Did anyone else become an adult late in the game?

This makes me hopeful as a late bloomer.

I feel that I have finally become an adult very recently, in my mid 40's. I haven't achieved ANY of the normal milestones.

I had a traumatic childhood. I believed that if I worked hard at school, I could have a better future. So I worked hard. I aced my GCSEs, but sadly got kicked out of home before I could finish my A-levels. I spent a few years going off the rails and then found a way back to education and eventually a degree and a professional job. I believed that this was my ticket to adulthood, and I wanted it all. I wanted my own home/a mortgage, a good financially secure husband, children, professional success.

I worked hard. I experienced persistent and relentless bullying at work and abusive romantic relationships. I used alcohol to cope. I became a victim of stranger rape. I eventually had a complete breakdown and lost everything....except my closest friends.

I went through 7 years of hell. I'm coming out of it now. I have had a lot of therapy and mh support.

I feel so much better. I feel completely free. I no longer have any desire to reach socially accepted milestones. I just want to find a little piece of happiness or beauty in the every day. I want to earn enough money to pay my bills, but I no longer have any desire to be promoted, earn more, get validation from work or my job title. I believe that the most important thing is my friends and relationships (platonic), support systems, communities, and being able to express myself creatively.

I feel like the luckiest person in the world because my breakdown was so bad, I lost my home, but I was allocated a council flat. It is a bit dodgy here , but I have a permanent home and some great neighbours.

I work. Poorly paid but very important for my community. Thanks to the therapy I received after my breakdown, I have learned to accept all of my emotions, as painful as some of them are.

My life is very far from perfect, I know every day that I still have so much to learn, I don't have the husband, career, house or children, that I always wanted. But I finally feel like a grown up! And for me it was coming to the acceptance of what I don't have and won't have that led to me finally becoming ' grown up'

Got together with DH at 38
Bought our house at 39
Had DS at 39
Married at 40
Started degree at 41
Had DD at 42
Qualified and changed career at 45

I'm 41. I still live with my mum and with my son in a 2 up 2 down council property. I've got no savings, no investments and I work as a housekeeper cleaning shitty Hotel rooms. I will never be able to afford to own my own property and will likely die in the house I was brought up in from the age of 2. I hope you feel better after reading my post 😂

'bouncing around country to country' is adulting. The things you've seen and experienced count for so much. Adulting isn't just about what jobs you've had or earned.

Question to all those who went to uni and qualified in their 30s and 40s, and now are in professional jobs. How were you perceived by interviewers. Presumably you were applying for the same jobs as newly qualified 22 year olds.

I became a dad for first time at 54. And started my own business a few years later. Know its different for guys. But 40 is nothing these days

Don't worry about what other ppl think, no ones perfect. As long as your happy then uts fine. All these ppl who project there houses etc aren't all happy. There are a lot of ppl unhappy. Don't worry. Do you

Lots of life left.........

I was in poverty, lone parent with children 7 years ago. Relatively ok now I'm creeping up on my late 50s.

Draw on your experience and set your sights on what you want, nothing is wasted and (whilst noone can guarantee success) life is a journey not a destination (Oh Lord did I really type that!!!)

Take the public sector . Will look good on paper if you want to rent or buy . Look on it as the way to fund your other interests . Unless you are in a certain sector , it shouldn't be all consuming or demanding and you can leave it behind you when you clock off.

Exactly. Not everyone judges people by the same standards. Personally, I have zero interest in what people do for a living or how much money they have. It doesn’t interest or impress me. I’m far more impressed by someone who can read Russian or play the violin. Most jobs are boring, and many of them are utterly futile. Unless you’re in the SAS, or professor of poetry at Oxford, or a five star Michelin chef, I’d rather not hear about it. I’m more interested in people’s hobbies than their job. And I’m infinitely more interested in their favourite books, favourite music, favourite paintings, etc.

That may be about to change. Virtually every magazine and newspaper seems to include an article on how we’re going to halt or reverse the ageing process. Billions are now being invested in this research. I’ve even heard one expert say that by the 2030s there will be 70-somethings who look like they’re in their early 30s. So much money is now going into this research, and so much hype and noise is beginning to build, that it’s hard to believe nothing will come of it.

I echo what @TrappedDaisy has said. How dare your mum speak to you like this? No wonder you're feeling so rubbish and if there's a pattern of this going back decades then no wonder you feel less than "successful" and are going mad about it. Success isn't defined by material success - it is defined by if you're happy enough, healthy enough, and have the wisdom to follow your own heart - be that marketing or working in a supermarket if you so wish, retraining in something completely wild and off the beaten track. I may be poor and not have a pension and live in a rented flat, but at least my time and mind and creativity is more my own than all my friends who followed the money and the regular "dream". I like to live on a shoestring to an extent and believe this is as much as an achievement vs those who have a bigger income - in fact it is much harder to live on less in some ways, so you are doing better in some terms! And no doubt very resourceful with it.

Yes, this. I rent, don't have children, and I work freelance to pay bills. Still an adult.

No wonder you felt depressed. I've family members like that too, and it's very demoralising and draining. If you want to work in Marketing, go for it! It's you who's going to doing the job, not your Mum. Some relatives like to keep treating us like little kids, and telling us how to run our lives. Maybe step back from telling her as much

Because to be able to save up for the mortgage i'd need in this area, i would have to stop competing and sell all my horses, stop track days, sell the fun cars and just have my daily car (you dont want to know my monthly outgoing on all that...)

I'd rather have the horses than a house.

I’ve lived my whole life with a 25-year time lag
I felt just about ready to take GCSE’s at age 40 (I added one then)
Felt I was ready for children and finally competent - at age 60 🤣…

You have a public sector job offer - that ticks off the career and pension boxes in one fell swoop. So why are you still chasing something else - the hotel management course (why?! Terrible sector if you want 'adult stability').

Perhaps you don't actually WANT those things, you just think you OUGHT to have them. You could embrace your free living, all over the place self if you wanted, it's your life.

I don't own my own home, no children (by choice) no investments other than a workplace pension (crap) Not married, but i do have an amazing DP and a good well paid career.

I also have 3 horses and we have a garage full of cars - none of which i'll ever give up to become "an adult" 😂

No...we all became adults at 18, the issue is how you personally view what an adult is supposed to be like.
You don't need to follow the herd ...just adapt a mature attitude and personality.

Yes. Name changed for this one. When I turned 35 I was living in a crappy rented flat and going out 5-6 nights a week, drinking a lot, dabbling in drugs at the weekend. My husband and I had an open marriage. We did however have good and highly paid jobs. But almost everyone we knew from university was at a completely different life stage.

Both of us lost a parent a few months later (for different reasons, but four weeks apart and both very sudden) and this led to a complete reassessment. We stopped seeing other people, I stopped smoking and drinking, we bought a house just after I was 36 and had our first child a month after that. We had another one a couple of years later.

(In fact, adulthood might have been short lived. Typing this in bed as my kids play computer games downstairs. My husband is off playing poker with some friends for the weekend. I have a hangover after having some girlfriends round last night. We do have a nice house, though, and kids are happy and settled.)