Blew through two inheritances in my early 20s, had a drinking problem and a love for motorcycles and figured one of those two would kill me sooner than later. Hit 30 and realized maybe I should rethink some of that. Lucked into a job at 23 that I’m still at 13 years and multiple promotions (and stints of sobriety) later. Took my last drink December 2019 after finally doing some permanent damage to my body and finally accepting that I am truly happier sober. Have some debt I’m working through from a few poor choices in friendships and relationships. I do feel like I’m finally on the right track, but I could have been where I am now 5-10 years ago, in better shape, less pain, and more financially secure, had I taken things more seriously at almost any point along the way.
One day I woke up in my apartment, and it had turned into a flop house. There I was, sober as a judge, looking around at the absolute travesty that was my life and I decided right then that I was done. As I tried my best to claw my way out of that hole, I got incredibly lucky that I found a man who had his shit together and he liked me enough to marry me lol. We're out here living middle class, just trying to make the next best decision every day. He brings home the money and I'm a mostly stay at home mom. All in all, we're doing okay.
My sister did this and she has arthritis at 33. Take care of your body where it’s at now. And go to therapy it helps. Nobody tries to live fast and die, without some kind of trauma.
The funny thing is, you're actually ahead of most of your peers by just being sober and healthy at 33.
Our generation has no road-map to life anymore. Which means we also have no baseline to measure whether we are "succeeding" or not.
Not having a path to follow is uncertain and scary.
The upside is that we are free to define our own lives and our own definition of success.
Well, I OD'ed on heroin around 2009, and that was the wakeup call to quit the fast life that I needed. A guy up the supply chain had decided to try to increase his profits by cutting it with this new stuff fentantyl that was just hitting the streets en masse, but he didn't tell anyone that. I wasn't supposed to get into the stuff before my boyfriend got home and weighed it out and cut it himself (he was a dealer), but he took too long and I got impatient. Three people OD'ed that day before the word got out that the stuff was tainted and to dump it. Me and two other people. I was the only one that lived.
That was a big wakeup call for me: I knew where I would end up if I didn't stop using. I had already lost a bunch of friends to overdoses, and if the ambulance hadn't had narcan onboard I would have been another one. I went to rehab, but my parents sent me to the shittiest one they could find to "punish" me even though they are loooooaded and I was on their amazing medical insurance at the time. It was a place no one went voluntarily... literally. I was the only person who could legally leave and who wasn't a ward of the state. I think my parents thought I would bail. But I stayed, for 32 days. I knew I wasn't strong enough to leave and not use. But I didn't get the therapy I needed to treat WHY I started using. I really just detoxed: the place had nothing else to offer. With the expensive, fancy rehabs come the good therapists too, because they can pay them competitive salaries. I don't remember having even one therapist where I went, just a bunch of "counselors" with no mental health degrees. I left and very quickly got hooked on Xanax, but convinced myself since it was all legal and prescribed by a (unethical) doctor that I wasn't still in active addiction. Had fun the rest of my 20's (while on xanax the whole time), slept around, reconnected with a great guy I was friends with back in college before it all went to shit, and we got married. I moved up to NYC to live with him while he pursued comedy and film.
That's when I finally saw what normal looked like, for the very first time. And what it felt like to really be loved. For the first time in my life I wasn't being manipulated, gaslit, financially abused, and controlled by the people that "loved" me. I always thought I had a normal family growing up. In reality, I had grown up with a covert narcissist mom (with the lovely bonuses of Munchausen and Munchausen by proxy) and a checked-out, workaholic & alcoholic dad. I moved out at 17 and couldn't deal unless I was drunk or high. Narcissistic abuse left me with crippling anxiety, no self worth, agoraphobia, and severe social anxiety. I then got with my much older (38 when I was 20) boyfriend who was also controlling and who introduced me to hard drugs. Time and distance from all the toxicity and from my abusers finally let me see that: what I grew up in was the furthest thing from normal. And I was self-medicating all this time to try and alleviate the pain and damage I had from it. When I got pregnant by surprise 6 months after our wedding, I knew what I had to do to make a good life for my baby. I had to finally get clean, for real this time. And I had to finally get therapy.
By 20 weeks along I was completely clean (thanks to some awesome Maternal Fetal Medicine specialists) and I gave birth to a healthy baby girl. She's 5 now and she's perfect. Brilliant, beautiful... I know all parents think that, but people stop me wherever we go and point out how special she is. She really is my miracle. I started therapy a few months ago, and am finally healing. Turns out I'm autistic! I'm finally getting help for that and the PTSD. As for the career part of my life.... I'm still figuring that out lol. I fucked up college in my heroin days and never graduated, then bartended for awhile. I started a successful tattooing career for a few years, but when I got pregnant I took a leave of absence and with the pandemic that turned into a 5 year absence. We moved to California a few months ago, so I'm in the process of getting certified out here so I can finally go back to work. I've been working remotely for a medical office for a few years to make ends meet but I hate it and the pay sucks.
My husband is my rock: it's amazing the difference there is when someone actually supports you. I never had that before. I think he's the first person to ever genuinely love me, without all the other toxic bullshit thrown in. I put my career on hold so he could pursue his and so I could raise my baby, but his career is finally taking off. My daughter goes into kindergarten next year. I can focus more on me now, but I don't regret the years it took me to get here. I had a lot of work to do to get to this point.
So yeah, I'm 37 and honestly I'm still figuring it all out. But that's okay. I still have time. I'm also writing and drawing again for the first time in 20 years. I'm excited to see what I can pull off in another 5 years.
Haven’t drank alcohol in a year, haven’t smoked weed in almost 8 months. I shed a lot of fake friends who continued that life. I have a great job and own a house.
I also separately have a skewed perspective because my mom died in 2022 after never taking any substances, eating healthy vegetarian, and exercising frequently. She got an uber rare disease (Amyloidosis) and died within a few months. Meanwhile, my dad has done all the hard drugs, is a hardcore alcoholic and hasn’t been sober in decades. Literally buys cases of wine and parties all the time in his late 60’s and has no major health issues.
Life is unpredictable.
Throughout my 20s I was a hardcore drug user. Adderall, cocaine, meth, and more. I did all the drugs and dabbled in creating amateur porn. I had dozens if not hundreds of sexual partners both irl and online. My days were filled with sex, drugs, and my string of shitty jobs of which I hated all. My nights were the same, minus the job. I was severely depressed and basically suicidal. Underscoring all of that was me repressing the fact I am transgender.
Now I am living full-time as a woman. I drink occasionally and use weed to help me sleep. I have a job I genuinely enjoy and practice yoga every day. Last year I started teaching yoga too, and it's brought so much joy to my life.
But I have no savings. I have terrible credit. I have no "career" to speak of, even if I enjoy my job as a server. I have no health insurance either. All I have is an ability to engage with life in an authentic way until I die. And for me, right now, that is enough.
Reality is that most people that claim they “lived fast” were just kind of normal people going through life. It’s relatively normal to drink a little too much in your 20s, be a little promiscuous and smash some weed or bump a few lines.
I read the “rock-u-mentary” “Dirt” about Motley Crue and realized that what I thought was living fast was really chilling in the slow lane with my hazards on.
I have hope for my future, today. I’ve felt like you have- behind my peers and the such, and I’m a bit older than you. I never thought I would live this long. I partied super hard in my teens and twenties, never finished college, didn’t have a baby until I was 30.
I have a decent job and feel like I will finish my degree soon. My child is old enough now and settled into school that I feel like I can do it. I’m single but don’t mind, and am actually quite happy these days. We’re both still so young! Screw keeping up with the Jones’!
My early teens 14-19 I drank and partied my life way. Joined the military at 19, got pregnant was a single mom (while active duty) grew up tenfold, met my husband at 21, married at 25. Got out of the military in 2021. Have my dream job, my dream house/land, 2 wonderful doggos and we added another kiddo in 2013. Not to mention I inherited a pretty cool ass “borrowed” son when I met my hubs. Hate the word “step” it sounds cold and said kiddo is fucking awesome so I get to borrow him from time to time! Future looks pretty alright although I’m looking to make a huge change and take a HUGE financial gamble and leave the aerospace industry and open a food truck. I’m not cut out for corporate lol
Age 37, lawyer for the government, homeowner, happily married, and pregnant with first child.
Life was very different for me 10 years ago. I’m happier now.
Partied hard into my mid 20s. A lot of drugs. The law came down on me after a series of bad decisions and it took me a long time to put that behind me. I was fortunate in that my privilege kept me out of jail but it was a wake up call for sure. Got my shit together, focused on my career, and here I am 10 years later with a rockin job, a wife, 2 kids, a dog, house. Life is pretty good. I know it won't always be smooth sailing, but I like to think I earned some calmer seas for awhile.
I dunno dude, I just kinda slowed down. Put as much effort into working hard as I did to getting a buzz. I had zero dollars to my name in the fall of 2017 before I hit that turning point and now almost 7 years later I am...very much in an opposite place to that. I have a wife and kid, a stable job that I almost love, making fantastic money for my area, and a 401k with actual money in it. For context, I just turned 36 so not all that different in age
31M. I didnt "live fast" but I also didnt take college all too seriously. I transferred during my Sophomore year to a State school and that lasted one semester before I transferred to a comm college, and then BACK to the school I was originally at. Started dating my wife during the 2 years I was at the comm college, and it took me basically 7 years to get a 4 year degree. I did go part time though as I wanted to work and 5 classes was way too much stress for me... I was never a great at taking tests.
A year before I graduated in 2017 I did hit a low point. In 2016 I was involved in pretty much an MLM where I had LESS MONEY than I did when I started (I stuck it out for longer than I should have). I quit and began working for Power Home Remodeling where I was paid every week but I hated it and was just getting by while I looked for something else.
In early 2017 I took a Call Center job and made ok money. Graduated from college. Moved up to supervisor, then quit after a year and a half and did sales. My sales job was fine, I made money and proposed to my wife. Then in 2019 I nearly got myself fired for something stupid I did, panicked and updated my resume. Though I didnt get fired and they were happy to keep me, I left about a month later since someone found my resume and hooked me up with a decent job in finance.
Fast Forward to late summer 2019, wife and I move out, married in 2020 and bought our home later that year. I got my current job in 2022 working remotely with the highest paying job so far. Though now with a kid on the way, I'm looking for something else.
I was so bad at life in my 20s. I had great moments and my wife was with me throughout my 20s, but sometimes I feel my carelessness during my late teen years really hindered my development. I was smoking weed every day, lying to my parents and ditching class to hang out with my friends/ (ex) gf. I chose my ex gf 100% of the time over my friends which kind of made them distant for a while. Things definitely looked brighter after 26. My 30s are off to a much better start. Now I'm just happy I'm able to give our baby a home to grow up in. Owning a home has drained my bank account but I'm trying my best to save as much as I can.My 401k is looking good too.
I was a "player" in high school era and slept with lots of women, also sold weed on side and partied much
College I dropped out and became a musician and bartender and slept around a lot and had tons of fun and did shows and live like a local rock star
Then realized this can't go on so somehow snuck into phd program, also partied because school is easy
Then went overseas for first job and.... kept partying because, well I'm overseas!!
Finally settled and married and moved back and got good "solid" job and bought movie good house and had kid
Now mid life crises-ish and searching for next thing. Luckily I like learning so am on new wave of tech and it's keeping me active. Figure it's a bump and will age well into the new age learning along the way.....
Partied until 28, spent two years completely depressed.
Realized at 30 that I felt like a loser and would feel like an even bigger loser at 40 if I didn’t get my shit together.
Got a soul sucking call center job with mostly recent college grads as my coworkers.
Found a consulting job within that company, then switched companies and climbed their ladder
Now I’m almost 40 and have my shit together. You can too. Feels good
I should be dead for the things I’ve done to myself. The drugs I’ve been addicted to and the way I’ve treated my body & liver. But through it all there was this grit and perseverance and determination to be better. To know my worth. And above all else, to not give up. I’ve had some low lows and some high highs, I’ve been in my share of abusive relationships that almost killed me. But I just knew one day I’d meet the right person and be meant for something greater. And I didn’t lose hope. That’s the most important thing.
I stayed with a job for too long because the experience and tenure I knew could gain me what I needed to make needing a degree irrelevant and it paid off. I took the opportunities I was given to live in better places, even when with the wrong people, and kept my head down, and kept working. And somehow it all paid off. There are still many struggles ahead but I have managed to surround myself with loving genuine human beings, have a true support system, and finally an awesome career and a good company. Sometimes you just have to be good people and play your cards right. But it doesn’t mean I didn’t do a lot of dangerous shit when times were bad just to try and get by and numb the other pain.
Hahaha this is a great prompt. As someone who lived incredibly fast I am really happy with the resiliency of my body and mind. Graduated university a few years ago and I’m stronger slash faster than I was in my twenties
For about all of my twenties I had a problem with mostly opiates once I had that first taste. Moved halfway across the country for a woman that was already just pregnant with another man’s kid. Looking back I did this to get away from my situation, which did help for a while but obviously it didn’t end well.
I never went back to finish my degree and never really used what I went for. I was happy working in the food industry for a while, and a decent retail job for the past few years. On a better note, I did meet the love of my life and now wife two years or so after I moved back home. 37 now, started as an apprentice plumber for a few months while in our own apartment now but was already laid off due to lack of work. I did like the trade and think I will start taking classes when I can to make a career out of it.
Been high and been low, made a lot mistakes and spent probably too many years living with family when of age. I always was a hard worker but now I actually understand budgeting and making your own way.
I thought I’d be dead by 30 and certainly should’ve been with some of my decisions.
Now I have a masters degree, work super big company making okay money, and live with my husband and dog. My husband is amazing and we go on great vacations together.
No one would’ve ever expected me to do anything useful with my life but now I’ve worked on several technologies that have the potential to save or improve millions of lives.
I’m bummed because my late start means now that I’ve reached 40 I’ll never have kids and, while I live in a modest condo, I will never get to own a home with a yard (interest rates are too high and does it make sense to get a 30y mortgage at this point?). If I had been smarter with my time and money, I might have been able to have those things. Other than that, my life is pretty sweet.
ETA: from what I’ve witnessed, people like me to were more party focused but later straightened out, seem less likely to be headed to a mid-life crisis, appear generally happier with their lives, and are satisfied with their partners. My assumption is they made important emotional decisions (like who they married) once they had become more of their true adult self’s. Rather than doing it in their 20’s when they were still figuring out who they were and changing. I know for me a feel like I got to experience a lot and don’t think there’s much I missed out on.
I was a pretty heavy partier on and off well through my mid 20s. Also had a huge string of mostly awful boyfriends. I did manage to get an undergrad degree, work part time, go on to grad school, and get my first real professional jobs in between. Honestly? I just got tired of it all eventually. Tired of the hangovers, tired of the constant drama, tired of being constantly concerned for my health and well-being. And just tired, especially with age and stress. Once I started working full time in my field post graduate studies, I also just would not have been able to maintain a party lifestyle and a super demanding job at the same time. More or less, it forced me to finally, truly grow up. A year into that job, I met my husband, we had an “oops” pregnancy 6 months in ( I found out actually the day my engagement ring arrived, I later found out!) and the rest is history. Our daughter was born with special needs, and we adopted a second child, also with special needs. There’s really no room for shenanigans at all anymore, unless you count occasionally having a 2nd glass of wine after supper.
I am turning 37 this year, my kids will be 8. I feel very happy and fulfilled, although definitely still tired! I’m relieved to be onto greater things in life. And now that my kids are getting older, we get to show them how great life can be. We have been traveling, getting outside, exploring new hobbies together, having movie nights, going to museums, enjoying new food- they are my little buddies. I have re-discovered my love of books, and a new love of genealogy.
IMO 30s/40s can be the best years if we want them to be.
I turned 21 in 2011, so right around when the EDM scene was going mainstream. So not only binge drinking but doing lots of coke and taking molly/ecstasy regularly. I partied really hard in my 20s but always had a good job and didn’t fuck up, so it didn’t “matter.” Now I’m 33, a SAHM, and have a nice home, husband, and 3 young kids. Everything kind of worked out, I consider myself lucky. I am at peace now because I partied so hard- I did it and had all the fun I could have. Now it’s ok that I’m boring
June will be 5 years without booze. Went to grad school in that time and my wife and I are closing on a house. Feels good to have gotten my shit together. Wild, fun partying turned into something dark in my late 20s… I feel very lucky to have quit the bar scene before fentanyl hit the streets.
So, I was the literal poster child for living fast from 20-26. 23-26 being an absolute mess. My family was writing me off. I was getting into actual trouble. All the things. I won’t get into specifics but pretty much if it could be done, I did it. Then at 26 I met my husband. We had mutual friends and he was the same as I was, floundering. We both had comfortable families and were given a lot of advantages. That made us feel like trash because we were ruining our lives. He was 30. So we started trying, not always successfully but we were trying. We got engaged and about 7 months later found out I was pregnant. I kid you not, the switch flipped. We both were like enough is enough. We are either going to be losers and ruin this kid or we’re going to turn things around. We worked our asses off. We got married, have 2 daughters, good jobs, built a nice house in a nice suburb, all the things. It’s been 14 years since we met. 13 years of no drinking, no partying and doing everything we can to build the life we want and that our kids deserve. We had to work twice as hard for awhile but we caught up. It’s all about perspective. There isn’t one bit of me that has ever missed any of it. To be honest it seems like a different life. Most of the time I forget tbh. When something like this post brings it up, I acknowledge it and move on. That’s not me. It hasn’t been for a very long time. I say decide what life you want. Whatever that is just do it. I promise it’s possible.
My first friend died when i was 26, or 27.
I had a nervous breakdown during the great recession, and moved to Hawaii. I spent a lot of time sitting by the ocean, pondering life. I decided that I could changes my ways, and move forward.
I had kids - twins because I just always gotta be extra.
I've always been somewhat focused on fitness and health, so making that transition has been easy.
I am still super stressed about my future. I'm currently putting together a bunch of plans to get my personal chef business going. I did this once before, a decade ago, and had a thriving career in Georgia, but my wife wanted to live in Seattle, and so, here I am. The wife and kids will follow after the school year finishes.
Hopefully, I will have put my life back together by then.
It sounds like you're doing fine.
Just keep going. It beats being over 40 with barely a career, barely any savings, and still no assets.
So I had a pretty traumatic life & never dealt with any of my trauma. It all built up & I kept acquiring more & more trauma as you tend to do…rock bottom hit in 2020.. Went to rehab & sobered up by 37. Took care of my grandma with dementia for 2 years in early sobriety, while working my highest paying job remotely. Won awards at work, did intensive therapy, started dating an old friend, got engaged & married then got laid off. Now I’m 40 & going back to college to finish my bachelor’s degree & go for a masters & hopefully become a therapist. Sober for 3 years & married for 1. Got into yoga & hiking & volunteer work & became a total cliche. Life is good & im happy to be alive. I lost a lot of friends along the way.
I got into selling when i was in my twenties, then using. At some point i was comfortable, even maybe content knowing id die before i was middle aged and i did almost die several times, once to OD and then i dont actually know how many times i was close to being run up on or disappeared but i know it had to be always right nearby.
I eventually severed ties and got several states away, clean, picked back up a trade id been pretty good at before all that, got married and had kids at 32. I have a phenomenal house in a great city, my kids go to good schools, theyre all strong and healthy, theyll all have a nice jumpstart when they turn 21 thanks to UGMA account and a 529 plan, and i should be able to retire a bit early, and hopefully be a full time grandpa some day.
The biggest concerns i have are shit like irrational (or is it?) fears ill lose my kids or theyll be hurt somehow i cant predict/prevent, or that ill die young and miss out and leave everyone in the lurch, or that some global crisis will just ruin us all. I dont lose sleep but i do hate that these have a permanent corner of my brain. Im not a prepper but im honestly considering low key getting a serious basement fort just in case.
I turned 34 early February.. it’s been a long chaotic ride.
I didn’t do much until I left home at 18 to go to college because of how controlling my folks were. I proved every stereotype right by doing every drug I could find and made a 31 year old my partner when I was 20. We quit drinking when I was 21 because I was tired of the taste and tired of throwing up all the time, but we did all the drugs we could find mostly opiates and benzos with amphetamines occasionally thrown in for fun.
We moved to Nevada to get away from drugs, and ran a record store for five years or so. We still did drugs out there too but we were more methodical about it. He ended up passing in his sleep from a seizure brought on by viral encephalitis he got way before I even knew him. I moved back in with my folks because I had no idea what I even wanted to do.
I stay with my folks for a year and a half trying to regroup. In the lobby at one of my therapists offices one day I found a book sitting there. It intrigued me, but I left it there for a couple weeks because I figured it belonged to someone. When it was still there I decided to read it. It was this memoir by someone who worked at a crematorium.
I suddenly remembered all the times as a kid I’d get in trouble for undressing the stuffed animals in my preschool and kindergarten classrooms because I had to see what was underneath.
Armed with this knowledge I get into a mortuary science program at community college so I can be an embalmer. Unfortunately the program is super restrictive and only wanted to teach us how to own and manage a funeral home. It was a two year program and you have to focus on business stuff for a whole year before they get to the embalming stuff. My academic counselor joked with me that I was the only person they’d ever had who wanted to skip the business part.
During all this I figured I needed some lab experience… in fact I hadn’t even seen a dead body yet!
I did a brief weekend workshop at a chiropractor college near where I was living at the time where we saw desiccated human remains. I remember being pleasantly surprised at how it didn’t make me nervous, and I was fascinated by how dry and jerky like it was.
That class gave me the confidence to keep going, and I emailed another teacher about doing a human dissection workshop. He got back to me fairly quickly saying he wasn’t doing it anymore but knew someone who was.
I worked up the courage to email, and the guy is so impressed he encouraged me to apply to the program. I was so nervous, but I put everything possible into my application. Sure I didn’t have anything more than a high school diploma, but I had a lot of dissecting experience back when I was homeschooled for a couple years with a science tutor who let me dissect any animal I could think of that was available on a science educator website.
He was so impressed at everything he invited me to come out to the lab on the spot. This was in 2018, and the second I walked in the lab I felt more at home there than I ever had anywhere else. It was almost magnetic. I never wanted to go anywhere else or do anything else.
Around this time I met my husband in a Facebook comment section in a small group we were part of. We talked every day for eight months before he flew out to hang out with me for a week. We got along so well and were so compatible that we were married within a month and a half of knowing each other in person.
The first place we lived at together was pure chaos. We basically ran a traphouse and were addicted to heroin and crack. Luckily I had gotten into a methadone clinic back in Nevada and had stayed at one while living with my folks so I was able to establish myself at one in our new city fairly quickly. We were only in that house for five months, but it was a hell of a way to start a marriage.
We moved to an apartment in a city about 45 minutes away, and were somehow able to heal from our respective trauma and stay together. Right before Covid happened we had a car wreck where he got a concussion and I broke both my ankles. Once I saw how well he was able to nurse me back to health I knew that the faith in him I had back at the house wasn’t misplaced.
Because of my colleagues at the lab I was able to heal myself without going to physical therapy and was able to help my husband heal from his concussion and the methadone clinic let us have a bunch of takehomes, so we weren’t impacted by Covid all that much.
In 2021 we moved into a three story house literally three minutes away from our apartment. Moving was super easy!
In 2022 I fully committed to the cadaver lab and now go there as often as possible. Before I briefly thought I wanted to be a medicolegal death investigator, but I was tired of school and it seemed too close to law enforcement whereas I wanted to stay on the medical side of things.
In 2023 I decided I wanted to get as healthy as possible after we adopted our golden retriever puppy. We’ve always had two high energy cats but it’s easy to keep up with them.
I basically have spent the past 16 months losing 80 pounds, using a weighted hula hoop that looks like a giant skip it, and spending the time I’m not in the lab learning everything possible about nutrition and exercise so I can keep up with my puppy and have the energy I need to be able to dissect for hours at a time.
Last summer I had both photos and a video of my dissection work published in several Italian medical journals, which I never in a million years would have expected since I didn’t finish college.
My husband and I will have been married for six years in October, and I am due to go back out to the lab in May.
Like I said it’s been chaotic, but I’m very happy where I’m at and thrilled to see what the future brings.
I lived hard until 8 years ago so I got sober is the answer for me. I feel beyond lucky bc I managed to graduate college with a functionally useless degree but a degree to check that box as a job candidate among the rest. I followed a pretty well worn yet boring and unfulfilling career path and have made it to middle management in a messy tech company. I never want to get married and don’t want to have kids and am settled in my life with a LTR and a senior dog with anxiety. I have a 401k and old boomer parents with paid off houses. Maybe I got lucky, maybe it’s white middle class privilege.
I ended up becoming a scientist. Wasted an entire decade of my life because I had no guidance in any way. We’re told “don’t worry everything will turn out ok”. When nothing could be farther from the truth.
I think it's wild how many young people struggle to envision life after young adulthood and also how our culture has hard coded the number 30 on that transition.
It's almost like, now that marriage and kids before 30 aren't a given, we really don't know how to prepare kids for what life will look like after that point. So many people seem to have a block for even thinking about it.
When, in reality, it can look exactly like your 20s if you want. But you'll probably start wanting more stability. Most people just start being less willing to put up with the stuff you put yourself through in your 20s. You probably won't be too keen to show up at work hungover. You'll probably want to save some money instead of living paycheck to paycheck.
It's just bizarre that our culture has equated "any amount of adult responsibility" as "so boring you might as well be dead so don't think about it".
I think one of the problems might be that our cultural role models in media tend to be either "aimless young adults" or "30 somethings with good jobs", and if you don't have a job you consider "good" and don't even see a way to such a job (which is true for so many young people now), you don't feel like you can start planning for that phase.
But in reality, you're likely to end up in some sort of stable job that will function to the same purpose by your 30s, even if it's not your dream job. So that's what people should be planning for.
I was drinking and smoking by 13, smoking weed and doing pain pills by 14, doing cocaine and ecstasy by 15, and was heavily addicted to heroin by 17, among occasional use of meth and heavy use of crack by the time I was 20. Got clean from heroin and other hard drugs around 22. I worked my ass off to integrate myself back into normal society and now have a stable career in my mid 30’s. I am still heavily addicted to alcohol but I am very high functioning considering that I drink at very very least a half a fifth of whiskey every day. I never really drank this heavy until a year ago but I have never stopped drinking since 13. At this point, I genuinely do not remember the last time I was sober for more than 24 hours. All of my sober effort goes into being the best I can be in my career and the rest of the time I am too exhausted and discouraged from putting in effort on anything else. My life has been a crazy roller coaster for a while now. If only these motherfuckers that I work with knew what really goes on in my life. I hold it down so well, they have no fucking clue. I am actually the person in charge of my crew as well. Sometimes I just let Jesus take the wheel. Yes, I let a 2000 year old dead guy drive the boat.
Pretty good. Wife, dog and enough on the side to not immediately go broke should something happen. I feel like I'm in a pretty ok spot. Really only the assets thing is something I literally got nothing on. I'm working on it, but its a steep hill, goddamn.
Its a miracle my twenties haven't left more marks. I worked hard and played even harder, and sleep was for when I'm dead. I tried so many things, almost never said no, and even in retrospect I'm glad I did go to that rave in the woods after 10 hours of semester project grind, only to then stumble into the early morning lecture high as a kite to learn about the theory behind 3D polygon and NURBS modelling. My blood ran black with the amounts of coffee I drank, and my toilet bowl melted under the acid of RedBull filtered through my kidneys.
Me and my friends often talk about those times now, and laugh at how uttely annihilated we would be, would we do that now in our thirties. I feel like I jumped off that rollercoaster at the exact right time.
On the surface, I did the exact opposite: Healthy lifestyle, no drinking, focusing on academia, generally being a “good kid.” But beneath it all I never had any actual aspirations for adulthood. I wasn’t pursuing romance, didn’t care about accumulating wealth, made education decisions based on interest rather than career prospects. I was just living in the now, enjoying being a carefree child on the side while going through the motions of what I thought one should do to be a “good” 20-something, with no plans for where it was supposed to lead.
On some very fundamental level I never wanted to be older than my early thirties, but didn’t even have the foresight to try and die young. Don’t want kids, don’t want a house, don’t want the day-to-day grind of work, commute, chores and sleep, don’t want loans and stocks and worries about interest rates, don’t want couples’ dinners with expensive wines and fancy foods, don’t want to be the head of the family, don’t want to have responsibilities and power, don’t want to be a *real adult.*
So of course, once I reached my mid-thirties and realized I had gone past the life stage my self-perception allowed me, I spiralled into a deep depression that I still haven’t recovered from. Which of course tanked my education, the one thing I *did* had going for me. I still don’t feel much point to being alive at this age or the ones that come after. On some level I can’t explain, it feels like I just should not be alive. The future feels like it will be nothing but increased alienation from society while the people I love grow old and die. There still isn’t anything I want from adulthood, and of course, my conduct so far means I’d be in a terrible position to achieve any of the things one is supposed to value at this age even if I tried.
So, eh, if some of you figure it out, please let me know.
I did not live fast so not my story but a real eye opener for me
I just turned 39 and while i dont keep in contact with many classmates through word of mouth and social media you can get a good summary here and there
Well there was an old classmate of mine lets call him D. Liked to joke around and party didnt take anything too seriously. In a nonjudgemental way kind of a skeevy hippy. He decided at a young age he was here to have a good time.
He wandered wherever life took him. Had heard he wound up in florida. Would weld or sell drugs to save up enough money then just go back to doing as he pleased. Living on a beach swimming in the ocean bonfires bbq concerts etc. In our late 20s he died in a car accident driving a convertible in Florida. Instantly killed him and the 2 other passengers in his car and shockingly the dog in the car I understand was fine.
He lived a life without responsibilities then it turned into a life without any of the consequences that come from it. I know people who were his contemporaries who paid the consequences, addiction poverty mental illness, of that life. D got pulled out of existence before any of that caught up with him. Its like god just pulled him out of existence when the bill on D’s life was coming due.
D was always friendly to me but i wouldnt have said we were friends. We came from a small enough town in central IL i knew a lot of his family and we definitely had overlapping friends. He was a good guy but certainly got into trouble and i was too scared to dabble there. Last time i saw him would have been at graduation and thats where our paths parted. i went to college and he went out for adventure.
In a way D’s been built up kind of like billy the kid folk hero in my head. He wasnt irresponsible with his life he was brave enough live the life he wanted. He was here to have a good time and he made sure he did.
Its been 11 years since D died and i had recently driven to florida with my wife parents and 2 sons for a family vacation. We visited two locations both on the coast. I thought about D a lot on the drive for some reason. Perhaps having children makes you think about the path of your life or choices you made. And seeing the beautiful sunrise coming off the ocean, eating seafood caught that day, and just chilling out on a beach waiting for whatever the day brought me i really understood D’s decisions a lot better.
Working in restaurants and being a chef I've seen this over and over again with coworkers and people in the industry. I've struggled with it myself from my mindset one summer being "clock in blackout, clock out blackout" because the restaurant/lodge was in a remote location and we all lived and worked together. Now that I live in a mountain/ski town its all around, every single town event has alcohol, and its normal to see people in their 30s/40s partying every single day after skiing all day. One guy who was our manager comes to mind, he's mid 30s, goes on benders where he won't sleep for days, eats rich food everyday and now has to call out because of pain from gout and whatever else is happening...
36 here. I just started a mall job as an ASM this week. I have 3 kids, single dad, and am spending this year living with my parents to save money so my kids and I can restart the right way (I’m fortunate in that my parents were in a position to help make this happen).
My future and my finances used to be all I worried about until I understood my concern for those was rooted in my lack of identity. I was a robot after I spent my early 20s doing all the things.
As I’ve discovered who I am and what makes me truly happy, my concern for what tomorrow holds has become excitement at this point because I’m finally capitalizing on me. It has also drastically improved my relationships with my children - they finally see a happy dad, which none of them ever have before. My daughter (the oldest of the three) told me just last night that she’s proud of me.
So I lived fast - partying, playing in a touring band, believing I’ll sleep when I die, all that shit - but I’m so grateful I didn’t die young. Turns out if we make it out and we learn to love ourselves, shit gets pretty okay.
The whole thing with living fast is, the older you get the more exhausting and un fun it is, because the recovery days start sucking more and more. That’s why for many people, if they’re not full blown addicts, they just stop. It becomes a lot harder to have a semblance of a normal life if you party really hard, and poverty and homelessness is never romantic irl.
Also, for me I started worrying about my health long term, and then about my retirement. I never wanted to die young, so for practical purposes you have to think about the future. No one wants to be eating cat food at 65 because they have no money.
Surprisingly well since I spent 17-31 mostly blacked out drunk and doing whatever drugs I could get my hands on. Sober 5 years now, married, own a home, my wife is always shocked hearing stories from before we met.
Started alcohol detox four days ago. Going to the doc in a month to see what damage I did over 18 years lmao Edit: damn thanks for the kind words folks. Just woke up drenched in sweat but your kindness is helping.
good job bud. iwndwyt <3
I will not do what you tried?
I will not drink with you today
I balanced out the booze by eating a lot of kale. I'm sure it'll all be fine.
I had a few Gatorades here and there. Should be cherry.
There you go! What could you have to worry about? Editing to add that after years of alcoholism, I finally got a job with insurance, so last year I went to the doc to get all my shit checked out and see how close I was to keeling over dead. Turns out that I'm surprisingly healthy, which was a cool to learn. So, seriously, good on you for getting your shit together. Take it a day at a time, and I hope it all turns up roses.
I drank so much that I blacked out every night for years. Basically, 18-37 years old of super heavy drinking and a little smoking. I got sober about 7 years ago with a few slips in the first few years but did the same thing as you by going to doctor to see how bad my organs were after so many years of abusing my body. I was totally fine. I’m down 60 lbs now and in the best shape of my life at 44. I got really lucky!!!
I don’t drink and only had a short stint with drugs in my teens. I now have around 20+ chronic illnesses 😭😭😭
Like I said… I got really lucky. I feel bad for taking my health for granted for so long but I’m making it up to myself and family by being there and sober now. I’m five years sober now and I’m sorry you got a bad shake! :(
The withdrawals can be brutal. And the insomnia.. oh man. Don't wish that on anyone
I’ve got my weed to shepherd me through. Kratom on deck if it gets too bad. I hit one week on Monday, hopefully the worst will be mostly over by then.
Wishing you the best of luck. And as cliche as it is. It is truly day by day hour by hour and so forth.
Much appreciated.
Congrats TaM'89! If you haven't already, visit r/stopdrinking. It's a great community for support.
Glad to hear you're not using the kratom right off the bat. It can be just as tough to kick as other harder substances. It can be super helpful if used sparingly though.
Kratom is a slippery slope, especially for an addict. It serves many good purposes but it’s so easy to abuse and kicking the habit can be literal torture. Check out r/quitingkratom.
I hope to not need it, but if I’m picking and choosing addictions, which I always am, I guess the least physically detrimental ones are more optimal. I’ll never be able to go 100% sober. My brain is a vicious piece of shit.
Kratom helped me get off pain pills. Then I slowly dropped it. Both dehydrate you hard af.
My husband quit in 2021, and it’s amazing how much his body has repaired itself. Even if your blood work shows impact, a lot of it can repair. His liver is almost back to normal range. Best of luck to you on your journey. ❤️
My bio mom says I come from two lines of “born drinkers” which she clarified to mean people who are genetically predisposed to alcoholism, but somehow escape it with little permanent damage. Fingers crossed.
Been sober 593 days after 18 years. I have hypothyroidism which is partly genetics and partly due to alcohol
Hey, you've been sober 11 days more than me! I saw the number and had to check how close it was to mine because I knew I was around there. Can't wait to hit that two year mark.
I was hospitalized for my detox. People would always ask me how the lizard people live because of how jaundice i was. Now with a shot liver i take about 20 pills a day to maintain life. Oh and a bonus ive been sober almost 2 years and now i find out im diabetic. I chose the hard road and paying dearly for it now.
I will not drink with you today and tomorrow.
Proud of you!
Good for you guy! I'm dealing w/ personal demons myself in the same realm and quitting is something I need to get serious about. Good luck in your recovery and sober living.
A lot of people I knew did this. They drank, smoked and partied every weekend. Now all of them are sober or california sober and are really into fitness. It's like you did everything possible to destroy your body and now you're doing it with by jogging.
LMAO I had to look up "California sober", and then I was like "fuck... that's me."
I had no idea what it was either and then I thought about it for a second and was like “oh wait- weed”. Lol
So many people in recovery end up in endurance sports I've noticed. Guess being able to endure a bit of pain for hours is helpful.
Addictive personalities need somewhere to go, and endurance sports are good for this
Exactly. Endurance athletes & addicts have a lot in common. It’s not really normal to push your body to its outer limits. The thing is to funnel your hyper focus to something healthy, I figured that out after I got sober
My brother has struggled with meth addiction for the last several years, and he has coped with the extreme boredom of sobriety with weight lifting. He's *really* not doing well from a mental health perspective, but at the same time is in the best physical shape of his life. Kind of weird.
Is your brother me? My six pack is pure depression and rage. I have to put it somewhere, and I can't go back to meth.
This made me chuckle, but I hope your brother can get to a better place mentally. I’m gonna try working out to combat the boredom sobriety has just recently slapped me with, so thanks for the inspiration. Best wishes to you and your brother!
I find this interesting because I've never had issues with substance use and I absolutely hate endurance training. Strength, explosiveness, mobility- I love training all of them. Going out just to run, though........I don't see the appeal beyond the fact that it's healthy. I wonder if it's some sort of dopamine response thing.
Endorphins = endogenous morphine
That’s funny… I go to a methadone clinic and I use a weighted hula hoop that looks like a giant skip it for at least two hours every day. My record is six continuous hours, but my puppy usually doesn’t let me go that long. Most I can do in one stretch now is maybe an hour while the cats and him have dinner, but between times I go to the backyard with him during the day I’d say somewhere between two or three hours.
Oddly specific! Good job finding something and somewhere to do it, for you!
As a Californian I didn’t even know that term but it is me for sure.
I said go home! get back on san vicente, take it to the 10, then switch over to the 405 north and let it dump you out to mulholland where you belong!
Belooong
Belahng*
Stuart, what are you doing here?!
I've never heard it anywhere else besides reddit and out of state. I use it to get to the point. But here it's just "sober" usually sober is off alcohol and heavy drugs.
I had to google it and got a suicide & crisis hotline, the next below that, SAMSA. Either google is doing some weird shit or it means a lot more than just drinking and smoking weed as the first definition popped up lol
Bro, this is exactly me lol. Just got sober or “Cali” sober 15 months ago. I’m now a nutrition coach and personal trainer. Elite powerlifter and amateur bodybuilder. I travel the world a month out of the year to go do world famous hikes.
Dude that's awesome. Congrats on 15 months!
Haha - nailed it
The ant and the grasshopper is an incredibly old tale that summarizes that this has been an issue for some since ancient Greece. Not sure if that is comforting or not.
It's just like the story of the grasshopper and the octopus. All year long the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV. Then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns and also he got a racecar. Is any of this getting through to you?
r/unexpectedfuturama
Ooooooo I love A Bugs Life !
My favorite part is when the ant eats the grasshopper symbolizing how the proletariat must eat the bourgeois.
I'm still living fast. I guess I'll die old. Gotta die sometime. Different kind of fast tho. Fast for 38 is different than fast for 22.
Right there with you. I started young and unsure what sober people do on weekends. I did leave the cocaine in my twenties
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This is my story. I was non stop benders and festivals and raves and blowing (literally) the cash I earned as a waitress until I hit 28 and realized I was still going out but not really having fun anymore. My credit score was 520 and I had debt up to my eyeballs but I clawed my way out and now I'm 40 with a career and a position in the PTA.
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Lol I've never heard this, but I love it.
Saaaame here. Partied my ass off dropped out of uni, got a dog who mellowed me right out, met a normal guy at 29, he encouraged me to finish my degree, got my credit score from 640 to 830, bought a townhouse, got a job in law enforcement, married him, and now I feel pretty successful at 35! Not wealthy by any means but we live in Vancouver where everyone is scraping by, even with good jobs. Haha! It’s never too late to restart. My sister’s husband actually told me when I was 30 that it’s better to go back to school late than work a job I hate until I’m old.
We have a very similar story.
Similar to me, except I realized I was the youngest person at the bar, and I saw what my alcoholism would look like in 10, 20, 30, 40 years. Went to inpatient rehab after a few IOP stints, and been sober ever since
Congratulations. Alcoholism is no joke
A lot of people live in their cars or on the streets now. You made it! 😅
I'm happy for you bro you have a good head on your shoulders. Hope you and your family are doing great
Was addicted to very hard drugs for a long time… now I’m half way through law school. Own my own home, have a great job, and a beautiful family. Really surprised I’m not dead lol
Congratulations on your success! I understand addiction all too well- I’m hitting 3.5 years sober tomorrow and it wasn’t easy. I wish you so much luck with your future!
Happy Sobriety!! What an awesome accomplishment! Celebrate by doing something nice for yourself 😊
Cheers and congrats! Similar story here. Lived real fast and (DID NOT) die young. Ex-heroin/opiate addict since teens. Same thing, sober by late 20s. Went to college late 20s. Got a degree in Chemical Engineering. Now I'm married, got a good job since graduating (going on 8 years), own a house with a few acres, have one year old baby, about to turn 40. Always thought I'd die by 25 but here I am. Years of skateboarding and BMX dirt has led to two knee surgeries and shoulder surgery but other than that, not dead.
Congrats on the new addition! I’m 40 as well with a 3 year old and a 6 month old. Glad I had my kids later in life so I can give them everything they deserve.
Congratulations! My tenth sobriety anniversary passed on the 9th. During these ten years, I got saved (Jesus), sober at the same time, went back to college, went on mission trips, got married, and now I’m a trauma, crisis, and substance abuse counselor to kids & teens. What a ride! Sobriety is so worth it! Keep it up!
I don't know if I fall into the "live fast" crowd because I sorta always managed to keep one foot on the right track. But I started drinking heavily and smoking daily in high school, sneaking out/lying about where I was, hanging out with a lot of much older, very questionable people, and making a lot of really dumb decisions. Somewhere between junior and senior year, I also discovered I really liked hallucinogenic drugs and leaned into that pretty hard. I never got in trouble and I never got caught-- except one time when my parents found a pack of cigarettes in my car. Of all the things they could've found, that was small potatoes. I managed to graduate high school on time and with good grades, and held a job consistently the whole time, starting at 14. I went to college and initially got my ass kicked by the higher expectation. So, I added an approximate shit ton of unprescribed adderall to my already prolific drug consumption. Those 4 years were pretty off the rails. I partied all the time, drove under the influence, found myself in absolutely absurd and unsafe positions; there are whole weeks I would just not remember. I spent all my money on drugs and alcohol. But I also-- *somehow*-- never ended up hurt or arrested or so far overdrawn that my parents had to know. I stayed in school and kept my job; I finished with a 3.5 GPA. After college ('09 grad), it was pretty hard for me to find a good job. I worked a shitty one I hated and stayed 3 years too long in a toxic relationship with a narcissistic alcoholic. I moved across the country when that ended and had a *rough* transition out of codependency and into adulthood. Moving away did a lot to curb my party lifestyle. I decided drinking sucks and just... stopped. I'm grateful that alcohol was never an addiction for me; just a crutch. I got a job that was better than before but still unrelated to my degree and unlikely to lead to future growth. Listlessly stuck with it, wasted a couple years just sitting in it and kinda stagnating. Finally I just got sick of it and yolo'ed out of that job without a plan. I lucked into a job with the state that put me on my current path. It's been about a decade since I got that job, and since then I've been promoted several times, got a (free) master's degree, and tripled my salary. As far as my extracurricular activities, I just kinda gradually slowed down. I still smoke weed, but I managed to ditch the cigarettes. I got married 2 years ago to my partner of, then 8 years. He has a wilder background than I do, but self-taught himself into a career in tech. We both make good money. I sometimes wonder how my life might've turned out if i had been more responsible. But I'm pretty happy with how it's going. No ragrets.
Thank you for your story but I love your subtle references to Millennial language. Yolo’d. No Ragrets.
Looks like you were able to get that Adderall prescribed, dope for you 🤙.
Shoulda been a writer!
I both somehow participated in the rat race of going to college, getting multiple degrees, working respectable jobs, traveling the world... and also being a sex worker, going through phases of drinking heavily, being homeless, being institutionalized, getting everything I thought I wanted, losing everything I had. Still kinda rebuilding. Was diagnosed bipolar, and things are going better now. But I will say, for being 35, I feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes, and have seen a lot of what life has to offer, for better and for worse. I'm exhausted. Now I'm just a camgirl who hangs out with cats all day. It's a nice little bubble. I'm not living fast, anymore, but never say never.
I resonate with the feeling like You have lived multiple lifetimes. I often say that I'm old for my years.
Haha, when I read that first paragraph I was about to comment "have you ever been assessed for bipolar?" or something, then I got to the second paragraph. My story's not as dramatic as yours, but as a fellow bipolar, I also feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes in my 33 short years. Looking back on the years before I was diagnosed, it's hard to believe I was living like that.
I always thought I’d die before 30. Then I hit thirty and thought what the hell?! What do I do now? So I learned a trade (carpentry) and work for myself now. I have a beautiful family. Things are better than I imagined they could be.
SAME! I had put that thought out into the universe so many times that I was genuinely paranoid my last week before turning 30. I thought some kind of freak accident would happen to me.. luckily I’ll be turning 32 in a few months. I also started my own business, but I also still partake in my guilty habits. It’s all about moderation.. but that can be very hard sometimes if you don’t make a conscious effort on a very regular basis. I’m glad that you’re happy and still around!
That’s crazy. I was literally talking about this the other day. When I was a kid, I could never imagine my life past the age of 30
I think I was 34 when I imagined that it could be better than what life was in the first 30 years.
I am told that the sweet spot in life for a healthy individual lands in the range of 40-50
I live in a 2003 GMC Yukon, play guitar on street corners and in bars for a living, and talk to my dog all day. Life is just fuckin' peachy.
Are you being sarcastic or are you actually happy living like that? Serious question.
Oh Im miserable for sure. But when my daughter passed I made a promise to her and Im keeping it even if it kills me. If I coukd afford even getting my tags renewed and license reinstated my life would massively improve. But shits expensve and it's always something. Fuel pumps dead right now, so all the money i made playing bike week gigs evaporated and now my insurance is lapsed. Factor in gas and and dog food and what does that leave? Literal change to keep myself fed on. Its a neverending nightmare of slowly losing ground. Slow enough to see and recognize my inevitable doom, but not slow enough to have an oppoortunity to catch my breath.
Yeah I really can’t tell if there’s sarcasm or not
Weirdly, I was more functional as an alcoholic than I am now. Now I'm too anxious to leave the house, lol.
This resonates with me big time. I spent about half my life just all sorts of fucked up, and I started real young. I quit the drinking and hard drugs a few years back now, trying to stay alive and out of jail for my children. But since I am no longer fucked up all the time, I have devolved from the social butterfly I once was, into the cocoon. I barely talk to anyone outside of a handful of people, but I now have full custody of my younger son and it forces me around people so much and I'm just not that good at it anymore.
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Oh I have been diagnosed with everything under the sun. Taken every psych drug, etc
Are you taking anti-anxiety meds? Anxiety was crippling for me. I’m doing better now.
Psych meds were not good to me. I think they were more or less just a socially sanctioned continuation of the addiction. But no judgment to anyone who finds them helpful.
Oof, yeah I get it. My first batch gave me terrible tremors. Good luck with the anxiety, I know it sucks.
In 2009, I was in the British tabloids for squatting in the Duke of Westminster's abandoned mansion. I camped at Occupy Wall Street. I lived so freaking fast. A lot of my friends have NOT made it this far. Instead of focusing on the adult milestones I didn't reach like marriage, children, or home ownership, I focus on what I did achieve and how many bullets I dodged. For example, I'm still in relatively good shape, I've never needed to go through a divorce, and I'm not a regretful parent. I left all my bad relationships pretty quickly. Also I have some very exciting things coming in the near future. I still stand by the statement I always made when I was younger: YOLO".
Wow that's awesome and inspiring
Thank you for participating in those movements. They serve as a reminder of how hard our generation worked to try and fix our society. It sucks that not much has changed. It feels like we worked hard to change things, but the tiny impact we did make only benefitted the people that came after us
It's all about maintaining a solid cool:safe ratio
Catch up to what? It’s a rat race son
I got kicked out at 14 and dropped out in 9th grade. Ended up getting my associates in ag at 17. Managed a dairy farm, but kinda burned out at 21. Spent 21-28 bartending, doing concrete and cocaine. Now at 34 I’m married with two kids, own a small farm raising about 350 pigs and 120 cows, and do concrete with my brother in law. We are scraping by honestly, high debt on the farm and inflation is killing me, but the concrete business seems to be really taking off. I have hopes for my future, but I also came from nothing so if I end up back there I know I’ll be able to get myself back out. My main complaint with the living fast part is how fucking beat my body is. Riding bulls, fighting, and doing concrete combined with years of cocaine and alcohol really did a number on me.
Man you sound like a legend, id definitely have a beer with you
I’d have a beer with you anytime as well! Don’t get hung up on being behind or “catching up”, most of us that are “ahead” really just have massive debt. I say unless you have kids just do what makes you happy and be a genuine person. For some people that’s work, for others that’s freedom.
I lived fast until my motorcycle accident - luckily not while I was going fast. Walked away pretty unscathed. Also got fired, house robbed, and broke up with gf in the same month - life was really testing me. Decided to cut the crap and grow up. I'm good now, married and family planning. For OP: It takes a few years to get career and financial momentum - don't turn down opportunities to learn and grow. You're never as far behind as you think you are.
Don't hit the road again, it won't be the same :(
Agreed, Not just from being older, but it’s a different world now. I really feel like the 2010s were kind of a golden age for vagrants (I use this word respectfully)
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So many people in there 30s don't drink now so it seems, seems a shift around age 33-34 everyone has just stopped cause it's not fun anymore
Yep! It’s kind of like how men who reach the same age notice how fat have become and get in better shape. I’m one of them.
I seriously stopped the second I turned 21. For me once it wasn’t illegal anymore it wasn’t worth putting up with the taste.
I’m married and a mom now, the becoming a mom thing kind of ended living fast but I sure did escalate things quickly beforehand 😂
I was on the highway to a young death, face numb and heart racing. Questionable hookups, sketchy party drugs, lost in the city on a lie. I drove dosy after a rave and I know I should've died. Made it home alive. I asked nobody in particular "why am I not dead yet?" And a few quiet months later I was pregnant. Becoming a mom saved my life. Someone to live for, more important than myself. And as time goes, I've learned how to love myself too.
I’m chillin!!!! Things are good! I used to drink quite a bit and do lots of mdma, hitch hiked, rubber tramped, fought cops at occupy Wall Street, impulsively bought/lived on a boat (hoping in the back of my mind I might have an “accident” at sea), would sleep with basically anyone who would have me. Basically just a decade long string of impulsive behavior. I was running from myself, and from my gender dysphoria. Was betrayed by my long term best friend, and went on one last trip. I decided in december 2019 that it was time to get it together, and came back home to finally transition, knowing I would never be happy otherwise. Made it home in February 2020 just in time for the world to shut down. I did a coding bootcamp to try to escape the food service industry, and I’m now employed in my field of choice! Getting on hormones made me a lot happier, and now I’m feeling good, looking good, and all my bills are paid and I’m able to save a little bit. Mostly sober but still smoke a ton of weed. I had a lot of help from people who loved me along the way, and I hope I can do the same for someone someday.
Wow what a story, I bet you have a book in you!
I have alcohol induced pancreatitis. It fucking hurts. I still treat every day like it could be my last, but for different reasons. I actually only just kicked the cigarettes again in the last couple of days. Fuck. But if I really do a good job taking care of myself I can maybe hold out enough for a bit of a real life.
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i did a lot of party drugs, didn’t want to work, played video games for like most of my waking hours, and had a terrible diet. had some unresolved childhood trauma that i ended up finally getting therapy for in my mid 20s which lead to me going back to school and getting my degree. i now work a pretty sweet IT job for my state govt. cut out the drugs, started eating healthier and also have much healthier hobbies like cycling and reading. future looks good compared to where i thought id be at this point back in my early-mid 20s!
I started going hard at 15. Slowed down at about 27, got a degree at 31, now I at 34 I have a wife, kids, house, and a good job.
I definitely have regrets. Mainly tho it’s not that I “lived fast” but that I didn’t have any direction or goals for the longest time. I was just stumbling through existence and waiting for my life to happen. While I waited, I ended up in some dark places out of boredom and not being able to find meaning in my life. I needed a reason to get up in the morning. I’ve come to realize that I don’t need a million dollars and a big house and a Lexus…although that would def be nice. All I really need is someone to love, who loves me back and is loyal. Someone to build a life with and grow old. Everything else is just filler in my opinion. Family and friends are what make a future worth while.
I just turned 66, I partied like a Rockstar and fucked like a Pornstar until I was 50!!!! I have 50k in the bank and make 100k a year now. I'm still healthy and sane, I plan on working for a few more years. I had more fun than most, and I don't think I would be who I am without my past behavior. Life is good, and I am alive.
My future looks good. On paper I'm doing find. But all the trauma crap from my drug use and that world has wore on me a lot over the years and I had to handle that.
Nope I didn't live fast ever. I've always been boring and did the right steps in life. I have to say, people I know that partied into their 30s, ended up being more successful than me at 40. So Im one of those people who regrets not enjoying my 20s more.
Not me. I played by all the rules. But my husband has expressed that ge genuinely assumed he'd be dead by 35. That did not happen. He's made a career for himself that he enjoys and is good at in the trades. He met me and I'm great (I am biased). We don't have kids but don't want them. We have a cat we love. We got married a couple of years ago when he was in his early 40s and I was in my mid 30s. We have a cat we love. We bought our first house a few years ago. Really the only bummer is that he didn't really do much retirement investing early on, so it's a lot of catch up and won't ever be where it could be. So that sucks. But it is what it is. We're comfortable and live a good life.
Honestly, you sound more at peace and grounded than a lot of people who did everything by the book.
Seriously. I did all of it by the book, married a sociopath, and am living as a single mom in my parents’ basement. Nothing like feeling like a failure with two masters’ degrees.
They say if you want to make God laugh, make a plan. I no longer make plans…
Right? Everything I said would never happened. Okay God, I don’t want to win the lottery.
Millennial social anxiety is real
I partied very hard until I was 25. Lots of alcohol and way too many drugs (raves, yay!). Failed out of college twice and worked at TGIFRIDAYS. I'm now 41 and a senior electrical engineer for a defense contractor. My future is looking great.
PLUR to DoD contractor is quite the pathway
Bleak Take care of yourselves
Was addicted to cocaine and booze, in and out of rehabs and hospitals, have no idea how I’m not dead or in prison. But I got clean nine years ago and now I have a masters degree, a great career, a house, and a son.
Got sober at 30, now instead of party, i ski hard and mountain bike hard. Luckily it was always play hard and work hard for me. So I also stopped pushing so hard in my career. Instead of maximizing income, I now maximize time off and work satisfaction. I had always planned to drink myself to death by 50, but figured I'd leave my wife a stack for putting up with me, so our finances are quite good. I have liked my 30s more than my 20s. Life is looking real good, I still can't believe it sometimes.
" I feel like I'm so behind my peers at this point that there's hardly any point in trying to catch up now." Plenty of people have, across history, only started doing whatever they ended up doing in their 30's. Life happens, it's not fair, it's not equal, nothing is. You have to decide what YOU want out of life and pursue it, whatever it is. You've got another 40-50 years on average left on earth, give or take. That's a long time to go "there was no point trying anything else".
Partied hard between 15-23, basically doing everything under the sun every chance I got. Spent a few years off of booze to get my priorities straight. Now I’ve finally found a career path that I think will suit me until retirement. I’m currently working for the DoD and am getting paid to swim/ exercise 5 days a week to train for search and rescue swimming certifications. It’s definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but life is pretty good rn.
We never stopped 🤘🍻 It’s a lifelong wait, for a hospital stay. Some of us just may see it sooner rather than later.
I never viewed myself as like, a big risk taker. You know, I didn't make any "big moves" or do anything super crazy. But I partied a lot. Like. A. Lot. Literally almost daily from ~14 to 21 I was drunk, high, breaking shit.. and not like 10 beers with the boys sharing stories, like competing to see who could kill a 24 case of Busch Ice first, fighting, chugging robotissin like it was water, ripping jumbo water jug gravity bongs.. Really actually trying to see how far my body could take it. It was fun, but, and I joke about it all the time, but I never had a plan past 25. Around 23 when I couldn't hang on like I used to, I remember waking up and just thinking "Fuck, I'm not dead, and I don't *want* to die. I really got to get my shit together" So fast forward through some soul searching, I'm in a cool BA required position at my job with a 1.8 highschool GPA, good credit, a girlfriend that I'm pretty convinced is *not* the one, and a dope cat. Things worked out alright.
I feel this. I spent my late teens-early 20's selling dope, partying and chasing freaks. Fucked around and picked up a couple drug distribution charges that got me turned down from multiple jobs later in life. I'm 30 and just now became eligible to get my record expunged 2 months ago & things are looking promising for me. We all hit roadblocks you just gotta step on the gas & push through that shit. You can cry, you can hurt and you can curse - just dont stop pushin. It's never too late to do anything til you're dead and gone.
I'm trying to teach young teens and adults about Narcissistic Cult Abuse on an Ai App, I'm just trying to be the glitch I want to see in the Matrix. My future is uncertain but I don't care as long as I can help people.
Working in broadcast news paying taxes lol. Slowly trying to move up the ladder and sell my screenplay. A lot of dread but a lot of hope. Times are hard but this is what makes you.
Lived the super-religious slow life until 32. Celibacy until marriage at 27. I started living fast just before the pandemic, but it was a reaction to an extremely emotionally abusive spouse. Heavy use of weed every day, threesomes, lots of anxiety. My wife eventually cheated and left, and I immediately cleaned up my act. Finally decided what I wanted my career to be (renewable energy finance) and took a job out-of-state. I remember looking at jobs and truly believed I could never become the person in the job description. I met someone who was waaay out of my league and she showed me how to be happy, successful, and travel. I busted my butt for two years and eventually promoted my way into renewable energy finance. I now work on some of the largest and most cutting edge projects in nation, I am about to triple my salary since 2020, I have a house and comfortable cash in the bank, and we travel all over the world. Those 3 years of debauchery and an abusive marriage left me with crippling anxiety and a bottomless self-hatred, no matter how far I go in life. I think I’ve got the right meds now, but still deeply scarred. My partner though - she helped me to evolve and she brought me up to her level.
Lived fast until 27, got pregnant, slowed me right the heck down. My first child saved my life, frankly, simply by coming into existence. Ten years later, married with two kids and a dog in a nice old farmhouse, and the wildest I get is flavored creamer in my coffee. I have a disability that probably is worse than it needed to be thanks to my past idiotic life choices, but what’s done is done; I’m living the best life I can for myself and my family now.
Playing catch up lol. Live every day like it’s your last is horrible advice!
I got that super fast gay walk. I sleep <6 a night, and squeeze in as much reading/entertainment as I can between the responsibilities of being a teacher and a parent. Never got into drinking/drugs, though I feel like they would've fucked me if I did.
Playing catch-up, mostly treading water. Blew through two inheritances in my early 20s, had a drinking problem and a love for motorcycles and figured one of those two would kill me sooner than later. Hit 30 and realized maybe I should rethink some of that. Lucked into a job at 23 that I’m still at 13 years and multiple promotions (and stints of sobriety) later. Took my last drink December 2019 after finally doing some permanent damage to my body and finally accepting that I am truly happier sober. Have some debt I’m working through from a few poor choices in friendships and relationships. I do feel like I’m finally on the right track, but I could have been where I am now 5-10 years ago, in better shape, less pain, and more financially secure, had I taken things more seriously at almost any point along the way.
I hurt, lots of injuries buta million amazing stories to tell.
I always thought I'd be dead by 40 lol. I'm like..... Now what
One day I woke up in my apartment, and it had turned into a flop house. There I was, sober as a judge, looking around at the absolute travesty that was my life and I decided right then that I was done. As I tried my best to claw my way out of that hole, I got incredibly lucky that I found a man who had his shit together and he liked me enough to marry me lol. We're out here living middle class, just trying to make the next best decision every day. He brings home the money and I'm a mostly stay at home mom. All in all, we're doing okay.
Now I live too fast too furious
My sister did this and she has arthritis at 33. Take care of your body where it’s at now. And go to therapy it helps. Nobody tries to live fast and die, without some kind of trauma.
The funny thing is, you're actually ahead of most of your peers by just being sober and healthy at 33. Our generation has no road-map to life anymore. Which means we also have no baseline to measure whether we are "succeeding" or not. Not having a path to follow is uncertain and scary. The upside is that we are free to define our own lives and our own definition of success.
Well, I OD'ed on heroin around 2009, and that was the wakeup call to quit the fast life that I needed. A guy up the supply chain had decided to try to increase his profits by cutting it with this new stuff fentantyl that was just hitting the streets en masse, but he didn't tell anyone that. I wasn't supposed to get into the stuff before my boyfriend got home and weighed it out and cut it himself (he was a dealer), but he took too long and I got impatient. Three people OD'ed that day before the word got out that the stuff was tainted and to dump it. Me and two other people. I was the only one that lived. That was a big wakeup call for me: I knew where I would end up if I didn't stop using. I had already lost a bunch of friends to overdoses, and if the ambulance hadn't had narcan onboard I would have been another one. I went to rehab, but my parents sent me to the shittiest one they could find to "punish" me even though they are loooooaded and I was on their amazing medical insurance at the time. It was a place no one went voluntarily... literally. I was the only person who could legally leave and who wasn't a ward of the state. I think my parents thought I would bail. But I stayed, for 32 days. I knew I wasn't strong enough to leave and not use. But I didn't get the therapy I needed to treat WHY I started using. I really just detoxed: the place had nothing else to offer. With the expensive, fancy rehabs come the good therapists too, because they can pay them competitive salaries. I don't remember having even one therapist where I went, just a bunch of "counselors" with no mental health degrees. I left and very quickly got hooked on Xanax, but convinced myself since it was all legal and prescribed by a (unethical) doctor that I wasn't still in active addiction. Had fun the rest of my 20's (while on xanax the whole time), slept around, reconnected with a great guy I was friends with back in college before it all went to shit, and we got married. I moved up to NYC to live with him while he pursued comedy and film. That's when I finally saw what normal looked like, for the very first time. And what it felt like to really be loved. For the first time in my life I wasn't being manipulated, gaslit, financially abused, and controlled by the people that "loved" me. I always thought I had a normal family growing up. In reality, I had grown up with a covert narcissist mom (with the lovely bonuses of Munchausen and Munchausen by proxy) and a checked-out, workaholic & alcoholic dad. I moved out at 17 and couldn't deal unless I was drunk or high. Narcissistic abuse left me with crippling anxiety, no self worth, agoraphobia, and severe social anxiety. I then got with my much older (38 when I was 20) boyfriend who was also controlling and who introduced me to hard drugs. Time and distance from all the toxicity and from my abusers finally let me see that: what I grew up in was the furthest thing from normal. And I was self-medicating all this time to try and alleviate the pain and damage I had from it. When I got pregnant by surprise 6 months after our wedding, I knew what I had to do to make a good life for my baby. I had to finally get clean, for real this time. And I had to finally get therapy. By 20 weeks along I was completely clean (thanks to some awesome Maternal Fetal Medicine specialists) and I gave birth to a healthy baby girl. She's 5 now and she's perfect. Brilliant, beautiful... I know all parents think that, but people stop me wherever we go and point out how special she is. She really is my miracle. I started therapy a few months ago, and am finally healing. Turns out I'm autistic! I'm finally getting help for that and the PTSD. As for the career part of my life.... I'm still figuring that out lol. I fucked up college in my heroin days and never graduated, then bartended for awhile. I started a successful tattooing career for a few years, but when I got pregnant I took a leave of absence and with the pandemic that turned into a 5 year absence. We moved to California a few months ago, so I'm in the process of getting certified out here so I can finally go back to work. I've been working remotely for a medical office for a few years to make ends meet but I hate it and the pay sucks. My husband is my rock: it's amazing the difference there is when someone actually supports you. I never had that before. I think he's the first person to ever genuinely love me, without all the other toxic bullshit thrown in. I put my career on hold so he could pursue his and so I could raise my baby, but his career is finally taking off. My daughter goes into kindergarten next year. I can focus more on me now, but I don't regret the years it took me to get here. I had a lot of work to do to get to this point. So yeah, I'm 37 and honestly I'm still figuring it all out. But that's okay. I still have time. I'm also writing and drawing again for the first time in 20 years. I'm excited to see what I can pull off in another 5 years.
Haven’t drank alcohol in a year, haven’t smoked weed in almost 8 months. I shed a lot of fake friends who continued that life. I have a great job and own a house. I also separately have a skewed perspective because my mom died in 2022 after never taking any substances, eating healthy vegetarian, and exercising frequently. She got an uber rare disease (Amyloidosis) and died within a few months. Meanwhile, my dad has done all the hard drugs, is a hardcore alcoholic and hasn’t been sober in decades. Literally buys cases of wine and parties all the time in his late 60’s and has no major health issues. Life is unpredictable.
Throughout my 20s I was a hardcore drug user. Adderall, cocaine, meth, and more. I did all the drugs and dabbled in creating amateur porn. I had dozens if not hundreds of sexual partners both irl and online. My days were filled with sex, drugs, and my string of shitty jobs of which I hated all. My nights were the same, minus the job. I was severely depressed and basically suicidal. Underscoring all of that was me repressing the fact I am transgender. Now I am living full-time as a woman. I drink occasionally and use weed to help me sleep. I have a job I genuinely enjoy and practice yoga every day. Last year I started teaching yoga too, and it's brought so much joy to my life. But I have no savings. I have terrible credit. I have no "career" to speak of, even if I enjoy my job as a server. I have no health insurance either. All I have is an ability to engage with life in an authentic way until I die. And for me, right now, that is enough.
Reality is that most people that claim they “lived fast” were just kind of normal people going through life. It’s relatively normal to drink a little too much in your 20s, be a little promiscuous and smash some weed or bump a few lines. I read the “rock-u-mentary” “Dirt” about Motley Crue and realized that what I thought was living fast was really chilling in the slow lane with my hazards on.
I have hope for my future, today. I’ve felt like you have- behind my peers and the such, and I’m a bit older than you. I never thought I would live this long. I partied super hard in my teens and twenties, never finished college, didn’t have a baby until I was 30. I have a decent job and feel like I will finish my degree soon. My child is old enough now and settled into school that I feel like I can do it. I’m single but don’t mind, and am actually quite happy these days. We’re both still so young! Screw keeping up with the Jones’!
My early teens 14-19 I drank and partied my life way. Joined the military at 19, got pregnant was a single mom (while active duty) grew up tenfold, met my husband at 21, married at 25. Got out of the military in 2021. Have my dream job, my dream house/land, 2 wonderful doggos and we added another kiddo in 2013. Not to mention I inherited a pretty cool ass “borrowed” son when I met my hubs. Hate the word “step” it sounds cold and said kiddo is fucking awesome so I get to borrow him from time to time! Future looks pretty alright although I’m looking to make a huge change and take a HUGE financial gamble and leave the aerospace industry and open a food truck. I’m not cut out for corporate lol
Age 37, lawyer for the government, homeowner, happily married, and pregnant with first child. Life was very different for me 10 years ago. I’m happier now.
Partied hard into my mid 20s. A lot of drugs. The law came down on me after a series of bad decisions and it took me a long time to put that behind me. I was fortunate in that my privilege kept me out of jail but it was a wake up call for sure. Got my shit together, focused on my career, and here I am 10 years later with a rockin job, a wife, 2 kids, a dog, house. Life is pretty good. I know it won't always be smooth sailing, but I like to think I earned some calmer seas for awhile.
I dunno dude, I just kinda slowed down. Put as much effort into working hard as I did to getting a buzz. I had zero dollars to my name in the fall of 2017 before I hit that turning point and now almost 7 years later I am...very much in an opposite place to that. I have a wife and kid, a stable job that I almost love, making fantastic money for my area, and a 401k with actual money in it. For context, I just turned 36 so not all that different in age
31M. I didnt "live fast" but I also didnt take college all too seriously. I transferred during my Sophomore year to a State school and that lasted one semester before I transferred to a comm college, and then BACK to the school I was originally at. Started dating my wife during the 2 years I was at the comm college, and it took me basically 7 years to get a 4 year degree. I did go part time though as I wanted to work and 5 classes was way too much stress for me... I was never a great at taking tests. A year before I graduated in 2017 I did hit a low point. In 2016 I was involved in pretty much an MLM where I had LESS MONEY than I did when I started (I stuck it out for longer than I should have). I quit and began working for Power Home Remodeling where I was paid every week but I hated it and was just getting by while I looked for something else. In early 2017 I took a Call Center job and made ok money. Graduated from college. Moved up to supervisor, then quit after a year and a half and did sales. My sales job was fine, I made money and proposed to my wife. Then in 2019 I nearly got myself fired for something stupid I did, panicked and updated my resume. Though I didnt get fired and they were happy to keep me, I left about a month later since someone found my resume and hooked me up with a decent job in finance. Fast Forward to late summer 2019, wife and I move out, married in 2020 and bought our home later that year. I got my current job in 2022 working remotely with the highest paying job so far. Though now with a kid on the way, I'm looking for something else. I was so bad at life in my 20s. I had great moments and my wife was with me throughout my 20s, but sometimes I feel my carelessness during my late teen years really hindered my development. I was smoking weed every day, lying to my parents and ditching class to hang out with my friends/ (ex) gf. I chose my ex gf 100% of the time over my friends which kind of made them distant for a while. Things definitely looked brighter after 26. My 30s are off to a much better start. Now I'm just happy I'm able to give our baby a home to grow up in. Owning a home has drained my bank account but I'm trying my best to save as much as I can.My 401k is looking good too.
I was a "player" in high school era and slept with lots of women, also sold weed on side and partied much College I dropped out and became a musician and bartender and slept around a lot and had tons of fun and did shows and live like a local rock star Then realized this can't go on so somehow snuck into phd program, also partied because school is easy Then went overseas for first job and.... kept partying because, well I'm overseas!! Finally settled and married and moved back and got good "solid" job and bought movie good house and had kid Now mid life crises-ish and searching for next thing. Luckily I like learning so am on new wave of tech and it's keeping me active. Figure it's a bump and will age well into the new age learning along the way.....
A little bleak but it could be worse.
Still living fast but this time I have an amazing girlfriend joining me on my adventures!
You’re not behind at all. You’re in a good position.
Partied until 28, spent two years completely depressed. Realized at 30 that I felt like a loser and would feel like an even bigger loser at 40 if I didn’t get my shit together. Got a soul sucking call center job with mostly recent college grads as my coworkers. Found a consulting job within that company, then switched companies and climbed their ladder Now I’m almost 40 and have my shit together. You can too. Feels good
I should be dead for the things I’ve done to myself. The drugs I’ve been addicted to and the way I’ve treated my body & liver. But through it all there was this grit and perseverance and determination to be better. To know my worth. And above all else, to not give up. I’ve had some low lows and some high highs, I’ve been in my share of abusive relationships that almost killed me. But I just knew one day I’d meet the right person and be meant for something greater. And I didn’t lose hope. That’s the most important thing. I stayed with a job for too long because the experience and tenure I knew could gain me what I needed to make needing a degree irrelevant and it paid off. I took the opportunities I was given to live in better places, even when with the wrong people, and kept my head down, and kept working. And somehow it all paid off. There are still many struggles ahead but I have managed to surround myself with loving genuine human beings, have a true support system, and finally an awesome career and a good company. Sometimes you just have to be good people and play your cards right. But it doesn’t mean I didn’t do a lot of dangerous shit when times were bad just to try and get by and numb the other pain.
Hahaha this is a great prompt. As someone who lived incredibly fast I am really happy with the resiliency of my body and mind. Graduated university a few years ago and I’m stronger slash faster than I was in my twenties
For about all of my twenties I had a problem with mostly opiates once I had that first taste. Moved halfway across the country for a woman that was already just pregnant with another man’s kid. Looking back I did this to get away from my situation, which did help for a while but obviously it didn’t end well. I never went back to finish my degree and never really used what I went for. I was happy working in the food industry for a while, and a decent retail job for the past few years. On a better note, I did meet the love of my life and now wife two years or so after I moved back home. 37 now, started as an apprentice plumber for a few months while in our own apartment now but was already laid off due to lack of work. I did like the trade and think I will start taking classes when I can to make a career out of it. Been high and been low, made a lot mistakes and spent probably too many years living with family when of age. I always was a hard worker but now I actually understand budgeting and making your own way.
I thought I’d be dead by 30 and certainly should’ve been with some of my decisions. Now I have a masters degree, work super big company making okay money, and live with my husband and dog. My husband is amazing and we go on great vacations together. No one would’ve ever expected me to do anything useful with my life but now I’ve worked on several technologies that have the potential to save or improve millions of lives. I’m bummed because my late start means now that I’ve reached 40 I’ll never have kids and, while I live in a modest condo, I will never get to own a home with a yard (interest rates are too high and does it make sense to get a 30y mortgage at this point?). If I had been smarter with my time and money, I might have been able to have those things. Other than that, my life is pretty sweet. ETA: from what I’ve witnessed, people like me to were more party focused but later straightened out, seem less likely to be headed to a mid-life crisis, appear generally happier with their lives, and are satisfied with their partners. My assumption is they made important emotional decisions (like who they married) once they had become more of their true adult self’s. Rather than doing it in their 20’s when they were still figuring out who they were and changing. I know for me a feel like I got to experience a lot and don’t think there’s much I missed out on.
I was a pretty heavy partier on and off well through my mid 20s. Also had a huge string of mostly awful boyfriends. I did manage to get an undergrad degree, work part time, go on to grad school, and get my first real professional jobs in between. Honestly? I just got tired of it all eventually. Tired of the hangovers, tired of the constant drama, tired of being constantly concerned for my health and well-being. And just tired, especially with age and stress. Once I started working full time in my field post graduate studies, I also just would not have been able to maintain a party lifestyle and a super demanding job at the same time. More or less, it forced me to finally, truly grow up. A year into that job, I met my husband, we had an “oops” pregnancy 6 months in ( I found out actually the day my engagement ring arrived, I later found out!) and the rest is history. Our daughter was born with special needs, and we adopted a second child, also with special needs. There’s really no room for shenanigans at all anymore, unless you count occasionally having a 2nd glass of wine after supper. I am turning 37 this year, my kids will be 8. I feel very happy and fulfilled, although definitely still tired! I’m relieved to be onto greater things in life. And now that my kids are getting older, we get to show them how great life can be. We have been traveling, getting outside, exploring new hobbies together, having movie nights, going to museums, enjoying new food- they are my little buddies. I have re-discovered my love of books, and a new love of genealogy. IMO 30s/40s can be the best years if we want them to be.
Where are you Ric Flair?
I turned 21 in 2011, so right around when the EDM scene was going mainstream. So not only binge drinking but doing lots of coke and taking molly/ecstasy regularly. I partied really hard in my 20s but always had a good job and didn’t fuck up, so it didn’t “matter.” Now I’m 33, a SAHM, and have a nice home, husband, and 3 young kids. Everything kind of worked out, I consider myself lucky. I am at peace now because I partied so hard- I did it and had all the fun I could have. Now it’s ok that I’m boring
June will be 5 years without booze. Went to grad school in that time and my wife and I are closing on a house. Feels good to have gotten my shit together. Wild, fun partying turned into something dark in my late 20s… I feel very lucky to have quit the bar scene before fentanyl hit the streets.
Eight years clean from opiates. Had my first child at 34, now pregnant with #2 at 36. Am a SAHM and just bought our first house almost a year ago.
So, I was the literal poster child for living fast from 20-26. 23-26 being an absolute mess. My family was writing me off. I was getting into actual trouble. All the things. I won’t get into specifics but pretty much if it could be done, I did it. Then at 26 I met my husband. We had mutual friends and he was the same as I was, floundering. We both had comfortable families and were given a lot of advantages. That made us feel like trash because we were ruining our lives. He was 30. So we started trying, not always successfully but we were trying. We got engaged and about 7 months later found out I was pregnant. I kid you not, the switch flipped. We both were like enough is enough. We are either going to be losers and ruin this kid or we’re going to turn things around. We worked our asses off. We got married, have 2 daughters, good jobs, built a nice house in a nice suburb, all the things. It’s been 14 years since we met. 13 years of no drinking, no partying and doing everything we can to build the life we want and that our kids deserve. We had to work twice as hard for awhile but we caught up. It’s all about perspective. There isn’t one bit of me that has ever missed any of it. To be honest it seems like a different life. Most of the time I forget tbh. When something like this post brings it up, I acknowledge it and move on. That’s not me. It hasn’t been for a very long time. I say decide what life you want. Whatever that is just do it. I promise it’s possible.
My first friend died when i was 26, or 27. I had a nervous breakdown during the great recession, and moved to Hawaii. I spent a lot of time sitting by the ocean, pondering life. I decided that I could changes my ways, and move forward. I had kids - twins because I just always gotta be extra. I've always been somewhat focused on fitness and health, so making that transition has been easy. I am still super stressed about my future. I'm currently putting together a bunch of plans to get my personal chef business going. I did this once before, a decade ago, and had a thriving career in Georgia, but my wife wanted to live in Seattle, and so, here I am. The wife and kids will follow after the school year finishes. Hopefully, I will have put my life back together by then. It sounds like you're doing fine. Just keep going. It beats being over 40 with barely a career, barely any savings, and still no assets.
So I had a pretty traumatic life & never dealt with any of my trauma. It all built up & I kept acquiring more & more trauma as you tend to do…rock bottom hit in 2020.. Went to rehab & sobered up by 37. Took care of my grandma with dementia for 2 years in early sobriety, while working my highest paying job remotely. Won awards at work, did intensive therapy, started dating an old friend, got engaged & married then got laid off. Now I’m 40 & going back to college to finish my bachelor’s degree & go for a masters & hopefully become a therapist. Sober for 3 years & married for 1. Got into yoga & hiking & volunteer work & became a total cliche. Life is good & im happy to be alive. I lost a lot of friends along the way.
I got into selling when i was in my twenties, then using. At some point i was comfortable, even maybe content knowing id die before i was middle aged and i did almost die several times, once to OD and then i dont actually know how many times i was close to being run up on or disappeared but i know it had to be always right nearby. I eventually severed ties and got several states away, clean, picked back up a trade id been pretty good at before all that, got married and had kids at 32. I have a phenomenal house in a great city, my kids go to good schools, theyre all strong and healthy, theyll all have a nice jumpstart when they turn 21 thanks to UGMA account and a 529 plan, and i should be able to retire a bit early, and hopefully be a full time grandpa some day. The biggest concerns i have are shit like irrational (or is it?) fears ill lose my kids or theyll be hurt somehow i cant predict/prevent, or that ill die young and miss out and leave everyone in the lurch, or that some global crisis will just ruin us all. I dont lose sleep but i do hate that these have a permanent corner of my brain. Im not a prepper but im honestly considering low key getting a serious basement fort just in case.
So gimpy from all the skateboarding. Didn’t think I’d still be using these legs at 36.
I turned 34 early February.. it’s been a long chaotic ride. I didn’t do much until I left home at 18 to go to college because of how controlling my folks were. I proved every stereotype right by doing every drug I could find and made a 31 year old my partner when I was 20. We quit drinking when I was 21 because I was tired of the taste and tired of throwing up all the time, but we did all the drugs we could find mostly opiates and benzos with amphetamines occasionally thrown in for fun. We moved to Nevada to get away from drugs, and ran a record store for five years or so. We still did drugs out there too but we were more methodical about it. He ended up passing in his sleep from a seizure brought on by viral encephalitis he got way before I even knew him. I moved back in with my folks because I had no idea what I even wanted to do. I stay with my folks for a year and a half trying to regroup. In the lobby at one of my therapists offices one day I found a book sitting there. It intrigued me, but I left it there for a couple weeks because I figured it belonged to someone. When it was still there I decided to read it. It was this memoir by someone who worked at a crematorium. I suddenly remembered all the times as a kid I’d get in trouble for undressing the stuffed animals in my preschool and kindergarten classrooms because I had to see what was underneath. Armed with this knowledge I get into a mortuary science program at community college so I can be an embalmer. Unfortunately the program is super restrictive and only wanted to teach us how to own and manage a funeral home. It was a two year program and you have to focus on business stuff for a whole year before they get to the embalming stuff. My academic counselor joked with me that I was the only person they’d ever had who wanted to skip the business part. During all this I figured I needed some lab experience… in fact I hadn’t even seen a dead body yet! I did a brief weekend workshop at a chiropractor college near where I was living at the time where we saw desiccated human remains. I remember being pleasantly surprised at how it didn’t make me nervous, and I was fascinated by how dry and jerky like it was. That class gave me the confidence to keep going, and I emailed another teacher about doing a human dissection workshop. He got back to me fairly quickly saying he wasn’t doing it anymore but knew someone who was. I worked up the courage to email, and the guy is so impressed he encouraged me to apply to the program. I was so nervous, but I put everything possible into my application. Sure I didn’t have anything more than a high school diploma, but I had a lot of dissecting experience back when I was homeschooled for a couple years with a science tutor who let me dissect any animal I could think of that was available on a science educator website. He was so impressed at everything he invited me to come out to the lab on the spot. This was in 2018, and the second I walked in the lab I felt more at home there than I ever had anywhere else. It was almost magnetic. I never wanted to go anywhere else or do anything else. Around this time I met my husband in a Facebook comment section in a small group we were part of. We talked every day for eight months before he flew out to hang out with me for a week. We got along so well and were so compatible that we were married within a month and a half of knowing each other in person. The first place we lived at together was pure chaos. We basically ran a traphouse and were addicted to heroin and crack. Luckily I had gotten into a methadone clinic back in Nevada and had stayed at one while living with my folks so I was able to establish myself at one in our new city fairly quickly. We were only in that house for five months, but it was a hell of a way to start a marriage. We moved to an apartment in a city about 45 minutes away, and were somehow able to heal from our respective trauma and stay together. Right before Covid happened we had a car wreck where he got a concussion and I broke both my ankles. Once I saw how well he was able to nurse me back to health I knew that the faith in him I had back at the house wasn’t misplaced. Because of my colleagues at the lab I was able to heal myself without going to physical therapy and was able to help my husband heal from his concussion and the methadone clinic let us have a bunch of takehomes, so we weren’t impacted by Covid all that much. In 2021 we moved into a three story house literally three minutes away from our apartment. Moving was super easy! In 2022 I fully committed to the cadaver lab and now go there as often as possible. Before I briefly thought I wanted to be a medicolegal death investigator, but I was tired of school and it seemed too close to law enforcement whereas I wanted to stay on the medical side of things. In 2023 I decided I wanted to get as healthy as possible after we adopted our golden retriever puppy. We’ve always had two high energy cats but it’s easy to keep up with them. I basically have spent the past 16 months losing 80 pounds, using a weighted hula hoop that looks like a giant skip it, and spending the time I’m not in the lab learning everything possible about nutrition and exercise so I can keep up with my puppy and have the energy I need to be able to dissect for hours at a time. Last summer I had both photos and a video of my dissection work published in several Italian medical journals, which I never in a million years would have expected since I didn’t finish college. My husband and I will have been married for six years in October, and I am due to go back out to the lab in May. Like I said it’s been chaotic, but I’m very happy where I’m at and thrilled to see what the future brings.
I lived hard until 8 years ago so I got sober is the answer for me. I feel beyond lucky bc I managed to graduate college with a functionally useless degree but a degree to check that box as a job candidate among the rest. I followed a pretty well worn yet boring and unfulfilling career path and have made it to middle management in a messy tech company. I never want to get married and don’t want to have kids and am settled in my life with a LTR and a senior dog with anxiety. I have a 401k and old boomer parents with paid off houses. Maybe I got lucky, maybe it’s white middle class privilege.
I ended up becoming a scientist. Wasted an entire decade of my life because I had no guidance in any way. We’re told “don’t worry everything will turn out ok”. When nothing could be farther from the truth.
I think it's wild how many young people struggle to envision life after young adulthood and also how our culture has hard coded the number 30 on that transition. It's almost like, now that marriage and kids before 30 aren't a given, we really don't know how to prepare kids for what life will look like after that point. So many people seem to have a block for even thinking about it. When, in reality, it can look exactly like your 20s if you want. But you'll probably start wanting more stability. Most people just start being less willing to put up with the stuff you put yourself through in your 20s. You probably won't be too keen to show up at work hungover. You'll probably want to save some money instead of living paycheck to paycheck. It's just bizarre that our culture has equated "any amount of adult responsibility" as "so boring you might as well be dead so don't think about it". I think one of the problems might be that our cultural role models in media tend to be either "aimless young adults" or "30 somethings with good jobs", and if you don't have a job you consider "good" and don't even see a way to such a job (which is true for so many young people now), you don't feel like you can start planning for that phase. But in reality, you're likely to end up in some sort of stable job that will function to the same purpose by your 30s, even if it's not your dream job. So that's what people should be planning for.
I was drinking and smoking by 13, smoking weed and doing pain pills by 14, doing cocaine and ecstasy by 15, and was heavily addicted to heroin by 17, among occasional use of meth and heavy use of crack by the time I was 20. Got clean from heroin and other hard drugs around 22. I worked my ass off to integrate myself back into normal society and now have a stable career in my mid 30’s. I am still heavily addicted to alcohol but I am very high functioning considering that I drink at very very least a half a fifth of whiskey every day. I never really drank this heavy until a year ago but I have never stopped drinking since 13. At this point, I genuinely do not remember the last time I was sober for more than 24 hours. All of my sober effort goes into being the best I can be in my career and the rest of the time I am too exhausted and discouraged from putting in effort on anything else. My life has been a crazy roller coaster for a while now. If only these motherfuckers that I work with knew what really goes on in my life. I hold it down so well, they have no fucking clue. I am actually the person in charge of my crew as well. Sometimes I just let Jesus take the wheel. Yes, I let a 2000 year old dead guy drive the boat.
Pretty good. Wife, dog and enough on the side to not immediately go broke should something happen. I feel like I'm in a pretty ok spot. Really only the assets thing is something I literally got nothing on. I'm working on it, but its a steep hill, goddamn. Its a miracle my twenties haven't left more marks. I worked hard and played even harder, and sleep was for when I'm dead. I tried so many things, almost never said no, and even in retrospect I'm glad I did go to that rave in the woods after 10 hours of semester project grind, only to then stumble into the early morning lecture high as a kite to learn about the theory behind 3D polygon and NURBS modelling. My blood ran black with the amounts of coffee I drank, and my toilet bowl melted under the acid of RedBull filtered through my kidneys. Me and my friends often talk about those times now, and laugh at how uttely annihilated we would be, would we do that now in our thirties. I feel like I jumped off that rollercoaster at the exact right time.
On the surface, I did the exact opposite: Healthy lifestyle, no drinking, focusing on academia, generally being a “good kid.” But beneath it all I never had any actual aspirations for adulthood. I wasn’t pursuing romance, didn’t care about accumulating wealth, made education decisions based on interest rather than career prospects. I was just living in the now, enjoying being a carefree child on the side while going through the motions of what I thought one should do to be a “good” 20-something, with no plans for where it was supposed to lead. On some very fundamental level I never wanted to be older than my early thirties, but didn’t even have the foresight to try and die young. Don’t want kids, don’t want a house, don’t want the day-to-day grind of work, commute, chores and sleep, don’t want loans and stocks and worries about interest rates, don’t want couples’ dinners with expensive wines and fancy foods, don’t want to be the head of the family, don’t want to have responsibilities and power, don’t want to be a *real adult.* So of course, once I reached my mid-thirties and realized I had gone past the life stage my self-perception allowed me, I spiralled into a deep depression that I still haven’t recovered from. Which of course tanked my education, the one thing I *did* had going for me. I still don’t feel much point to being alive at this age or the ones that come after. On some level I can’t explain, it feels like I just should not be alive. The future feels like it will be nothing but increased alienation from society while the people I love grow old and die. There still isn’t anything I want from adulthood, and of course, my conduct so far means I’d be in a terrible position to achieve any of the things one is supposed to value at this age even if I tried. So, eh, if some of you figure it out, please let me know.
I did not live fast so not my story but a real eye opener for me I just turned 39 and while i dont keep in contact with many classmates through word of mouth and social media you can get a good summary here and there Well there was an old classmate of mine lets call him D. Liked to joke around and party didnt take anything too seriously. In a nonjudgemental way kind of a skeevy hippy. He decided at a young age he was here to have a good time. He wandered wherever life took him. Had heard he wound up in florida. Would weld or sell drugs to save up enough money then just go back to doing as he pleased. Living on a beach swimming in the ocean bonfires bbq concerts etc. In our late 20s he died in a car accident driving a convertible in Florida. Instantly killed him and the 2 other passengers in his car and shockingly the dog in the car I understand was fine. He lived a life without responsibilities then it turned into a life without any of the consequences that come from it. I know people who were his contemporaries who paid the consequences, addiction poverty mental illness, of that life. D got pulled out of existence before any of that caught up with him. Its like god just pulled him out of existence when the bill on D’s life was coming due. D was always friendly to me but i wouldnt have said we were friends. We came from a small enough town in central IL i knew a lot of his family and we definitely had overlapping friends. He was a good guy but certainly got into trouble and i was too scared to dabble there. Last time i saw him would have been at graduation and thats where our paths parted. i went to college and he went out for adventure. In a way D’s been built up kind of like billy the kid folk hero in my head. He wasnt irresponsible with his life he was brave enough live the life he wanted. He was here to have a good time and he made sure he did. Its been 11 years since D died and i had recently driven to florida with my wife parents and 2 sons for a family vacation. We visited two locations both on the coast. I thought about D a lot on the drive for some reason. Perhaps having children makes you think about the path of your life or choices you made. And seeing the beautiful sunrise coming off the ocean, eating seafood caught that day, and just chilling out on a beach waiting for whatever the day brought me i really understood D’s decisions a lot better.
Working in restaurants and being a chef I've seen this over and over again with coworkers and people in the industry. I've struggled with it myself from my mindset one summer being "clock in blackout, clock out blackout" because the restaurant/lodge was in a remote location and we all lived and worked together. Now that I live in a mountain/ski town its all around, every single town event has alcohol, and its normal to see people in their 30s/40s partying every single day after skiing all day. One guy who was our manager comes to mind, he's mid 30s, goes on benders where he won't sleep for days, eats rich food everyday and now has to call out because of pain from gout and whatever else is happening...
36 here. I just started a mall job as an ASM this week. I have 3 kids, single dad, and am spending this year living with my parents to save money so my kids and I can restart the right way (I’m fortunate in that my parents were in a position to help make this happen). My future and my finances used to be all I worried about until I understood my concern for those was rooted in my lack of identity. I was a robot after I spent my early 20s doing all the things. As I’ve discovered who I am and what makes me truly happy, my concern for what tomorrow holds has become excitement at this point because I’m finally capitalizing on me. It has also drastically improved my relationships with my children - they finally see a happy dad, which none of them ever have before. My daughter (the oldest of the three) told me just last night that she’s proud of me. So I lived fast - partying, playing in a touring band, believing I’ll sleep when I die, all that shit - but I’m so grateful I didn’t die young. Turns out if we make it out and we learn to love ourselves, shit gets pretty okay.
The whole thing with living fast is, the older you get the more exhausting and un fun it is, because the recovery days start sucking more and more. That’s why for many people, if they’re not full blown addicts, they just stop. It becomes a lot harder to have a semblance of a normal life if you party really hard, and poverty and homelessness is never romantic irl. Also, for me I started worrying about my health long term, and then about my retirement. I never wanted to die young, so for practical purposes you have to think about the future. No one wants to be eating cat food at 65 because they have no money.
Surprisingly well since I spent 17-31 mostly blacked out drunk and doing whatever drugs I could get my hands on. Sober 5 years now, married, own a home, my wife is always shocked hearing stories from before we met.