Ways life didn’t pan out how you expected as a child

[Sarahandduck18]

As a child I assumed I’d get married, change my name, have 3dcs live in and own a semi or detached house with a garage garden and a bedroom for every child. I assumed my dcs would go to good state or private schools and I’d never be out of employment. I assumed I’d we’d have a foreign holiday every year and a decent sized not old banger of a car. I assumed I’d always be healthy and a healthy bmi. I assumed I’d have a career and would progress up and be in the higher tax band type level of responsibility by middle age.

I didn’t think any of these things were too ‘out there’ or ambitious.

But when I look at my life it is very different!

Some things I wouldn’t want anymore (marriage/name change) but some I feel I’ve failed my dcs (holidays/house)

I suppose it’s a generational thing.

My parents of course blame it all on us having smartphones!

Are other women’s lives what their child’s eye saw?

I think it helps I was really poor growing up and had really low life expectations.

I was planning on being a vet and driving round Yorkshire in an old Landrover. Big country house, 4 dc.

I am not a vet. I drive round Yorkshire in a Ford Ranger. Small house, 2 dc.

I thought I'd be living in London in a glamorous central flat and commuting every day in lovely clothes, with a handsome and rich husband. Didn't really see children involved.

Thing is I did move to London and lived in a flat and commuted. Clearly it was not he central London flat I envisaged as I'm not a squillionare. And my work clothes are mostly from Sainsburys or Next. It wasn't as glamorous as I thought to be honest.

Now still commute but from a long way out and I enjoy being in London on the days I'm working but I was standing on the tube platform the other day and oddly thinking that really I'd got what i thought I'd wanted but it wasn't very good really! I really want to live in the country with a lot of dogs and cats and write books now.

I expected to go to boarding school a la Mallory towers. Never happened. I ate fruit cake once, though.

I was told every day that I was hideous/stupid and not worthy of love.

I’m now 34 with three kids, an incredible husband and my own (council) house. I should be a home owner before I’m 40 and I live life in a sort of blissful haze, when I’m not dealing with PTSD and bipolar. Which are unfortunate consequences of such a childhood

I wanted to be a biology teacher. Assumed I would meet DW at university, and have unspecified children at a young age. And live hundred(s) of miles from parents, in some non specific large town.

Am an accountant, met DW at 30, have 1 DC, and live in same town as parents.

So, kind of there or there abouts. I didn't put enough effort into my ambitions..

keep telling DC they are going to do medicine

I assumed I'd have a big wedding and get lots of wedding presents off the k8bd my parents did- posh cutlery for special occasions, posh crockery, serving dishes rec. I assumed I'd need all these things for dinner parties with our also- married couple friends, of whom we'd have loads. Turns out i really dont like formal entertaining, am twice divorced and would much rather have on of mu female friends rpund for a natter and a plate of pasta at the kitchen island than faff about cooking for numerous people. Best to know yourself than to put loads of pressure on to live up to your previous expectations.

Don't think I had many expectations so it's easy to feel I did OK! I did want to be a writer though (after being a gymnast) so maybe that's something I can still try for.

@Howtodeal How did things go after the millennium?! I think you write very well btw

The life in the op wasn’t even what I dreamed of it was the fall back of what I’d expected if I failed at having a glamourous, creative life with travel, sports cars, Caribbean and skiiing holidays!

To the op who said about weddding gifts YES! I never did get the naice dinner sets or homewares.

I’d assumed I’d have visited NYC, Australia, Asia, and a few other countries well before now.

I thought I'd be a vet which is my dream job. And I could have been if I'd worked hard enough in school!

{goes back in time and yells at 15 year old self}

I was going to be tall enough to shop in long tall Sally and have a visible collar bone.
Neither happened

My 5 year old self would be bitterly disappointed to know that I never became a Muskerhound

I don't think I was anticipating being married with a child - I remember meeting someone one year when we were on holiday who lived out of a VW campervan doing seasonal work wherever she could get it and pitching up on campsites and that seemed idyllic to teenage me. Mind you, I don't remember ever thinking beyond about 25 (and I seem to have got mentally 'stuck' at the age of 28) so I don't think I had particularly detailed plans...

I was going to marry Shakin Stevens. Failing that I was going to be a vet and have lots of pets.

I achieved neither of my childhood ambitions. I'm a single parent with 1 DD, have my own home and a decent job, no pets!

I wanted to marry Mr Spock and work as a doctor on the Starship Enterprise!
I am now a retired doctor, and still have a crush on Spock fifty years later, but sadly am Earthbound and widowed, albeit with two lovely DDs.

I planned on marrying a Scottish Laird with red hair and a kilt, but sadly lairds are few and far between in central London.

Years later, whilst shopping in a small Scottish town, a lovely chap asked me to help him chose a tie. When he left the shop the assistant, all afflutter, told.me that it had been Himself, the local laird.

I felt as though I'd slipped through a crack in the fabric of time, and inhabited for a few minutes, the life I should have had....

As a child I assumed I would basically be a female version of Richard Feynman.

Once I was in my mid to late teens I realised I hadn’t the discipline for that. I envisioned myself manufacturing drugs for the illegal market to fund my drug habit and doing chaos magic. I romanticised this idea as “exploring the outer edges of human experience”.

Now as an adult I am a boring traditional housewife and mother with neither a career as a scientist or as an international drug baron. And I’m a Christian not a chaos magician.

So yeah lol.

So weird, but I really had no dreams or aspirations. I am disabled, so figured I would live with my parents and die a virgin.

I have been married twice, have a Master’s degree and three children.
I feel like I have lived beyond my dreams.

I'm not an astronaut.

I could only imagine myself as homeless, mentally deranged, destitute, alone. In the same area where I grew up. Dirty & bad health & likely to die before 60. Never married, home-owner or having kids, obviously. No big wedding, no university degree(s), no foreign travel.

The reality is very far from all of those.

I'm still waiting for my jet pack. Tomorrow's World lied to me about so many things.

I thought that once I'd grown up I would have 4 children and as many dogs and cats as I could afford, money would be no object in my lovely big house with really thick carpets...2 children and 2 cats in my small house (but at least it's mine :) ) , money tight, back doing a menial job that I first qualified for 35 years ago...never mind, I'm happy and better off than some people

I think I was duped by the ‘work hard at school and you’ll reap the rewards in later life’ line

Excellent thread OP.

I was to be a brilliant artist. No children. Married to David Cassidy.

Reality: Married to workaholic telecoms exec. Two kids, one of each. Detached house in small village. Just retired from my NHS admin job.

I'd be a highly paid executive working in banking in the city of London, probably living in a flat, with a terribly trendy boyfriend and no children.

Instead I've lived in rural Scotland though now returned to England, I'm on my third marriage, and have a disabled child.

I imagined I'd explore Europe by motor bike, never get married or have children and be a brilliant scientist, doing breakthrough research and smoking lots of weed but still being effortlessly cool and rich.

In reality, I can even ride a bike never mind a motorbike, failed my a levels and am now a chef with a lovely partner and gorgeous dc.

I am far from rich or cool but I am actually pretty happy