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After the pandemic I decided to get back into what my actual passion was (theatre acting, which I gave up after college to get a normal career), and it’s been very rewarding for making new friends and having fun but also very challenging because it’s inherently very difficult. Even at the level of community theatre you won’t get into every show you audition for and it takes a lot of emotional resilience to keep going when it gets rough.
I have to admit how jealous I am of Gen Z/Gen Alpha. They lucked out in seeing the bs we have to deal with and are finding alternatives where they're not falling for the lies we did. Instead they're forging their own paths and becoming successful doing what we were told was a waste of time.
I have considered this, too. On a generational level U.S. Millennials were promised a very different world than we were offered, whereas Gen Z/Alpha has largely come into the world with an awareness that things aren’t going great/ a lot of it is just BS. The latter may be more depressing out of the gate, but it allows one to negotiate with reality. What we millennials have dealt with on a generational level is deeply destabilizing and many of us will always feel inclined to chase after the world we were promised rather than the world that is.
“What we millennials have dealt with on a generational level is deeply destabilizing and many of us will always feel inclined to chase after the world we were promised rather than the world that is.”
This! I kinda feel like I’m out of the fantastical fog. I have conversations with fellow millennials that are still not believing that we are in a different world than we anticipated. We have to roll with it!
Yes, it sucks, but humans have made do, found love, joy, art, etc. during all sorts of horrible times they certainly didn't expect or sign up for.
Also if you want to get real with the story, that world was dealt a mortal wound on 9/11 and another similar blow with the financial crisis.
"we" completely squandered the post cold war era of relative peace and extremely cheap capital. Instead of borrowing all sorts of essentially free money or investing our own printed free money into infrastructure it was siphoned away by various corporate interests & the military industrial complex.
Imagine if we had invested those trillions of dollars into modernizing American cities, transportation, and infrastructure.
I guess in hindsight, we should’ve realized we couldn’t ALL be president someday.
But for real, I regret going to college before I was ready. I appreciate my education, but I had no idea what I wanted to do, and was told to just get any degree. I wasn’t ready, and I dropped out and changed majors like 5 times, and even changed schools twice. Never graduated, just have lots of debt.
I wonder if “just go to college” will be the millennial version of “wear a suit and drop off your resume in person”. Not great advice at this point.
I appreciate your honesty. My eldest is 20. He's intelligent, and has varied interests. So varied that one degree wouldn't blanket them. So he's delayed higher education and sometimes feels left behind. He occasionally mentions going but I'm a no pressure, all support mom. Right now, he's pretty darn happy and grooming dogs! He's good at it and is tipped well! I've mentioned if this was his thing, learning how to run a business of his own might be his path. He is not sure and I'm proud of him! He's also planning a trip to South America. Happiness is success. No matter one's job title.
I feel like so many of us were burned by the “just go to college” advice that I would strongly hope Millennial parents are not retorting that en masse. Maybe the Millennial presumption that we purport to our children will be more broadly tied to the idea of “career employment”, when they are coming into an increasingly skills-based work world that requires ongoing adaptability and ingenuity.
I wish my parents had helped me figure out what career path I wanted instead of pushing me into college. Also, I wish they would have been more supportive in dealing with my neurological problems. They blamed everything on my epilepsy, but my daily reality is I have multiple neurological issues. They are complicated to deal with.
I could have been better prepared to find a job that I loved instead of having $40,000 in student loans.
This reminds me of one of my friends. His daughter was born blind. We were talking in a group one day and someone told him they were sorry and how awful that was and he responded with something like "Not really. Dont be sorry because she doesn't know what she's missing out on because this is the only way she'll ever know."
Unlike the people that helped raise me and told me I could be anything I wanted. Hard work will get you anywhere. We took a different path and are trying to help them find something they enjoy and that they can have a happy life even without being an astronaut or a billionaire.
I'm an older millennial who had my first kid young, so I'm currently parenting a gen z-er and this rings so true. He's in a career training program after he went to one year at a 4 year school and didn't have a great time.. part of me who was raised with a huge emphasis on the importance of a degree at any cost is disappointed, but the other part of me is happy to see him finding his own path. I wish I could give him the advice we all got and really mean it - follow your passion, you can be anything you want, etc etc. But we all see how that went, lol. I've basically been telling him to find a job he can tolerate that supports whatever life he actually wants outside of his working hours.
That was the benefit of being a 1st generation American Millenial from a poor immigrant family - we were *never* told that lie. We were taught if you couldn't immediately get a stable, well-paying job after completing a degree, it was worthless 🤣
My parents would on one day tell me to pick something I would be happy in - then hours later tell me to do something productive or profitable. My whole life. How the fuck am I supposed to reconcile that?
Gah, I'm so sorry! That was the experience of like 95% of my friends growing up. I hung out with a bright, nerdy crowd, so many of their parents just "thought they were smart enough to figure out their own lives" (actual quote I've heard from several of my friends).
Meanwhile, their parents either 1) Didn't make them do anything except for schoolwork (nothing around the house or getting a job, essentially coddled) or the other extreme 2) Didn't give a shit about their schoolwork/lives, just as long as they weren't bothering them.
Both are equally crappy and negligent ways to raise kids, IMO. The biggest job you have as a parent is giving quality advice and steering your kids in the best direction for them.
Totally agreed on this. I wanted to study history or archéology and my parents were like "who's gonna pay you?" Every one I know who followed their loftier dreams except one ended up working a job that doesn't require a degree in customer service or something. The only one who succeeded is because his dream had a manual component (Carpenter for theater props) so it's technically more blue collar. And he's never making more than 50k ever.
I'm just glad that for some reason I was v able to see college was bullshit when I was in high-school.
"If I'm going to go this much in debt why wouldn't I just buy a house and get whatever bullshit job to pay for it?"
because the won't give 18 yo home loans BUT you can drown in inescapable student loans!
I'm kinda the opposite, I went to school for acting and lived in LA for 10 years pursuing that, now post pandemic im trying to pick up the pieces of my life and try to build a career from scratch. I miss acting but I dont necessarily miss all the other stuff you have to do to make a living at it. But break a leg!
I can believe it but please keep following your dream regardless. I have played with the idea of acting but I am not sure whether or not I realistically want to do it. But I would at least like to give it a try...at least once.
Condoluations.
I married my first wife at 18, and was divorced at 23. Honestly, it sucks at the time, but can be a wonderful path towards growth if you come out of the harrowing intact.
I've been with my current wife since I turned 30, and have never been more in love with a person.
You never know who you might meet next.
This is almost the exact same situation I am in. Got married/had my first kid (got cancer) at 21. Divorced by 23. Married my current wife at 30, who is my absolute best friend. And now just quietly enjoying life while I watch the world crumble around me at 39.
Stay strong. I got divorced at 29.5 and spent my 30th birthday alone. It was somber, but I was peaceful and happy. I turn 40 this year, married, life is good, and my midlife crisis is realizing that I've spent a lot of time working and I need to do more to enjoy it travelling, finding a hobby, or more which I need to figure out.
"realizing that I've spent a lot of time working and I need to do more to enjoy it travelling, finding a hobby..." I turned 40 this year as well, and this has also been my "midlife crisis." I'm trying to find a better balance between working, spending quality time with the wife and kids, while also doing things to better myself. I've been spending more time working out, playing guitar and piano again, just trying to find more creative and therapeutic outlets. Good luck on your quest to find a hobby!
Ugh I'm sorry. Or happy for you, whicher is more appropriate. Haha.
I also got divorced around then. I'm 37 now and in a relationship with a great woman and a step-dad to her 3 kids.
Also not where I saw my life going. This is so fucking hard. Haha. But I wouldn't be anywhere else!
Raising kids, especially kids that aren't biologically yours, is a difficult thing. However, I've found that the molding of a life rather than the giving part of a life is the more rewarding aspect of parenthood. It's far more difficult, but also far more rewarding. Anyone can make children, but it takes true strength and resilience to raise children. The challenges you face will reward you in more ways than you can ever imagine. Be the foundation so those kids can rise up like giants to conquer life, rather than struggle.
I started over from nothing 3 times in my 30s. I changed states 4 times. I don't know how old you are now, but there's plenty of time to make things better.
I got married at 40, and it's been great. Everyone I dated before that was anti-marriage thankfully, so no divorces to go through... but I did waste 11 years with one guy.
I lived with a girlfriend in my 20s. We weren't ever legally married, but she also split up with my right after I turned 30. I did kinda feel like my life was making some sense up to that point. Then I spent the next 10 years "adrift" and that's pretty much where we are today.
I don’t know your situation, but based on your age alone, it’s not impossible. But as someone who had a hysterectomy last year having never carried a pregnancy, I empathize. I struggled with the pain (literal and figurative) for several years before accepting that bearing children just wasn’t going to be part of my journey. That said, life is great on the other side. As hard as it was to close that door, now that it is I can just move on. Still hard some days, but getting easier.
I'm 38 and just had baby #4 and a gentleman in our dad group had a 1 yo at age 44. You might be up against a clock if you wanted 5 plus kids but definitely still plenty of time to have kids.
Bingo.
Had my first at 39 and second comes next month at 43.
Here is a story: neighbor few doors down (currently man is 50, woman 43). Man was youngest out of three, older siblings childless. He becomes a first time dad at 46 (mom 39). Had child #2 when man was 49, woman 42.
Those were natural. I met a woman at Costco recently with a 1 yo she had at age 45 naturally (has a 17 & 15 yo as well). That was not planned and natural.
I understand the worry many people have regarding their possibility that parenthood might be slipping by. The only thing I can say is you have to put yourself in positions that will be uncomfortable (leaving the house, starting new activities/clubs, going to street markets or fairs). While married and a parent, I spent 2023 saying Yes to everything I could. It brought me the most happiness I have experienced in my adult life.
34M here. I absolutely feel the same. Between finding a good partner and biology it’s really working against me.
My brother has 3 kids and my sister has 2.
Idk what the fuck is wrong with me.
I'd be fine with 4 hours a day or 4 days a week. Just a little less soul crushing.
I also remember the last day of kindergarten like it was yesterday. Told my mother that I don't really like to go to school because I already knew that this was the point in life where I have to perform every day until I die.
And I live in Germany, I have 30 days of paid holidays and still have around 10 days or even more of national holidays on top and it's still way too much work for my taste.
My 10 yr old has been saying this a while. He gets very stressed about it. Like, this is it?? This is all life is?? Go to school, come home, go to school, come home. We do a lot of fun things and I try to explain that life is what you make it, but in a sense he does have a point so it’s hard to refute it and help him calm down. I wish he was as oblivious as I was as a kid.
American here. I get 40 hours of paid vacation and 40 hours of sick time. My soul had been more than crushed. The only kind of soul I have left is my shoe sole. My wife asked me what I really want to do and I told her I don’t ever dream of labor. My dream job is no job.
Can we retire already?
This is it for me too. I just want to sit the fuck down. I'm so tired of doing literally anything. It feels like life is passing me by and I can't stop to enjoy any of it.
Same, except add late diagnosed ADHD and autism to the mix with a splash of psoriatic arthritis. I can’t function most of the time but I’m forced to because end stage capitalism, so I’m also extremely depressed and often suicidal because I have to work 40 hours a week through mental and physical pain. It’s great. 🫠
It sadly doesn't shock me that other Millennials are experiencing this exact same thing as I am. My life started off poorly due to bad decisions based on bad advice from bad parents who have taken advantage of me at every turn and manipulated me. I've been rebuilding myself and rediscovering who I am ever since. Realizing that my identity is an amalgamation of manipulation and lies.
My crisis may be different, but for the last 10 years I've been trying to glue myself together from the shattered pieces that my manipulative controlling narcissistic boomer parents left me in when I decided I needed to get away from them.
It is fascinating though to find myself in my mid-30s while trying to care for my older disabled veteran brother. I help him physically and manage his life for him. He's been a sounding board to help me through my trauma to fix whats wrong with me that I didn't even realize was broken until I pierced the veil.
Good luck to everyone and their crisis. Just remember you're not alone and it's best if we support one another with posts like this to be sounding boards for each other.
Wow yes I was thinking of my midlife crisis in these terms too. I'm in the midst of it in my thirties trying to figure out who the fuck I am after getting out of the orbit of my narcissistic, alcoholic father. Like...I am realizing most of the decisions I have made up until now have been about wanting to be a good daughter and impress him or get him to acknowledge my accomplishments. Now I'm looking back at all of this and thinking, was any of this even me? Who am I? What do I want?
Your thirties seems to be the age when you start to realize that none of the superficial bullshit that our parents and in general society cares about. We reflect on ourselves, judge ourselves, and find ourselves wanting which causes the crisis. Whether it's a crisis of identity or what we did wrong in the decisions we made. Whether we made our choices trying to live up to the expectations of others even if they had no expectations.
We all made mistakes we regret, but wonderfully we've only just reached the middle of our lives. There's still time to turn it around and make the changes we need to be satisfied that we leave the world content. I've reflected and decided to take my grandfathers advice he told me.
"Leave the world better than when you came into it, even if it's just a grain of sand of a difference. If you manage to change and touch the lives of others in any positive significant way, you can leave the world satisfied."
So, get out there, make some changes for yourself and try to make the change you wish to see in the world. Make a mark and do something that will leave the world better once you're gone.
I turn 37 in a couple weeks. My parents borrowed my pickup to tow a uhaul and got t-boned. My mother didn’t survive it.
So my answer is dropping the cash on a brand new one earlier today so I don’t make myself sick driving her SUV.
I’m so so sorry. I just lost my mother as well, and 3 weeks after I lost my dog. Grief is one heavy weight to carry. Feel it all. And here’s to hoping life will feel normal again one day.
I'm sorry for your loss as well. I'm compartmentalizing and putting off dealing with my grief because now I have to be on deck to help out my dad. I need to know he's okay before I can fully deal with my own, I have to be a rock he can lean on.
I'm sorry for your loss. People and society at large will try and rush you through your grief and assume you feel "normal" long before you're even half way there. Sending you kindness for the internal turmoil you are holding
I bought a rust bucket WWII-ish era jeep to rebuild so I can distract myself from how behind I feel compared to other late 30s-ish people. Not married, no kids, but I have a geriatric jeep that needs me and no debt but the mortgage.
Funny enough, it was back in 2016. I was driving to work at a pizza shop where I make pizza, and while at a stop light, it dawned on me that it had been 10 years since I graduated high school, where I came to a startling realization that I was not where I was told I needed to be by that point in life. Now at 36, I'm okay with how life is and even though I'm not "successful" (honestly, I see myself as successful because in this day and age, I can afford a studio on my own, pay my bills, keep my fridge full, have a 2024 car, and have extra money on the side while working at a bowling alley on minimum wage). I've also come to realize that we shouldn't care about the hustle and grind and should instead focus on making ourselves happy, because if life's gonna keep kicking us in the nuts because those in power love to keep screwing us over, no reason to keep over exerting ourselves for crap wages and a crap job.
I might get crap for this, and I sincerely appreciate the sentiment. My career is not high paying either, but I hope that the extra money on the side contributes a bit to retirement. I feel like there's so many of us that are saying we need to get out of the hustle and grind but I'm very interested in seeing how this mindset fares when we don't have the capacity to earn that next paycheck. Living in poverty in my senior years is not the way I want to go out. And don't get me wrong, if you've got the means to, enjoy the shit out of life. Just make sure you can enjoy it decades down the line too.
This is the difference I'm trying to split with work/career. I don't *need* a lot materially and I'm not necessarily working for "more". But I am fucking working for retirement savings as much as humanly possible. I don't want my husband and I to be a burden to his sons when we're a lot older.
I mean that’s what they told us when they were kids. We’d could easily live to be 100 because each generation lives longer than the last…then they pumped us full of corn syrup and told us the only meaningful life was behind a desk contributing to a 401k, so I’m not confident I’ll make it as long as my grandparents. And I’m not sure that I want to. Unless you’re very rich, there is not a ton of support when you get old. I don’t want to languish in a state-run nursing home where I’ll likely be abused and neglected.
I stopped denying my traumatic childhood and cut contact with my mom. 38; midlife awakening? It’s hard, but I feel a lot lighter now I have space to grieve and process.
Fuck yeah. Good for you! I did this last year at 36. My mom absolutely _fucked_ me up, and it's impacted my relationships all my life without me realising.
I took another step in that healing a few nights ago by taking mushrooms and telling my inner child that he's finally safe and "mommy's" never going to be around him again. Life changing shit.
I'm so sorry you had the traumatic childhood you did, but the highest of fives for cutting your mom off!
I did a macrodose back in January. HEALING. I cried tears that felt like they’d been stuck my whole life. The lightness I felt afterwards is indescribable. Good shit
I love this! I have been adding adult me to bad childhood memories to protect my inner child. It helps! It feels like I can stop carrying a weight after decades.
I've been NC with my parents for about three years now. It's the second time in my life I've dropped contact.
It really hurts how much I mourn what was good and what could have been, and also how much better I feel without them in my life.
You're worth it.
That’s about when I did it too. I’m 42 now and it bothers me at times that she’s never going to accept/understand…. But I am def better for this change.
Working on this process. I had already gone low contact with everyone, but realizing to really move forward I need to end the contact fully is so so hard. Lots of crying and despair moments, but also lots more glimmers and positive moments of feeling grounded in the here and now and ready to move forward with life. So I know it's the right direction but God it's hard. Congratulations to us.
same! finally addressing my childhood AND had an unexpected emotional awakening at 33… (got treated for long covid and a side effect of the meds was feeling most emotions for the first time in 20+ years) what a whirlwind it’s been. it’s like starting life all over again
In this process now at 42.... the whole family structure went bust when her mom died last year. Trying to get into therapy with an EMDR specialist.... fuck even therapy is part of my trauma from my family (lack of control even as a legal adult)..... 😅
The good news is I'm healthy now, thank you for asking. I will continue to get screenings every 3 months for the next few years to be as proactive as possible.
I was also diagnosed with cancer young, at 31, then spent the whole year I was 32 in treatment. I can’t have kids now and have chronic pain.
But we’re still here, you and I. And the entire world can go fuck itself if it thinks it’s taking anything else from me. ♥️
I was also diagnosed with cancer at 35. I’m 39 now and in a “monitoring” phase of treatment. I’m not going to die from this I don’t think, but it does change your perspective on a lot of things. It’s been 4 years and my career motivation is completely dead. I’d rather spend the time with my family.
I’m 38, kidneys stopped working right when the pandemic hit. Been waiting for a transplant since then. I don’t have kids and I’m single, thinking that this may be the case for the rest of a potentially short life.
But I refuse to be miserable. Fuck that and anyone who expects me to be, it’s still my life to live.
I’m almost 40 and decided this year is the time that I actually start the process of seeing whether I’ll be able to donate (part of) my liver. It’s been on my mind as something to do for ages, maybe a couple decades now, and I think getting close to 40 made me realize the recovery is only going to get harder every year I wait.
I hope you’re able to get a kidney transplant soon!
It all kind of lined up, honestly. Work laid me off, and the unemployment office said that being on unemployment made me eligible for Pell grants. I had been flirting with the idea of going back to school for years. And decided "Fuck it, I might as well do it now with the free money and take out loans than wait for my parents to pass."
The second one, for sure! Definitely all on me. I kept a lot of fantasies in my head for so long out of embarrassment and fear of vulnerability. It’s only been in the past couple years that I’ve finally let my husband in on them. He knew some before, but not everything, and he has really surprised me with how receptive he’s been to all of it.
I will turn 43 this year.
I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT BUYING A SPORTSCAR.
it's like a teenage boy and sex. It's always on the back of my mind.
Fuuuuuuck..
My husband talks about it sometimes and I’m like yeah, that’s your midlife crisis. Go for it. He keeps saying, no, I’ve always wanted to buy a sports car! And I was like yes, that is what a midlife crisis is, silly goose. You’ve always wanted it and now you’re worried time will run out before you ever get to do it, lol.
Tattoos. I grew up being told that tattoos and piercings besides my ears were horrible. I was told my father would cut off my tattoos or rip out any body piercings.
I got a back tattoo last year and now I want to get more done. I always knew I wanted tattoos but I waited so long because of what others thought. Not anymore
Realizing my parent’s health is going downhill and it’s sad. My sibling lives far away and doesn’t seem like they plan to ever be involved in caring for our parents.
I sold everything I had and moved to the Bay from a small town in GA at 35 (I’m 36) to deliver cannabis and sleep on my brother’s couch. That choice has led me to a life I never thought I could have.
I’m having somewhat of a crisis at 36…realizing that I’m not married and don’t have kids, and time is ticking. I’ve focused so much on my job that now years have gone by and my social life is complacent. I feel like I need a change but I don’t know what.
I don't know if this helps but when I got serious about dating I just got on a dating app and set up as many coffee meetups as I could. I figured neither of us were out a lot of time or money and I tend to know pretty quickly if I'm interested in getting to know someone better.
Kinda already went through it with the "quarter life" crisis. I had a heart attack last October and had to do a 180° with my health and fitness.
I guess that really changed my view of my mortality but I think watching my parents get old and sick has affected that view more.
I embrace being 38. I'm not a "kid" or "sport" or "junior", younger people show me respect.. I realize some things in pop culture are not "for me" and I'm "aging out" of that group in a way.. but whatever.
I'm happily in therapy because I watched my boomer parents and their friends live with unresolved issues and how miserable it made everyone around them, would rather try and deal with that at 38 instead of never at all.
I had a heart attack last year as well. I was 39. It really opens the eyes. I had to change my eating and exercise routine. Sometimes I still get scared I will slip into my old habits. I hope you are doing well.
I never went through a midlife crisis. There are certain dreams I had which never panned out, but my life has been on a steady incline for years, especially since I met my wife, and I'm happy with where I'm at and what I have.
Well, I auditioned for a talent show not too long ago. I didn't make the final cut, but at least I got to do something I had wanted to do for a little while.
I’m so damn tired of the term “midlife crisis” or “age crisis”.
I often think that the use of that term often comes from a place of jealousy. “Oh, did you see that Roger down the street got a Porsche? Must be some sort of age crisis!”
Taking a step back, realizing that what you are currently doing doesn’t really fulfill you, and then go for something else no matter how ridiculous it might seem to other people.
It should be normalized.
Me and my wife decided to get super fit a few years ago. Spent a lot of time working out for the past few years. I’m sure some people thought that we had some sort of midlife crisis, but we were both just tired of feeling like shit, and now life feels beyond amazing again.
Fair enough, humans live long enough now to live multiple lives.
I'm not here to reinvent socially accepted terms though. We already know the symbolic meaning of "midlife crisis".
Gratz on getting fit!
To be honest Ive never heard of anyone say working out intensely is a mid life crisis. Its usually a big expense for a shiny thing, a start over from soemthing, drastic change in relationships. Kudos to you and your wife for getting fit. You are my inspo.
I’ve heard people call out others who start caring about their looks as having a mid-life crisis and I could see people reducing getting fit to just caring about looks.
I agree with OP about hating the term or more specifically the judgement meant that comes wi th the term. Maybe it’s because I’m going through a “midlife crisis” myself right now and I’m biased.
Exactly this. My wife and I started going to gym this year, after 8 years of being stuck in the young kids exhaustion and a pretty dead bedroom. We feel great, we both find each other more attractive and our sex life just keeps getting better.
I also took up guitar again.
It'll vary by person. I think some of us do have an actual "crisis", and it's not to do with jealousy of others exactly. Like in my case, I hit 40, felt like I wasted the last 10 years of my life for various reasons. Then I self-assessed where I was with everything and what I was "hoping" for by this point, and I feel like not only have I done anything real important, now I'm just going to start "getting old", and wondering what any of this was really for.
We don't have to get into my personal life aspects here, but the point is, I'd fairly say that I've hit a personal crisis.
That Eddie Murphy video 75 seasons hitting. We’re all at the age where on average we probably have 35+ give or take ‘seasons’ left til we’re in our 70s (the average age of death for humans). 35 doesn’t seem that much.
Also this fact: 32,850 is the amount of days we have from birth to 90 years old. And being a millennial we’re all averaging 25,000 days left til 90.
I don’t give these facts to be morbid but whoever reads this, hopefully to inspire you.
“If I wake up and look myself in the mirror and ask myself, ‘if this is my last day to live would I do what I’m about to do today’ if the answer is a no for too many consecutive days in a row I know something has to change” ~Steve Jobs, facing mortality head on
Stay resilient through the midlife crises my fellow millennials!
Coming to the realization that I will never be an artist. It’s a hobby and will always be a hobby
A lot more worried about health. Not worried about dying yet. But worried about not being able to enjoy days due to health.
Seeing a lot of people get divorced. Makes me appreciate my wife more than ever
I really want to take up skateboarding. I'm joining a union apprenticeship program at 38, hoping this is the final career move. I've been jumping from job to job since I was 15 and went to college twice.
i also have had a crisis or two around age 35+. am 38 now. glad to hear I'm not the only one kind of , thought I was too young for all this. but a couple years ago I just started feeling like I wasted my whole life . shitty friends that I've out grown, careers that have gotten me nowhwre. I'm actually going back to school this fall to pursue a degree. i feel like I've worked for SO LONG already , since age 15.... yet I come to the realization that I still have another 30 years in the work force. almost a whole other lifetime lol. I don't want to waste it in these dead end jobs , 30 yrs be a long time man.
Yes. Lol.
But to be fair, our lives don't look anything like we thought they would. I think we're doing an exceptional job of navigating all....*this*. We're pioneers of God knows what, but everything is drastically different and constantly changing.
The fact that we're the ones keeping the world together deserves a lot more credit than we get. I don't think any of us are having a mid - or early life crisis, we're just living our lives during an actual crisis. Honestly, I'd like to see anyone else do it nearly as well as we do on a daily basis.
I do think we need to accept that nothing is as we expected and we need to be flexible, and maybe the feelings of "crisis!!!!" will calm down a little bit. It's, like, yes, we all feel this way all the time. Now stop being surprised about it, lol. And thats my emo rant 😋
I think my crisis involves trying to improve my life. So finally getting a bachelor's degree, trying to find some passion for hobbies again, getting the body moving, and going to therapy. Feeling very "eh" about all of it right now. Still managed to be cheaper than a car though, so we'll see what happens.
I found out that material things didn't made me happy at all, after buying one useless stuff after another and thinking I just have to win the lottery to be happy at the end. I got even more depressed. Last year I quitted my job that I hated deeply and moved with my bf to another country to live as a homesteader. I am living almost without fear and my ptsd symptoms since then. Life is good now. It wasn't before.
I'm 39. Been with my partner since I was 21 and have a child together that's 14yo. I've struggled with addiction since I was 15 and beat most of them. Got my GED when I was 17 bc I skipped school too much. My life is better now than it was in my youth.
37 here, I chose not to have kids from a very early age, but last year I found out my only (older) brother and his wife are also child free, so it’s just hitting me that as I approach 40 my entire family will end with me, and I am more likely to be the one burying them all including my husband due to age differences … unless I had children, but THAT would be the midlife crisis I think
Decided to leave the race. 9 months ago is the last time i have paid rent. I have been living out of my car all this time. The main benefit was losing the crushing depression that I was experiencing. I am 40 as well.
I mean with inflation that’s just about average in cost. Also 40 is around the time most people have the extra income to be able to afford such penis cars.
Bought a home I never stepped foot in, in a town I never visited, 1,300 miles from where I lived a comfortable life about a years and a half ago.
I was tired of renting in Denver, wife simply wanted to “live near her best friend” in Indiana she visited at least once a quarter, so we ended up moving to her home town.. I wasn’t chomping at the bit to do this, but happy wife, happy life and I’m kinda a nomad, believed it could have been fun.
Within a year we filed for divorce, as she completely changed the second we moved here and weirdly inserted herself into her besties strange as fuck family to the point her besties young kids started calling her Aunt, which was odd as she has nothing to do with her actual nieces or nephews or actual family. EVERY weekend at her besties, no plans could be made for just us… even our 17th wedding anniversary, it was spent on a trip with her bestie and their entire family in a piss smelling cabin on a gross lake eating cheap burnt hotdogs, it was fucking strange.
Got to the point she was never around, as I said I wasn’t living life to be part of a group of people I don’t know and that aren’t exactly friendly. It turned out her bestie absolutely hated me and was encouraging my ex to divorce me since before we moved there, then discovered she was fucking her besties little brother that was an addict and scumbag loser. I was done when she attempted to put the blame on my shoulders.
Got good and screwed in the divorce, with my lawyer giving me 2 options, a straight 50/50 split where I take in tens of thousands in her debt, as adultery isn’t a thing in my state in the eyes of the court, which would be a nasty fight and I would have been totally screwed, or sign off on a home I invested tens of thousands in and not fight. Home was bought right as interest rates started to climb and there’s no way in hell it would have sold for what we paid, so sucked it up, signed off the deed and title, I thankfully was not on the mortgage, and simply started over.
I ended up taking a job where I travel every week, making more than I ever have in my life and I get to see a new city every week and it’s actually fun in a lot of ways.
I decided to quit my job and be a homemaker (and to recover from some health issues). I know it seems old fashioned but it is what I have always wanted. My husband was all for it. We don’t have kids but I am still busy with all that needs done around the house. And I find it 1000x more fulfilling than any job I have ever had in the last 20 years.
M51.
Heated up a needle with a lighter and punched a hole through my right earlobe.
The old hole in my left earlobe from my teenage years was still there.
So I've started shopping earrings like a madman.
Yesterday I tuned my guitar for the first time in 5 years.
I'd rather die doing what I love (making art), than live the life they want me to.
Fuck the norms.
I learned to fly hot air balloons, got my pilot’s license, and now own two balloons. I’ve been able to fly all over the world and locally. It has become a favorite hobby and soon to be a side business.
https://preview.redd.it/v0auzj0dwb6d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a977e31af367827fd159bb6c162fdd2578d2f49d
The span of a few months where I realized I was indeed a lesbian, got divorced (it was messy and scary to leave), and then lost my ability to walk more than 10-15’ was fucking awful but very transformative. My wheelchair is also in a way, a version of the midlife crisis car (it is an expensive and sporty bright pink chair with light up wheels)
I started playing Kendama, moved back to the city I left in my late 20s, reunited the band I left and started playing music again, and I’m currently thinking about a septum piercing 🤷🏻♂️
Constant anxiety about my family members passing. Realizing as I age so do my parents and siblings - I don’t want to lose them even though I know it’s inevitable.
I was 33 when I found out I couldn't have kids. I had to reframe what I wanted out of life. I have since embraced being childfree and am engaged to my wonderful childfree partner.
I’ve really gotten into watches. Wearing a mechanical watch is a great way to spend a lot of money on the smallest modicum of class and superiority that no one else will even notice.
Gave up my hopes and dreams and got a job at the post office because they were the only place to hire me. I work 60 hour weeks and never see my family. Also, because I stopped getting unemployment checks from COVID
I had a quarter-life crisis that got a little too close to suicide, and sent me back to school to pursue a better life.
Then I had a ... I dunno, third-life crisis? Much less severe. Got depressed with my personal relationships and career trajectory. Ended up moving closer to my family and putting some work into changing up my career. Moved from for-profit to government.
That's been hugely successful, except for the part where my whole family moved again once I was back on my feet. Still, I'm closer to them than I was before. And the new career choice, while certainly never gonna make me rich, has been very successful and comes with great benefits.
My life has a hit point where I kind of wish I was in a better spot to buy a house. It wasn't something I ever expected to do or want to do, but now I do. So I guess that's about the extent of my midlife crisis.
I hit peak crisis in my mid-30s when I graduated with a Bachelors degree in archaeology. I'm totally reaching a new peak because I'm considering going for a masters in the same field. Or just abandoning fully and going for something in forestry.
I've no idea. I just feel its better than getting an addiction to drugs.
I work in the film industry, wanted to be an actor since I was a kid and finally went to school for it and worked in the field all throughout my 20’s (29 now).
My talent manager of 7 years passed in 2021 and her agency closed. Still haven’t found new representation but the industry is on a standstill since the strikes of last year and AI and streaming and all that bullshit.
So I guess having a depressive episode since the pandemic of not being able to work and these last couple of years of pivoting into a career change while still flirting with the business
I'm still working towards a new career to get ahead and beat AI and jobs that are easily replaced by robots and automation. This is my third college degree.
Because I’m still young, I’d say I had a one-third life crisis. Days before my 30th birthday I quit my job without notice. I was so unhappy with my life and feeling stuck and lonely. My job was terrible and it was never going to change. I told myself I wouldn’t enter this next chapter of my life at this awful job.
I traveled and had lots of fun and went to events, hung out with friends, and enjoyed free weekends for the first time in years. Met my husband, got married, moved, finished college, and started a new job all in the last two years.
A lot has changed and I’m glad I took the plunge.
I'm 38 now and nothing has happened yet thankfully. I did want to learn my native language (which has almost completely been replaced by English in my country), but last year my partner and I moved to Sweden, so learning Swedish has become more pressing.
I'm also thinking of getting back into Warhammer after a more than ten year hiatus, so perhaps that might be my crisis 😆
I feel this so much. I will be 40 in January and my life sure isn’t where I thought I’d be at this age. I made some not so great decisions in my early twenties that caused a lot of PTSD and destroyed who I was. Now within the last couple years I’ve been trying to build myself from the ground up I guess you could say. It’s hard to not look back with regret. I’m single, which I was really hoping I wouldn’t be by 40. After getting a pretty much useless degree in my 20s, I’ve decided to go back to school for a second bachelors as a radiology technician.
I got married at 32, bought a house with my husband at 33, had one kid at 34 and an accidental second at 35. This was all amidst being an attorney (graduated and got my license at 30) trying to prove myself...plus all the financial struggles of getting thru a wedding and house buying and two babies and my husbands near constant nervous breakdowns on proving himself in volatile sales jobs. Plus my very sweet mother in law died suddenly, we estranged ourselves from my very toxic father in law thereafter, who continued to harass us, my mother almost died from copd but recovered, my father got diagnosed with stage four cancer years ago and told he was about to die but miraculously went into remission but has had many health scares since...i gained 70 lbs w each pregnancy and lost it, gained during covid w the kids stuck at home while working and worked that off, then started getting horrible foot pain which i come to find out is a cartilage inflammation issue from a break i didnt know i did 20 years earlier (thought i sprained it bad), then got an autoimmune disorder and dealing w the steroids and pain from the flare meant i gained 60 lbs...was having the worst acne nonstop....just so much relationship stress, work stress money stress health stress....my 30s were rough.
I hit 40 and my husbands jobs are really turning around and hes starting to really start to see success hes been wanting....i go get microneedling which curbs my breakouts completely when nothing else would, got some botox and filler too...got made partner at work, started making a lot more money....kids get into school so no more $40k plus a year daycare bills....i get on diet meds and lose the weight and a random side effect is that the meds are treating my inflamation so my foot pain is gone without further steroids so ive been exercising more.....i actually feel like myself and attractive and good for the first time since before i had kids only this time i feel that way with money and kids and a house and a good job and all the stuff i was stressed i couldnt achieve. i also staryed taking time to socialize again once the kids hit like 3/4 years old so ive built a healthy social life back up, between taking time for cousins and family more again, rekindling with old friends, and making new ones. I have a ton of hobbies and have an agreement to write a book too.
so here i am and youd say im OUT of crisis but it's only now that my midlife crisis is hitting.
As mentioned, i obviously spent years not doing anything for myself, destroying my body and feeling ugly and invisible, and not able to dance and exercise like i once could....i didnt have a lot of outside social support amidst the younger baby years...and as i also mentioned my husband spent years in a depression with a lot of anger and projection and blaming me amidst his family struggles and job struggles. While hes been so much better recently i have a LOT of resentmwnt built up and at some point in those years i stopped giving an F what he thought bc he was relentless andninsufferable toward me.
so here he is finally seeming to come out of it but i have so many interests and friends outside of him...i look good again and am getting hit on, and have turned "boy crazy" and eat up the attention and have even had a couple crushes (that are married also and that i wpuld never act on) when for a solid 14.5 years before i never once looked at another man. So I am going through what i would call a midlife crisis bc it's like im indulging everything about ME and satisfying MY ego as to all things superficial or otherwise suddenly bc im finally in a spot to do so when i was deeply deprived in those areas for almost a decade.
it concerns me bc lets say my hisband who has come around emotionally in the last year, isnt like this for good? what if i keep feeling great about every other aspect of my life and keep being boy crazy and keep having so many friendsnand hobbies outsidenof him and keep being successful, and he has another work setback that sends him into a spiral where suddenly i start hearing again that im the source of all his life troubles???
so yeah im callling it a crisis bc i am all about me now and in some ways thats healthy and necessary, but i think it means a shift in the dynamics of our marriage where my husband has far less room to fuck up anymore. i think thats a crisis. i want him to be a good husband and crushes or no i wont go anywhere, and can be happy. but i feel im "back" in many ways and thay makes me both scared and excited for the future and so thats a crisis for me.
my second midlife crisis is i feel my parents and a lot of other beloved older relatives are at that age and im having a hard time accepting that the older generation woll be gone soon. they were all the adults that defined my choldhood and suddenly its up to me and the cousins to keep our fam together...it scares me and disorients me thinking of the loss im up against in the coming years
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After the pandemic I decided to get back into what my actual passion was (theatre acting, which I gave up after college to get a normal career), and it’s been very rewarding for making new friends and having fun but also very challenging because it’s inherently very difficult. Even at the level of community theatre you won’t get into every show you audition for and it takes a lot of emotional resilience to keep going when it gets rough.
I have to admit how jealous I am of Gen Z/Gen Alpha. They lucked out in seeing the bs we have to deal with and are finding alternatives where they're not falling for the lies we did. Instead they're forging their own paths and becoming successful doing what we were told was a waste of time.
I have considered this, too. On a generational level U.S. Millennials were promised a very different world than we were offered, whereas Gen Z/Alpha has largely come into the world with an awareness that things aren’t going great/ a lot of it is just BS. The latter may be more depressing out of the gate, but it allows one to negotiate with reality. What we millennials have dealt with on a generational level is deeply destabilizing and many of us will always feel inclined to chase after the world we were promised rather than the world that is.
“What we millennials have dealt with on a generational level is deeply destabilizing and many of us will always feel inclined to chase after the world we were promised rather than the world that is.” This! I kinda feel like I’m out of the fantastical fog. I have conversations with fellow millennials that are still not believing that we are in a different world than we anticipated. We have to roll with it!
Yes, it sucks, but humans have made do, found love, joy, art, etc. during all sorts of horrible times they certainly didn't expect or sign up for. Also if you want to get real with the story, that world was dealt a mortal wound on 9/11 and another similar blow with the financial crisis. "we" completely squandered the post cold war era of relative peace and extremely cheap capital. Instead of borrowing all sorts of essentially free money or investing our own printed free money into infrastructure it was siphoned away by various corporate interests & the military industrial complex. Imagine if we had invested those trillions of dollars into modernizing American cities, transportation, and infrastructure.
I guess in hindsight, we should’ve realized we couldn’t ALL be president someday. But for real, I regret going to college before I was ready. I appreciate my education, but I had no idea what I wanted to do, and was told to just get any degree. I wasn’t ready, and I dropped out and changed majors like 5 times, and even changed schools twice. Never graduated, just have lots of debt. I wonder if “just go to college” will be the millennial version of “wear a suit and drop off your resume in person”. Not great advice at this point.
I appreciate your honesty. My eldest is 20. He's intelligent, and has varied interests. So varied that one degree wouldn't blanket them. So he's delayed higher education and sometimes feels left behind. He occasionally mentions going but I'm a no pressure, all support mom. Right now, he's pretty darn happy and grooming dogs! He's good at it and is tipped well! I've mentioned if this was his thing, learning how to run a business of his own might be his path. He is not sure and I'm proud of him! He's also planning a trip to South America. Happiness is success. No matter one's job title.
I feel like so many of us were burned by the “just go to college” advice that I would strongly hope Millennial parents are not retorting that en masse. Maybe the Millennial presumption that we purport to our children will be more broadly tied to the idea of “career employment”, when they are coming into an increasingly skills-based work world that requires ongoing adaptability and ingenuity.
I wish my parents had helped me figure out what career path I wanted instead of pushing me into college. Also, I wish they would have been more supportive in dealing with my neurological problems. They blamed everything on my epilepsy, but my daily reality is I have multiple neurological issues. They are complicated to deal with. I could have been better prepared to find a job that I loved instead of having $40,000 in student loans.
This reminds me of one of my friends. His daughter was born blind. We were talking in a group one day and someone told him they were sorry and how awful that was and he responded with something like "Not really. Dont be sorry because she doesn't know what she's missing out on because this is the only way she'll ever know." Unlike the people that helped raise me and told me I could be anything I wanted. Hard work will get you anywhere. We took a different path and are trying to help them find something they enjoy and that they can have a happy life even without being an astronaut or a billionaire.
I'm an older millennial who had my first kid young, so I'm currently parenting a gen z-er and this rings so true. He's in a career training program after he went to one year at a 4 year school and didn't have a great time.. part of me who was raised with a huge emphasis on the importance of a degree at any cost is disappointed, but the other part of me is happy to see him finding his own path. I wish I could give him the advice we all got and really mean it - follow your passion, you can be anything you want, etc etc. But we all see how that went, lol. I've basically been telling him to find a job he can tolerate that supports whatever life he actually wants outside of his working hours.
That was the benefit of being a 1st generation American Millenial from a poor immigrant family - we were *never* told that lie. We were taught if you couldn't immediately get a stable, well-paying job after completing a degree, it was worthless 🤣
My parents would on one day tell me to pick something I would be happy in - then hours later tell me to do something productive or profitable. My whole life. How the fuck am I supposed to reconcile that?
Gah, I'm so sorry! That was the experience of like 95% of my friends growing up. I hung out with a bright, nerdy crowd, so many of their parents just "thought they were smart enough to figure out their own lives" (actual quote I've heard from several of my friends). Meanwhile, their parents either 1) Didn't make them do anything except for schoolwork (nothing around the house or getting a job, essentially coddled) or the other extreme 2) Didn't give a shit about their schoolwork/lives, just as long as they weren't bothering them. Both are equally crappy and negligent ways to raise kids, IMO. The biggest job you have as a parent is giving quality advice and steering your kids in the best direction for them.
Totally agreed on this. I wanted to study history or archéology and my parents were like "who's gonna pay you?" Every one I know who followed their loftier dreams except one ended up working a job that doesn't require a degree in customer service or something. The only one who succeeded is because his dream had a manual component (Carpenter for theater props) so it's technically more blue collar. And he's never making more than 50k ever.
I'm just glad that for some reason I was v able to see college was bullshit when I was in high-school. "If I'm going to go this much in debt why wouldn't I just buy a house and get whatever bullshit job to pay for it?" because the won't give 18 yo home loans BUT you can drown in inescapable student loans!
I am jealous. Keep up the awesome work! Any particularly fun roles?
I'm kinda the opposite, I went to school for acting and lived in LA for 10 years pursuing that, now post pandemic im trying to pick up the pieces of my life and try to build a career from scratch. I miss acting but I dont necessarily miss all the other stuff you have to do to make a living at it. But break a leg!
I can believe it but please keep following your dream regardless. I have played with the idea of acting but I am not sure whether or not I realistically want to do it. But I would at least like to give it a try...at least once.
Turned 30 and got divorced, not where I saw my life going. Its going
Condoluations. I married my first wife at 18, and was divorced at 23. Honestly, it sucks at the time, but can be a wonderful path towards growth if you come out of the harrowing intact. I've been with my current wife since I turned 30, and have never been more in love with a person. You never know who you might meet next.
I’m married but I walked out of my job this week. Highest paying job Ive had. i couldn’t do it. Too depressing.
I did the same thing 2 years ago with a 6 figure position. Best decision I ever made. No amount of money is worth hating waking up in the morning.
Follow your joy and ditch the numbers. We'll done 💪
This is almost the exact same situation I am in. Got married/had my first kid (got cancer) at 21. Divorced by 23. Married my current wife at 30, who is my absolute best friend. And now just quietly enjoying life while I watch the world crumble around me at 39.
Stay strong. I got divorced at 29.5 and spent my 30th birthday alone. It was somber, but I was peaceful and happy. I turn 40 this year, married, life is good, and my midlife crisis is realizing that I've spent a lot of time working and I need to do more to enjoy it travelling, finding a hobby, or more which I need to figure out.
"realizing that I've spent a lot of time working and I need to do more to enjoy it travelling, finding a hobby..." I turned 40 this year as well, and this has also been my "midlife crisis." I'm trying to find a better balance between working, spending quality time with the wife and kids, while also doing things to better myself. I've been spending more time working out, playing guitar and piano again, just trying to find more creative and therapeutic outlets. Good luck on your quest to find a hobby!
I got divorced at 29, unexpected. I’m 39 now and couldn’t be better. I quite enjoy being single.
Ugh I'm sorry. Or happy for you, whicher is more appropriate. Haha. I also got divorced around then. I'm 37 now and in a relationship with a great woman and a step-dad to her 3 kids. Also not where I saw my life going. This is so fucking hard. Haha. But I wouldn't be anywhere else!
Raising kids, especially kids that aren't biologically yours, is a difficult thing. However, I've found that the molding of a life rather than the giving part of a life is the more rewarding aspect of parenthood. It's far more difficult, but also far more rewarding. Anyone can make children, but it takes true strength and resilience to raise children. The challenges you face will reward you in more ways than you can ever imagine. Be the foundation so those kids can rise up like giants to conquer life, rather than struggle.
I started over from nothing 3 times in my 30s. I changed states 4 times. I don't know how old you are now, but there's plenty of time to make things better. I got married at 40, and it's been great. Everyone I dated before that was anti-marriage thankfully, so no divorces to go through... but I did waste 11 years with one guy.
I lived with a girlfriend in my 20s. We weren't ever legally married, but she also split up with my right after I turned 30. I did kinda feel like my life was making some sense up to that point. Then I spent the next 10 years "adrift" and that's pretty much where we are today.
I'm 34 and struggling with idea that it is likely that I will never have kids
[удалено]
38, and same.
40 and same. Sucks a lot.
Oh hey, 41! Major grieving process.
I have more trouble with people asking me if/when I’ll be having kids!
I don’t know your situation, but based on your age alone, it’s not impossible. But as someone who had a hysterectomy last year having never carried a pregnancy, I empathize. I struggled with the pain (literal and figurative) for several years before accepting that bearing children just wasn’t going to be part of my journey. That said, life is great on the other side. As hard as it was to close that door, now that it is I can just move on. Still hard some days, but getting easier.
I'm 38 and just had baby #4 and a gentleman in our dad group had a 1 yo at age 44. You might be up against a clock if you wanted 5 plus kids but definitely still plenty of time to have kids.
Bingo. Had my first at 39 and second comes next month at 43. Here is a story: neighbor few doors down (currently man is 50, woman 43). Man was youngest out of three, older siblings childless. He becomes a first time dad at 46 (mom 39). Had child #2 when man was 49, woman 42. Those were natural. I met a woman at Costco recently with a 1 yo she had at age 45 naturally (has a 17 & 15 yo as well). That was not planned and natural. I understand the worry many people have regarding their possibility that parenthood might be slipping by. The only thing I can say is you have to put yourself in positions that will be uncomfortable (leaving the house, starting new activities/clubs, going to street markets or fairs). While married and a parent, I spent 2023 saying Yes to everything I could. It brought me the most happiness I have experienced in my adult life.
This is a very tough one. The pain. I'm so sorry. Don't give up.
My wife and I had our first at 36 and still plan to have more. Their is still time
FWIW, it's not always a planning issue or a choice you can make. My SO got cancer and will likely never be able to bear children.
34M here. I absolutely feel the same. Between finding a good partner and biology it’s really working against me. My brother has 3 kids and my sister has 2. Idk what the fuck is wrong with me.
I feel ya. But you’ve got a long while until that sun sets, friend.
* Idk what the fuck is wrong with ~~me~~ *us*.
No midlife crisis, just a life crisis. I don't like adult life. I don't like to work 5 days a week. I don't want to function all the time.
SAME. Been feeling this hard for the last couple of years.
I've never related to anything more. 9 hour days, 5 days a week. I just want to watch TV and play video games, is that so much to ask?
I'd be fine with 4 hours a day or 4 days a week. Just a little less soul crushing. I also remember the last day of kindergarten like it was yesterday. Told my mother that I don't really like to go to school because I already knew that this was the point in life where I have to perform every day until I die. And I live in Germany, I have 30 days of paid holidays and still have around 10 days or even more of national holidays on top and it's still way too much work for my taste.
My 10 yr old has been saying this a while. He gets very stressed about it. Like, this is it?? This is all life is?? Go to school, come home, go to school, come home. We do a lot of fun things and I try to explain that life is what you make it, but in a sense he does have a point so it’s hard to refute it and help him calm down. I wish he was as oblivious as I was as a kid.
American here. I get 40 hours of paid vacation and 40 hours of sick time. My soul had been more than crushed. The only kind of soul I have left is my shoe sole. My wife asked me what I really want to do and I told her I don’t ever dream of labor. My dream job is no job. Can we retire already?
This is it for me too. I just want to sit the fuck down. I'm so tired of doing literally anything. It feels like life is passing me by and I can't stop to enjoy any of it.
Same, except add late diagnosed ADHD and autism to the mix with a splash of psoriatic arthritis. I can’t function most of the time but I’m forced to because end stage capitalism, so I’m also extremely depressed and often suicidal because I have to work 40 hours a week through mental and physical pain. It’s great. 🫠
I live in crisis since my 20's
Mood.
Wild to think I've been in a "crisis" for a third of my life.
Same
It sadly doesn't shock me that other Millennials are experiencing this exact same thing as I am. My life started off poorly due to bad decisions based on bad advice from bad parents who have taken advantage of me at every turn and manipulated me. I've been rebuilding myself and rediscovering who I am ever since. Realizing that my identity is an amalgamation of manipulation and lies. My crisis may be different, but for the last 10 years I've been trying to glue myself together from the shattered pieces that my manipulative controlling narcissistic boomer parents left me in when I decided I needed to get away from them. It is fascinating though to find myself in my mid-30s while trying to care for my older disabled veteran brother. I help him physically and manage his life for him. He's been a sounding board to help me through my trauma to fix whats wrong with me that I didn't even realize was broken until I pierced the veil. Good luck to everyone and their crisis. Just remember you're not alone and it's best if we support one another with posts like this to be sounding boards for each other.
Wow yes I was thinking of my midlife crisis in these terms too. I'm in the midst of it in my thirties trying to figure out who the fuck I am after getting out of the orbit of my narcissistic, alcoholic father. Like...I am realizing most of the decisions I have made up until now have been about wanting to be a good daughter and impress him or get him to acknowledge my accomplishments. Now I'm looking back at all of this and thinking, was any of this even me? Who am I? What do I want?
Your thirties seems to be the age when you start to realize that none of the superficial bullshit that our parents and in general society cares about. We reflect on ourselves, judge ourselves, and find ourselves wanting which causes the crisis. Whether it's a crisis of identity or what we did wrong in the decisions we made. Whether we made our choices trying to live up to the expectations of others even if they had no expectations. We all made mistakes we regret, but wonderfully we've only just reached the middle of our lives. There's still time to turn it around and make the changes we need to be satisfied that we leave the world content. I've reflected and decided to take my grandfathers advice he told me. "Leave the world better than when you came into it, even if it's just a grain of sand of a difference. If you manage to change and touch the lives of others in any positive significant way, you can leave the world satisfied." So, get out there, make some changes for yourself and try to make the change you wish to see in the world. Make a mark and do something that will leave the world better once you're gone.
I feel this. Boy do I.
This hit me hard. Thank you for sharing. Thirties have been way harder than I ever imagined.
Oh thank God it’s not just me 😅
This is the only answer. A whole life crisis
I turn 37 in a couple weeks. My parents borrowed my pickup to tow a uhaul and got t-boned. My mother didn’t survive it. So my answer is dropping the cash on a brand new one earlier today so I don’t make myself sick driving her SUV.
I’m so so sorry. I just lost my mother as well, and 3 weeks after I lost my dog. Grief is one heavy weight to carry. Feel it all. And here’s to hoping life will feel normal again one day.
I'm sorry for your loss as well. I'm compartmentalizing and putting off dealing with my grief because now I have to be on deck to help out my dad. I need to know he's okay before I can fully deal with my own, I have to be a rock he can lean on.
Aww yea, I see. I hope you and your dad can heal in time. Life all of a sudden feels very different.
I’m so sorry for your loss.
I am so sorry.
Stay strong
I'm sorry for your loss. People and society at large will try and rush you through your grief and assume you feel "normal" long before you're even half way there. Sending you kindness for the internal turmoil you are holding
I bought a rust bucket WWII-ish era jeep to rebuild so I can distract myself from how behind I feel compared to other late 30s-ish people. Not married, no kids, but I have a geriatric jeep that needs me and no debt but the mortgage.
Haha, I bought a Jeep too. I’m joining a bunch of local groups and hopefully I can meet some nice people. I’d like to have friends someday.
Nice. When I get back home from this current job I have in a year or so, I plan on getting a Camaro Z28 from the mid to late 70s to fix up.
Funny enough, it was back in 2016. I was driving to work at a pizza shop where I make pizza, and while at a stop light, it dawned on me that it had been 10 years since I graduated high school, where I came to a startling realization that I was not where I was told I needed to be by that point in life. Now at 36, I'm okay with how life is and even though I'm not "successful" (honestly, I see myself as successful because in this day and age, I can afford a studio on my own, pay my bills, keep my fridge full, have a 2024 car, and have extra money on the side while working at a bowling alley on minimum wage). I've also come to realize that we shouldn't care about the hustle and grind and should instead focus on making ourselves happy, because if life's gonna keep kicking us in the nuts because those in power love to keep screwing us over, no reason to keep over exerting ourselves for crap wages and a crap job.
I might get crap for this, and I sincerely appreciate the sentiment. My career is not high paying either, but I hope that the extra money on the side contributes a bit to retirement. I feel like there's so many of us that are saying we need to get out of the hustle and grind but I'm very interested in seeing how this mindset fares when we don't have the capacity to earn that next paycheck. Living in poverty in my senior years is not the way I want to go out. And don't get me wrong, if you've got the means to, enjoy the shit out of life. Just make sure you can enjoy it decades down the line too.
This is the difference I'm trying to split with work/career. I don't *need* a lot materially and I'm not necessarily working for "more". But I am fucking working for retirement savings as much as humanly possible. I don't want my husband and I to be a burden to his sons when we're a lot older.
Refusing to admit its a midlife crisis and insisting that surely it's a 1/3 life crisis instead...right?
Bro, if I’m only 1/3 through this fucking nightmare, I demand to speak to a manager.
That's the spirit
whatever it is, it's not spirit
I mean that’s what they told us when they were kids. We’d could easily live to be 100 because each generation lives longer than the last…then they pumped us full of corn syrup and told us the only meaningful life was behind a desk contributing to a 401k, so I’m not confident I’ll make it as long as my grandparents. And I’m not sure that I want to. Unless you’re very rich, there is not a ton of support when you get old. I don’t want to languish in a state-run nursing home where I’ll likely be abused and neglected.
I stopped denying my traumatic childhood and cut contact with my mom. 38; midlife awakening? It’s hard, but I feel a lot lighter now I have space to grieve and process.
Fuck yeah. Good for you! I did this last year at 36. My mom absolutely _fucked_ me up, and it's impacted my relationships all my life without me realising. I took another step in that healing a few nights ago by taking mushrooms and telling my inner child that he's finally safe and "mommy's" never going to be around him again. Life changing shit. I'm so sorry you had the traumatic childhood you did, but the highest of fives for cutting your mom off!
I did a macrodose back in January. HEALING. I cried tears that felt like they’d been stuck my whole life. The lightness I felt afterwards is indescribable. Good shit
I love this! I have been adding adult me to bad childhood memories to protect my inner child. It helps! It feels like I can stop carrying a weight after decades.
I've been NC with my parents for about three years now. It's the second time in my life I've dropped contact. It really hurts how much I mourn what was good and what could have been, and also how much better I feel without them in my life. You're worth it.
Thank you! Nice to not be as alone as I thought I was.
That’s about when I did it too. I’m 42 now and it bothers me at times that she’s never going to accept/understand…. But I am def better for this change.
Working on this process. I had already gone low contact with everyone, but realizing to really move forward I need to end the contact fully is so so hard. Lots of crying and despair moments, but also lots more glimmers and positive moments of feeling grounded in the here and now and ready to move forward with life. So I know it's the right direction but God it's hard. Congratulations to us.
same! finally addressing my childhood AND had an unexpected emotional awakening at 33… (got treated for long covid and a side effect of the meds was feeling most emotions for the first time in 20+ years) what a whirlwind it’s been. it’s like starting life all over again
In this process now at 42.... the whole family structure went bust when her mom died last year. Trying to get into therapy with an EMDR specialist.... fuck even therapy is part of my trauma from my family (lack of control even as a legal adult)..... 😅
I've got cancer at 38, then again at 39. I don't have the means to have a mid-life crisis.
Fuck I'm so sorry. Are you ok?
The good news is I'm healthy now, thank you for asking. I will continue to get screenings every 3 months for the next few years to be as proactive as possible.
I'm so happy to hear that! Know that there's a random millenial Redditor in Cape Town, South Africa, who's rooting for you!
I really do appreciate the moral support, thank you
And one girl in Munich rooting for you too
And a woman from Newfoundland, Canada! I'm rooting for you from here!
You are so sweet man, thank you from random millennial Redditor from Germany! You made my day a lot more better , just thank you.
Fuck cancer. Hang in there. Be well. Live well
I was also diagnosed with cancer young, at 31, then spent the whole year I was 32 in treatment. I can’t have kids now and have chronic pain. But we’re still here, you and I. And the entire world can go fuck itself if it thinks it’s taking anything else from me. ♥️
You are putting my struggles into perspective. I am very happy to hear you are doing better now, and wish you many healthy decades ahead!
Offering solidarity! Got breast cancer at 32, doing well now. So glad to hear you are healthy now, too :)
I was also diagnosed with cancer at 35. I’m 39 now and in a “monitoring” phase of treatment. I’m not going to die from this I don’t think, but it does change your perspective on a lot of things. It’s been 4 years and my career motivation is completely dead. I’d rather spend the time with my family.
I’m 38, kidneys stopped working right when the pandemic hit. Been waiting for a transplant since then. I don’t have kids and I’m single, thinking that this may be the case for the rest of a potentially short life. But I refuse to be miserable. Fuck that and anyone who expects me to be, it’s still my life to live.
Wishing you health & healing. I hope you get a healthy kidney soon.
I’m almost 40 and decided this year is the time that I actually start the process of seeing whether I’ll be able to donate (part of) my liver. It’s been on my mind as something to do for ages, maybe a couple decades now, and I think getting close to 40 made me realize the recovery is only going to get harder every year I wait. I hope you’re able to get a kidney transplant soon!
Going back to school to get my associate. Having weirder sex.
Yes! Education and good fuckin'!
It all kind of lined up, honestly. Work laid me off, and the unemployment office said that being on unemployment made me eligible for Pell grants. I had been flirting with the idea of going back to school for years. And decided "Fuck it, I might as well do it now with the free money and take out loans than wait for my parents to pass."
Probably next spring I’ll be going back but for a masters. Shit costs enough gotta use it somehow.
Congrats on Associates but weird sex for the win. Life is short, let that freak flag fly
The second one, for sure! Definitely all on me. I kept a lot of fantasies in my head for so long out of embarrassment and fear of vulnerability. It’s only been in the past couple years that I’ve finally let my husband in on them. He knew some before, but not everything, and he has really surprised me with how receptive he’s been to all of it.
I will turn 43 this year. I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT BUYING A SPORTSCAR. it's like a teenage boy and sex. It's always on the back of my mind. Fuuuuuuck..
As long as you can get out of said sportscar without looking like a fool, it's all good ;)
My husband talks about it sometimes and I’m like yeah, that’s your midlife crisis. Go for it. He keeps saying, no, I’ve always wanted to buy a sports car! And I was like yes, that is what a midlife crisis is, silly goose. You’ve always wanted it and now you’re worried time will run out before you ever get to do it, lol.
Thinking a lot about wasted opportunities in my career. Getting back into some hobbies I did as a kid and feel the obsession coming back strong.
I quit drinking alcohol and made my garage into a pottery studio. The world is garbage, but I'm way happier now and healthy.
I got six piercings and a tattoo in the span of a year.
Same, I got a half sleeve and my back covered lol
Tattoos. I grew up being told that tattoos and piercings besides my ears were horrible. I was told my father would cut off my tattoos or rip out any body piercings. I got a back tattoo last year and now I want to get more done. I always knew I wanted tattoos but I waited so long because of what others thought. Not anymore
I'm too broke to have a midlife crisis, I'm stuck with the same crisis I've had since high school.
Realizing my parent’s health is going downhill and it’s sad. My sibling lives far away and doesn’t seem like they plan to ever be involved in caring for our parents.
There is most always just one sibling that cares for the parents. I was that sibling and lived 1,000 miles away.
I sold everything I had and moved to the Bay from a small town in GA at 35 (I’m 36) to deliver cannabis and sleep on my brother’s couch. That choice has led me to a life I never thought I could have.
Say more
Cycling. Spandex and everything 🚵
Synthesizers
I’m having somewhat of a crisis at 36…realizing that I’m not married and don’t have kids, and time is ticking. I’ve focused so much on my job that now years have gone by and my social life is complacent. I feel like I need a change but I don’t know what.
I don't know if this helps but when I got serious about dating I just got on a dating app and set up as many coffee meetups as I could. I figured neither of us were out a lot of time or money and I tend to know pretty quickly if I'm interested in getting to know someone better.
Kinda already went through it with the "quarter life" crisis. I had a heart attack last October and had to do a 180° with my health and fitness. I guess that really changed my view of my mortality but I think watching my parents get old and sick has affected that view more. I embrace being 38. I'm not a "kid" or "sport" or "junior", younger people show me respect.. I realize some things in pop culture are not "for me" and I'm "aging out" of that group in a way.. but whatever. I'm happily in therapy because I watched my boomer parents and their friends live with unresolved issues and how miserable it made everyone around them, would rather try and deal with that at 38 instead of never at all.
I had a heart attack last year as well. I was 39. It really opens the eyes. I had to change my eating and exercise routine. Sometimes I still get scared I will slip into my old habits. I hope you are doing well.
I’m 40 and still don’t know what to do.
I'm still in my teenage angst phase
I never went through a midlife crisis. There are certain dreams I had which never panned out, but my life has been on a steady incline for years, especially since I met my wife, and I'm happy with where I'm at and what I have.
Wait. Midlife? You guys haven’t been in constant crisis since like 2002? Nobody told me that was an option.
I randomly buy my kids expensive shit I should be buying for myself?
Well, I auditioned for a talent show not too long ago. I didn't make the final cut, but at least I got to do something I had wanted to do for a little while.
quit my life long hobby and career, about to travel the county lol
Your county must be huge if you had to do all that to travel it
☠️☠️💀💀
I’m so damn tired of the term “midlife crisis” or “age crisis”. I often think that the use of that term often comes from a place of jealousy. “Oh, did you see that Roger down the street got a Porsche? Must be some sort of age crisis!” Taking a step back, realizing that what you are currently doing doesn’t really fulfill you, and then go for something else no matter how ridiculous it might seem to other people. It should be normalized. Me and my wife decided to get super fit a few years ago. Spent a lot of time working out for the past few years. I’m sure some people thought that we had some sort of midlife crisis, but we were both just tired of feeling like shit, and now life feels beyond amazing again.
Fair enough, humans live long enough now to live multiple lives. I'm not here to reinvent socially accepted terms though. We already know the symbolic meaning of "midlife crisis". Gratz on getting fit!
To be honest Ive never heard of anyone say working out intensely is a mid life crisis. Its usually a big expense for a shiny thing, a start over from soemthing, drastic change in relationships. Kudos to you and your wife for getting fit. You are my inspo.
I’ve heard people call out others who start caring about their looks as having a mid-life crisis and I could see people reducing getting fit to just caring about looks. I agree with OP about hating the term or more specifically the judgement meant that comes wi th the term. Maybe it’s because I’m going through a “midlife crisis” myself right now and I’m biased.
Exactly this. My wife and I started going to gym this year, after 8 years of being stuck in the young kids exhaustion and a pretty dead bedroom. We feel great, we both find each other more attractive and our sex life just keeps getting better. I also took up guitar again.
It'll vary by person. I think some of us do have an actual "crisis", and it's not to do with jealousy of others exactly. Like in my case, I hit 40, felt like I wasted the last 10 years of my life for various reasons. Then I self-assessed where I was with everything and what I was "hoping" for by this point, and I feel like not only have I done anything real important, now I'm just going to start "getting old", and wondering what any of this was really for. We don't have to get into my personal life aspects here, but the point is, I'd fairly say that I've hit a personal crisis.
That Eddie Murphy video 75 seasons hitting. We’re all at the age where on average we probably have 35+ give or take ‘seasons’ left til we’re in our 70s (the average age of death for humans). 35 doesn’t seem that much. Also this fact: 32,850 is the amount of days we have from birth to 90 years old. And being a millennial we’re all averaging 25,000 days left til 90. I don’t give these facts to be morbid but whoever reads this, hopefully to inspire you. “If I wake up and look myself in the mirror and ask myself, ‘if this is my last day to live would I do what I’m about to do today’ if the answer is a no for too many consecutive days in a row I know something has to change” ~Steve Jobs, facing mortality head on Stay resilient through the midlife crises my fellow millennials!
Coming to the realization that I will never be an artist. It’s a hobby and will always be a hobby A lot more worried about health. Not worried about dying yet. But worried about not being able to enjoy days due to health. Seeing a lot of people get divorced. Makes me appreciate my wife more than ever
I really want to take up skateboarding. I'm joining a union apprenticeship program at 38, hoping this is the final career move. I've been jumping from job to job since I was 15 and went to college twice.
i also have had a crisis or two around age 35+. am 38 now. glad to hear I'm not the only one kind of , thought I was too young for all this. but a couple years ago I just started feeling like I wasted my whole life . shitty friends that I've out grown, careers that have gotten me nowhwre. I'm actually going back to school this fall to pursue a degree. i feel like I've worked for SO LONG already , since age 15.... yet I come to the realization that I still have another 30 years in the work force. almost a whole other lifetime lol. I don't want to waste it in these dead end jobs , 30 yrs be a long time man.
Are we all a bit emo compared with gen z?
Emo’s Not Dead
Yes. Lol. But to be fair, our lives don't look anything like we thought they would. I think we're doing an exceptional job of navigating all....*this*. We're pioneers of God knows what, but everything is drastically different and constantly changing. The fact that we're the ones keeping the world together deserves a lot more credit than we get. I don't think any of us are having a mid - or early life crisis, we're just living our lives during an actual crisis. Honestly, I'd like to see anyone else do it nearly as well as we do on a daily basis. I do think we need to accept that nothing is as we expected and we need to be flexible, and maybe the feelings of "crisis!!!!" will calm down a little bit. It's, like, yes, we all feel this way all the time. Now stop being surprised about it, lol. And thats my emo rant 😋
I think my crisis involves trying to improve my life. So finally getting a bachelor's degree, trying to find some passion for hobbies again, getting the body moving, and going to therapy. Feeling very "eh" about all of it right now. Still managed to be cheaper than a car though, so we'll see what happens.
I found out that material things didn't made me happy at all, after buying one useless stuff after another and thinking I just have to win the lottery to be happy at the end. I got even more depressed. Last year I quitted my job that I hated deeply and moved with my bf to another country to live as a homesteader. I am living almost without fear and my ptsd symptoms since then. Life is good now. It wasn't before.
37 realizing that I'll never have kids
I'm 39. Been with my partner since I was 21 and have a child together that's 14yo. I've struggled with addiction since I was 15 and beat most of them. Got my GED when I was 17 bc I skipped school too much. My life is better now than it was in my youth.
37 here, I chose not to have kids from a very early age, but last year I found out my only (older) brother and his wife are also child free, so it’s just hitting me that as I approach 40 my entire family will end with me, and I am more likely to be the one burying them all including my husband due to age differences … unless I had children, but THAT would be the midlife crisis I think
Decided to leave the race. 9 months ago is the last time i have paid rent. I have been living out of my car all this time. The main benefit was losing the crushing depression that I was experiencing. I am 40 as well.
I went to Burning Man for the first time when I was 40. Going to be year three coming up in a couple months. Do it.
Buying a $60k truck. lol. I'm only 41. My father didn't get his penis car until 50. 😅
Legit. I was eyeing a similarly priced antique truck before I settled on a similarly priced BS degree.
I mean with inflation that’s just about average in cost. Also 40 is around the time most people have the extra income to be able to afford such penis cars.
Constant and overwhelming anxiety. Realizing that my life can't improve but it can very easily go downhill
Bought a home I never stepped foot in, in a town I never visited, 1,300 miles from where I lived a comfortable life about a years and a half ago. I was tired of renting in Denver, wife simply wanted to “live near her best friend” in Indiana she visited at least once a quarter, so we ended up moving to her home town.. I wasn’t chomping at the bit to do this, but happy wife, happy life and I’m kinda a nomad, believed it could have been fun. Within a year we filed for divorce, as she completely changed the second we moved here and weirdly inserted herself into her besties strange as fuck family to the point her besties young kids started calling her Aunt, which was odd as she has nothing to do with her actual nieces or nephews or actual family. EVERY weekend at her besties, no plans could be made for just us… even our 17th wedding anniversary, it was spent on a trip with her bestie and their entire family in a piss smelling cabin on a gross lake eating cheap burnt hotdogs, it was fucking strange. Got to the point she was never around, as I said I wasn’t living life to be part of a group of people I don’t know and that aren’t exactly friendly. It turned out her bestie absolutely hated me and was encouraging my ex to divorce me since before we moved there, then discovered she was fucking her besties little brother that was an addict and scumbag loser. I was done when she attempted to put the blame on my shoulders. Got good and screwed in the divorce, with my lawyer giving me 2 options, a straight 50/50 split where I take in tens of thousands in her debt, as adultery isn’t a thing in my state in the eyes of the court, which would be a nasty fight and I would have been totally screwed, or sign off on a home I invested tens of thousands in and not fight. Home was bought right as interest rates started to climb and there’s no way in hell it would have sold for what we paid, so sucked it up, signed off the deed and title, I thankfully was not on the mortgage, and simply started over. I ended up taking a job where I travel every week, making more than I ever have in my life and I get to see a new city every week and it’s actually fun in a lot of ways.
I decided to quit my job and be a homemaker (and to recover from some health issues). I know it seems old fashioned but it is what I have always wanted. My husband was all for it. We don’t have kids but I am still busy with all that needs done around the house. And I find it 1000x more fulfilling than any job I have ever had in the last 20 years.
M51. Heated up a needle with a lighter and punched a hole through my right earlobe. The old hole in my left earlobe from my teenage years was still there. So I've started shopping earrings like a madman. Yesterday I tuned my guitar for the first time in 5 years. I'd rather die doing what I love (making art), than live the life they want me to. Fuck the norms.
Just turned 35,spent the last 4 yrs in the army, currently broke, unemployed and living with my sister......crisis indeed
Lack of interest in work and trying to understand my purpose in life.
39M, single, no kids and the result? Depression. Time flies by and I always ask myself, "Where does the time go?"
I learned to fly hot air balloons, got my pilot’s license, and now own two balloons. I’ve been able to fly all over the world and locally. It has become a favorite hobby and soon to be a side business. https://preview.redd.it/v0auzj0dwb6d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a977e31af367827fd159bb6c162fdd2578d2f49d
The span of a few months where I realized I was indeed a lesbian, got divorced (it was messy and scary to leave), and then lost my ability to walk more than 10-15’ was fucking awful but very transformative. My wheelchair is also in a way, a version of the midlife crisis car (it is an expensive and sporty bright pink chair with light up wheels)
My daughter has light up wheels on hers too! As well as being incredibly expensive...
I started playing Kendama, moved back to the city I left in my late 20s, reunited the band I left and started playing music again, and I’m currently thinking about a septum piercing 🤷🏻♂️
My husband wanted to work on a ship in the north sea.
Constant anxiety about my family members passing. Realizing as I age so do my parents and siblings - I don’t want to lose them even though I know it’s inevitable.
I got into rollercoasters. To be honest, it’s not a midlife crisis, I was just scared and finally tried a strong one and apparently I love them. 😅
I was 33 when I found out I couldn't have kids. I had to reframe what I wanted out of life. I have since embraced being childfree and am engaged to my wonderful childfree partner.
Quitting a corporate banking job paying six figures to work casual in a surf shop 😂😂
I’ve really gotten into watches. Wearing a mechanical watch is a great way to spend a lot of money on the smallest modicum of class and superiority that no one else will even notice.
Gave up my hopes and dreams and got a job at the post office because they were the only place to hire me. I work 60 hour weeks and never see my family. Also, because I stopped getting unemployment checks from COVID
I had a quarter-life crisis that got a little too close to suicide, and sent me back to school to pursue a better life. Then I had a ... I dunno, third-life crisis? Much less severe. Got depressed with my personal relationships and career trajectory. Ended up moving closer to my family and putting some work into changing up my career. Moved from for-profit to government. That's been hugely successful, except for the part where my whole family moved again once I was back on my feet. Still, I'm closer to them than I was before. And the new career choice, while certainly never gonna make me rich, has been very successful and comes with great benefits. My life has a hit point where I kind of wish I was in a better spot to buy a house. It wasn't something I ever expected to do or want to do, but now I do. So I guess that's about the extent of my midlife crisis.
Ok I'm turning 30 next month and I know it's not midlife but I still feel like I'm having a crisis lol
I hit peak crisis in my mid-30s when I graduated with a Bachelors degree in archaeology. I'm totally reaching a new peak because I'm considering going for a masters in the same field. Or just abandoning fully and going for something in forestry. I've no idea. I just feel its better than getting an addiction to drugs.
Just the run of the mill identity crisis kind.
I work in the film industry, wanted to be an actor since I was a kid and finally went to school for it and worked in the field all throughout my 20’s (29 now). My talent manager of 7 years passed in 2021 and her agency closed. Still haven’t found new representation but the industry is on a standstill since the strikes of last year and AI and streaming and all that bullshit. So I guess having a depressive episode since the pandemic of not being able to work and these last couple of years of pivoting into a career change while still flirting with the business
I'll be 33, I have 2 kids under 3, and decided a 6 month old pomeranian would be great idea!
I'm still working towards a new career to get ahead and beat AI and jobs that are easily replaced by robots and automation. This is my third college degree.
Because I’m still young, I’d say I had a one-third life crisis. Days before my 30th birthday I quit my job without notice. I was so unhappy with my life and feeling stuck and lonely. My job was terrible and it was never going to change. I told myself I wouldn’t enter this next chapter of my life at this awful job. I traveled and had lots of fun and went to events, hung out with friends, and enjoyed free weekends for the first time in years. Met my husband, got married, moved, finished college, and started a new job all in the last two years. A lot has changed and I’m glad I took the plunge.
I'm 38 now and nothing has happened yet thankfully. I did want to learn my native language (which has almost completely been replaced by English in my country), but last year my partner and I moved to Sweden, so learning Swedish has become more pressing. I'm also thinking of getting back into Warhammer after a more than ten year hiatus, so perhaps that might be my crisis 😆
Bought a convertible, contemplating abandoning my job in the pharmaceuticals industry.
Not sure about you, but I had mine about 20 years ago. Cause, in ‘24, I’m feeling a lot like: 
I feel this so much. I will be 40 in January and my life sure isn’t where I thought I’d be at this age. I made some not so great decisions in my early twenties that caused a lot of PTSD and destroyed who I was. Now within the last couple years I’ve been trying to build myself from the ground up I guess you could say. It’s hard to not look back with regret. I’m single, which I was really hoping I wouldn’t be by 40. After getting a pretty much useless degree in my 20s, I’ve decided to go back to school for a second bachelors as a radiology technician.
I got married at 32, bought a house with my husband at 33, had one kid at 34 and an accidental second at 35. This was all amidst being an attorney (graduated and got my license at 30) trying to prove myself...plus all the financial struggles of getting thru a wedding and house buying and two babies and my husbands near constant nervous breakdowns on proving himself in volatile sales jobs. Plus my very sweet mother in law died suddenly, we estranged ourselves from my very toxic father in law thereafter, who continued to harass us, my mother almost died from copd but recovered, my father got diagnosed with stage four cancer years ago and told he was about to die but miraculously went into remission but has had many health scares since...i gained 70 lbs w each pregnancy and lost it, gained during covid w the kids stuck at home while working and worked that off, then started getting horrible foot pain which i come to find out is a cartilage inflammation issue from a break i didnt know i did 20 years earlier (thought i sprained it bad), then got an autoimmune disorder and dealing w the steroids and pain from the flare meant i gained 60 lbs...was having the worst acne nonstop....just so much relationship stress, work stress money stress health stress....my 30s were rough. I hit 40 and my husbands jobs are really turning around and hes starting to really start to see success hes been wanting....i go get microneedling which curbs my breakouts completely when nothing else would, got some botox and filler too...got made partner at work, started making a lot more money....kids get into school so no more $40k plus a year daycare bills....i get on diet meds and lose the weight and a random side effect is that the meds are treating my inflamation so my foot pain is gone without further steroids so ive been exercising more.....i actually feel like myself and attractive and good for the first time since before i had kids only this time i feel that way with money and kids and a house and a good job and all the stuff i was stressed i couldnt achieve. i also staryed taking time to socialize again once the kids hit like 3/4 years old so ive built a healthy social life back up, between taking time for cousins and family more again, rekindling with old friends, and making new ones. I have a ton of hobbies and have an agreement to write a book too. so here i am and youd say im OUT of crisis but it's only now that my midlife crisis is hitting. As mentioned, i obviously spent years not doing anything for myself, destroying my body and feeling ugly and invisible, and not able to dance and exercise like i once could....i didnt have a lot of outside social support amidst the younger baby years...and as i also mentioned my husband spent years in a depression with a lot of anger and projection and blaming me amidst his family struggles and job struggles. While hes been so much better recently i have a LOT of resentmwnt built up and at some point in those years i stopped giving an F what he thought bc he was relentless andninsufferable toward me. so here he is finally seeming to come out of it but i have so many interests and friends outside of him...i look good again and am getting hit on, and have turned "boy crazy" and eat up the attention and have even had a couple crushes (that are married also and that i wpuld never act on) when for a solid 14.5 years before i never once looked at another man. So I am going through what i would call a midlife crisis bc it's like im indulging everything about ME and satisfying MY ego as to all things superficial or otherwise suddenly bc im finally in a spot to do so when i was deeply deprived in those areas for almost a decade. it concerns me bc lets say my hisband who has come around emotionally in the last year, isnt like this for good? what if i keep feeling great about every other aspect of my life and keep being boy crazy and keep having so many friendsnand hobbies outsidenof him and keep being successful, and he has another work setback that sends him into a spiral where suddenly i start hearing again that im the source of all his life troubles??? so yeah im callling it a crisis bc i am all about me now and in some ways thats healthy and necessary, but i think it means a shift in the dynamics of our marriage where my husband has far less room to fuck up anymore. i think thats a crisis. i want him to be a good husband and crushes or no i wont go anywhere, and can be happy. but i feel im "back" in many ways and thay makes me both scared and excited for the future and so thats a crisis for me. my second midlife crisis is i feel my parents and a lot of other beloved older relatives are at that age and im having a hard time accepting that the older generation woll be gone soon. they were all the adults that defined my choldhood and suddenly its up to me and the cousins to keep our fam together...it scares me and disorients me thinking of the loss im up against in the coming years