What was/is your life like at 25?

[FennCara]

Mine is not what I expected.

I'm expecting my third child. I'm facing a messy divorce. I have no career, but have a degree. My parents aren't in great health.

I have lovely friends, a nice place to live. I'm definitely lucky in that sense.

But this isn't how i saw it.

[wonderingagain]

I was starting my degree. I worked after school and got a mortgage. At 25 I moved in with DP. Spent lots of money on booze and fags and lived a bohemian student life for a few years.

But I do wish I had had children much younger, about your age. I am old now and have very little energy for anything. I will be old when I have grandchildren and have missed any chance of a good career because of the bad timing and extended youth.

I believe that everyone reaches a time that's best for them, a time when you are surrounded by good things and when everything feels right. Your time might come a bit later. Mine came when DCs were young.

[Offred]

I had no expectations. I was struggling out of an abusive relationship trying to care for four children under 5 including newborn twins.

When trying to plan your life you have to be prepared for changes which are both within and beyond your control.

It is normal to be stressed and sad by a messy divorce, perhaps you need to stop placing unreasonable expectations on yourself?

[alwaysworriedtoo]

I was newly married a virginal bride! very old fashioned, straight from the family home to our new house!
Sounds like you have done so much and yet are still young enough to do loads more.

[exexpat]

I don't think many people's lives work out exactly as they expected.

At 25, I'd been married two years (not at all what I would have expected if you'd asked me five years earlier - no plans to marry ever), no kids, working full time. At 35, I had two children, still married, working part time. Now I'm 45, I've been widowed nearly 7 years, bringing up two children on my own, and I'm a full-time student. Definitely not the life-plan I had worked out for myself, but I'm doing OK.

It sounds like life is hard for you at the moment, but in five years's time you will probably be in a very different place.

[Coffee1Sugar]

I'm 25! I have a post grad degree and work full time, I have a wonderful dp and a gorgeous nearly 3year old dd, in December we bought our first home. I'm very very lucky in lots of ways, I just wish I had a better social life. I don't know anyone my age with a young child.

[Doshusallie]

I got married at 25. Was working full time, no kids, renting a gorgeous little cottage, very good social life. Am much happier and more settled since I have had my children though.

[Whatalotofpiffle]

I was entering into a civil partnership which would end messily then would meet my wonderful Fiance and father of my dd :)

[TwllBach]

I'm 25 too and my life is also not what I had planned/hoped for, although its not a bad life.

I wanted to be married and a mother by now and would be if I hadn't wasted six years with exDP but I'm neither. I have had two mcs though, which is also something I didn't expect.

I have found the career I love, though, which I think in this day and age is a very lucky thing. I'm hoping that one day soon I can secure a permanent position in it.

[Portofino]

Hmmm. 25 I just got divorced. I was living in a hippy type flat with my cousin. I had a job but not a career. It pretty much all happened AFTER that. 20 years on (eek) I am living just outside Brussels with dh and totally bilingual dd.

[MexicanHouseThief]

I was in the tail end of a moribund relationship, living in a shitty rented flat, doing a shit job, in debt, putting on weight, totally miserable and with no idea of who I really was or indeed how profoundly depressed I was.

It makes me shiver to look back on it, tbh.

Now I am 37, very happily married, two kids, not depressed anymore, full of ambition and hope for the future :)

[VelvetSpoon]

I had just bought my first house, had a v well paid job in the City, and was out 4/5 nights a week.

The flip side of that was that I had just lost my dad, my mum died when I was 21 and as an only child that was my fanily gone. And I'd just discovered I was pregnant by someone I wasn't even in a relationship with. I was for the most part desperately sad and painfully lonely.

None of it was as I expected. Losing my paremts (who were my closest friends) as young as I did had a very profound effect on me which I'm still feeling now.

[mamageekchic]

I'm 26, last year I was living in the same rented house as I am now, with DP of 8yrs (9now) and our 1yo DD (just turned 2). I had a degree and had been working in the same demanding, stressfull fulltime job for 4yrs (still there). Feeling as if everyone around me is buying houses except me.

[TheCatIsUpTheDuff]

I had just quit my enjoyable but no prospects job and moved to a big city to do a postgrad course. Lived with friends and a fierce cat, had no money, and soon got into a relationship with a prize arseweasel. Not what I'd planned, but it was good at the time, except the boyfriend.

[Skinnywhippet]

I live in a county 200 miles away from where I grew up. I went to arguably the best university in the uk and highly ranked in the world......even though I didn't think that would happen when I was 18. I married an older man....totally knew that would always happen! I do a job that up until I started doing it I was very snobby about and thought it wasn't good enough for me....how wrong, I absolutely love it! So, some things were unexpected and others I always hoped would happen. Up till now life has been fairly straightforward BUT have no idea what I want to happen in the NEXT 25 or even 5 years! Worry about the future and if you are unhappy then how you can change it!

[Skinnywhippet]

Ps. If it helps, I suffered from a weird eating disorder to do with nerves whilst at school, was very stressed and probably depresses whilst an undergrad, but not am really happy and settled. Life can and does change.

[NotMostPeople]

I had a very successful career, was living with my new man in a flat that I'd bought while he rented his out. Two big incomes all very happy.

Married and then divorced him.
No career now, three dc's with dH (No2).

[Skinnywhippet]

Edit: now I am really happy and settled.

[thegreylady]

At 25 [in 1969] I was a teacher, divorced from my childhood sweetheart and already engaged to dh2.During that year I married him,became pregnant with ds and moved far far away to a very foreign country. I sometimes look back and look at photos from that time and think,"Who was she-that girl in the pictures?"

[Skinnywhippet]

What is your degree in? Can your parents help with childcare? What sort of job would you like long term.

[KenDoddsDadsDog]

I had a good job but was shit with money . Had mistakenly ditched an amazing boyfriend for a fucker who proceeded to give me the worst year of my life. Thank god I'm not 25! By 26 it was much better.

[FennCara]

This is very interesting, gives me massive hope for my thirties! Twenties have been grim but I have my DC to show for it.

Feel like I have lived twenty years in the last five and I'm exhausted.

[FennCara]

Degree in linguistics. I'd like to teach... I think. Or SLT.

[Badvoc]

I was out of work due to ill health.
Engaged to now dh.
Loving at home and hating it.
But at 26 I got a pt job, married dh and moved into our first home.
What a difference 6 months can make! :)

[DerbyNottsLeicsNightNanny]

At 25yrs & 10months I moved to Spain for 10 months - which was probably the best time of my life so far (apart from having my ds). The few months prior to that had been very shitty - getting messed around by on/off commitment phobe older messed up boyfriend - which is why I moved to Spain.

I'm now 34 & married to the commitment phobe older messed up boyfriend & we have ds (3) and dc2 due in September!

[RussiansOnTheSpree]

I was single, had just bought my first property (a flat), just obtained my professional qualification, was powering on in my career - leaving the clubbing years and entering the promotion years. It was a great time. I miss it.