OK, I’m lying, a month and one day. A year ago I had promised myself that by the time I turned thirty I would DONE. Done with weight issues, done with anxiety and depression, done with my childish crushes on celebrities, done writing erotica, done being…a vacuous girl in her twenties.
Didn’t really take. I still have all those things, although I’m in therapy and on medication for the body issues and anxiety and I think the depression is lifting. As a present to myself on turning 30 I’m going to go to a photographer and have some pictures taken of me for my husband. I know that sounds really conceited and self centered, but I’m hoping that a good photographer will be able to make me look red hot sexy for my man who’s always there for me
Anyway, it may just be me, but I flipped when I turned 25. It seemed that it was like a “quarter life crisis”. I’d passed the big milestones of 18, and 21, I’d graduated college, gotten married, all that, and now I was AN ADULT. I really don’t want that to hit me ten fold when I turn the big 3-0 in September.
So what were your experiences, good AND BAD on turning thirty? Just so I can be ready for it.
Thirty didn’t hurt for me. Today I turned 53. Fifty three didn’t hurt either. Individual experiences between 30 and 53 were quite painful. They had little to do with how old I was. Your birthdays are like quick paint marks on an interstate bridge walls. Tomorrow it won’t mean a thing. (A slight exception: a bar will generally give you a free drink on your birthday.) On the “ten” years, somebody will make some stupid remark about being “over the hill.” What hill? I didn’t see a hill! We don’t need no stinking hill!
Didn’t hurt me. Neither did 40. 25 however, was painful. At 25 I was working at a minimum wage job with 1/3 of my life over and nothing to show for it. Now I’m successful and happy and age doesn’t really matter.
No, turning 30 was fine. Better than most birthdays, actually, because I got a big party thrown for me. And heck, I was still in grad school at the time. Then again, I’ve never been one to attach special significance to specific ages. Because of the laws, of course, 16, 18, and 21 had significance, but after that, it’s just another year. I don’t feel too different now (I’m almost 34) from the way I did, say, 5 years ago.
Sorry I couldn’t come up with any bad experiences I could tell you about. Those all came 3-4 years later.
Wow, am I going to be the first one to say turning 30 sucked?
I cried on my thirtieth birthday. My BF had made plans - we were going to go out to dinner and then hang at our favorite bar for the evening. I went over to his house, he gave me a beer. I drank it - and then I realized I was thirty. I was crying, and decided to go home and go to bed early. I was fine the next day, but it hit me hard.
I hit 39 today and that number, as well as all the others have been meaningless. I have a friend who nearly lost it when she hit 35. She’ll be 40 in January and I’m sure she’ll freak out. Mrs. Blue Sky will be 40 in February and has promised to not go mental.
I turned 30 last may. Fuck yes it hurt. I still can’t beleive it, I think i’m still in shock about the whole thing. I mean Christ, i’m supposed to be an adult by now and I cant even keep my checkbook balanced.
I reckon it’s never a good idea to promise yourself loads of stuff but a specific date. Sometimes the stuff is just too hard to get done by a specific point. And I tell you, as someone who just rediscovered silly celeb crushes at the age of 27, I am enjoying an adult revisiting of teenage fun stuff, and I’m not planning on giving up that sort of thing just to prove my age. I have much more in my character to be proof of my experience, and I have wrinkles and shit to prove my ageing.
But, though - sexy pictures for the husband, Now, that’s a good plan. And major big-ups for doing things to help the depression and anxiety go away.
You’re planning on living to one hundred I assume. Maybe that’s the problem; the perception of time in reference to your accomplishments. Having to have a certain thing accomplished by a certain age will make you much older than any smart-ass birthday card.
You’re born ---- bla, bla, bla ------- you die.
Make the best of the bla, bla, bla.
Happy birthday by the way - you OLD FART!!! Bahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
30 wasn’t a problem. Of course, I didn’t get sober for another year after that. 40 sucked. I was pissed about 40 for several years. I’ve got a couple of years before I need to worry about how I’ll react to 50.
It’s a number. That it happens to end in a 0 doesn’t make it more important than any other birthday unless you decide to make it more important. It is a random confluence of the length of Earth’s orbital cycle and the base 10 number system. It doesn’t change anything about you except what you decide it will.
