Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

Do you think 2000 was a long time ago?

58 replies

MO6 · 09/09/2025 23:49

If I was to think back to 2020 (so 5 years ago), I could mentally comprehend that 5 years had passed. This is as I can think (from a British perspective) of Covid; then the 2020 US election; then Prince Philip’s death; then the Oprah interview with Harry and Meghan; then the Boris Johnson resignation; then the Platinum Jubilee; then the Queen’s death/Liz Truss resignation; then King Charles’ coronation; then the 7th October attack against Israel; then the 2024 UK election; then the 2024 US election; and now 2025 as all one continuum of events. Yes, typing out all of these major events may make it seem like there were so many, but it honestly feels all so connected like they are one after the other and so makes the five years feel shorter.

I am young, though, so five years for me is a lot.

But, if as someone who is older, you were to explain how you feel when you think of the past and how time has passed to get to the present, how would you explain it? By this I mean, people often jokingly say that “time has flown by”, but how true is this?

For instance, think of the year 2000. Would you honestly think that the year 2000, to you, felt like “yesterday”, meaning you actually believe it was so short a time ago. Or, would you recognise that 25 years is a long time and would feel like 2000 was a long time ago, but by using the continuum of events I described above be able to sort of link all of these major events in the world (and in your personal life together), to make it feel like they all happened one after another and 2025 has suddenly crept up on you rather than having taken ages to come about?

OP posts:
Enko · 09/09/2025 23:53

It feels like 25 years ago. Not ages away not a short time. I have a dd born in 2000. So i think that makes me very aware of the time passed too.

AnneLovesGilbert · 09/09/2025 23:54

2000 feels like ages ago. I was still at school, it was before 9/11. Like another world actually.

DappledThings · 09/09/2025 23:58

If someone says "10 years ago" I still first think they mean in the 90s.

IdBeLionIfISaid · 09/09/2025 23:59

I was 13 in 2000 and I've now been married for 15 years and have 2 children so it does feel a lifetime ago2/ because it was!!

whitewineandsun · 10/09/2025 00:00

It was ages ago. 9/11 hadn't even happened yet. A completely different world in that Trump hadn't decided he wanted the ego boost of a political win, and I hadn't much idea about pandemics. My grandparents were all still alive, and my parents weren't sick.

I call it the beforetimes, and I'd give years off my life to go back.

trainedopossum · 10/09/2025 00:03

DappledThings · 09/09/2025 23:58

If someone says "10 years ago" I still first think they mean in the 90s.

This.
I think as you get older time seems to speed up so 10 or 20 years ago just doesn’t feel that long ago in the context of the whole time you’ve been alive and the stages of life you’ve passed through.
I’m not sure I’ve explained that brilliantly well but maybe it’ll make sense to someone.

mrsfollowill · 10/09/2025 00:03

I remember NYE 1999 very well- we were all scared into thinking planes would fall from the sky and traffic lights would fail. I'm in my mid 50's now .We went to a brilliant party that night got utterly hammered and the next day the world carried on. I went to bed that night/morning expecting Armageddon.
I have a friend who lives in the 1990's was a great time for us and we chat about old times a lot. One thing I will say the older you get the faster time goes- i didn't believe my mum when she told me this- she is no longer with us and I'm very conscious these days at how fast time goes by.

PestoHoliday · 10/09/2025 00:07

1990 was around 10 years ago. My adult children were born in the early 2000s but that's still 5 years ago.

March 2020 lasted for about 4 years.

Also, I am not old. And yet seem to be over 50, which is a clerical error on the part of the universe.

ninjahamster · 10/09/2025 00:08

I had two children and had two more in the next couple of years. They are all in their twenties now so it seems a fair while ago in many ways.

Rollercoaster1920 · 10/09/2025 00:08

When I think about 2000 I think:
Lets all wake up in the year 2000

Shortly after partying like it's 1999.

Shivaughn · 10/09/2025 00:20

No I find it weird that people who were 45 in the year 2000 are now 70 :/

JellyBeanSpring25 · 10/09/2025 00:24

PestoHoliday · 10/09/2025 00:07

1990 was around 10 years ago. My adult children were born in the early 2000s but that's still 5 years ago.

March 2020 lasted for about 4 years.

Also, I am not old. And yet seem to be over 50, which is a clerical error on the part of the universe.

I’m with you @PestoHoliday. 80s was quite recent and 70s just a little while ago! We were still black & white in the 60s though 🤣

blondebombsite13 · 10/09/2025 00:24

DappledThings · 09/09/2025 23:58

If someone says "10 years ago" I still first think they mean in the 90s.

Same.

I am mid 40s.

25 years ago I was I my heyday at uni.

if you said to me “is 25 years a long time ago?” Yes. Definitely

If you said “was 2000 a long time ago?” No, 2000 is recent.

I find it hard to compute 2000 being 25 years ago.

So in a way, yes, I’d say those 25 years have flown by.

I probably wasn’t as politically aware as you are. So my timeline would be something like:

2000, leave school, go to college, go to uni, get a job. 2008 banking crisis, lose my job, get another job. 2009 get engaged, 2010 split up, meet DH. 2012 marry DH, start having kids. 2020 covid. 2025, now.

it really does seem like the blink of an eye even though so much has changed.

2010 DH and I rented a beautiful old house by the coast. I had a Blackberry (phone), we had a cat, I had a very old, cheap car. We watched dvds and then, eventually moved to streaming (Netflix). There was no WhatsApp and I used to email my friends and family. I was much thinner. We had no kids. We worked and we relaxed in spare time but still thought we were busy.

sometimes I think of those days and it seems a lifetime ago. It’s hazy and I find it hard to imagine myself there.

Yet at the same time, if asked if 2010 was a long time ago….. I’d say no.

gottakeeponmoving · 10/09/2025 00:31

I'm old. 2000 is a lifetime ago for me. My youngest hadn't been conceived yet - I was the mum of 2 lovely little DC's, loving life with my DH. My lovely Mum and Dad were alive, well and working. Fast forward to 2025 and they are gone, DC3 is now an adult and due to life changing complications for me after her birth my life has changed beyond recognition.

Thank you for posting. Remembering New Years Eve 2000 makes me smile and takes me back to a time of contentment and feeling warm and happy. Everyone had parties and fireworks like no one had ever never seen - before or after. As midnight struck, I can still see my ever so slightly tipsy Mum and Dad 😙on the way back from the pub linking arms, walking past me, DH and the kids as we stood in our front garden watching the fireworks and waving back.

Thank you.

SprayWhiteDung · 10/09/2025 00:48

I still find it inconceivable to think that the time between the outbreak of WW2 and my birth was a decade less than the time between my birth and now.

Then again, if ever I think of or refer to 'the twenties', my mind will automatically go to the Roaring 20s. If I heard of somebody who had been born in the 20s, I'd assume they'd almost certainly be gone now or otherwise very, very old indeed... whereas a baby who was delivered yesterday was actually born in the 20s!

greengagesummers · 10/09/2025 00:48

I’m kind of mentally stuck around 2010-2015. 2000 is a while ago, but not that long ago! I think sometime around 2015 we must have slipped into some weird alternative timeline. It’s the last date I think that really felt “normal” and sane, like the world used to be.

Oh to go back to the days before Trump, Brexit, Putin, Covid, and all the increasing madness since then!

Original poster
MO6 · 10/09/2025 00:55

So, when those users on this thread say that they feel 2000 is a long time ago, does that mean you regard Princess Diana as being a figure of a “different age” and regard her death as being a very long time ago? Does The Queen Mother feel long gone too?

OP posts:
PinkArt · 10/09/2025 00:55

Shivaughn · 10/09/2025 00:20

No I find it weird that people who were 45 in the year 2000 are now 70 :/

Well this is just rude 😂 We've established that 2000 was very recent and as a 45 year old I'm not ok with being 70 in the blink of an eye!

whitewineandsun · 10/09/2025 00:57

MO6 · 10/09/2025 00:55

So, when those users on this thread say that they feel 2000 is a long time ago, does that mean you regard Princess Diana as being a figure of a “different age” and regard her death as being a very long time ago? Does The Queen Mother feel long gone too?

Yes. For me, it really was a long time ago.

SimoneHere · 10/09/2025 01:07

greengagesummers · 10/09/2025 00:48

I’m kind of mentally stuck around 2010-2015. 2000 is a while ago, but not that long ago! I think sometime around 2015 we must have slipped into some weird alternative timeline. It’s the last date I think that really felt “normal” and sane, like the world used to be.

Oh to go back to the days before Trump, Brexit, Putin, Covid, and all the increasing madness since then!

Edited

sometime around 2015 we must have slipped into some weird alternative timeline

Yes! Not helped by 2016 being the year the celebrities died.

researchers3 · 10/09/2025 01:13

PestoHoliday · 10/09/2025 00:07

1990 was around 10 years ago. My adult children were born in the early 2000s but that's still 5 years ago.

March 2020 lasted for about 4 years.

Also, I am not old. And yet seem to be over 50, which is a clerical error on the part of the universe.

Totally relate to this!

WearyAuldWumman · 10/09/2025 01:28

It doesn't seem that long to me, but I'm 65. Time does seem to speed up as you get older.

MaryMungoMidgley · 10/09/2025 01:34

It seems like eons, but also barely the blink of an eye ago!👁

ILoveWhales · 10/09/2025 01:39

MO6 · 10/09/2025 00:55

So, when those users on this thread say that they feel 2000 is a long time ago, does that mean you regard Princess Diana as being a figure of a “different age” and regard her death as being a very long time ago? Does The Queen Mother feel long gone too?

All you need to know is that it's coming for you too. You can marvel at the old people all you like, but you ll get there one day.

Ponderingwindow · 10/09/2025 02:01

I have a teenager, but if you ask me the date 10 years ago, my mind first goes to 1990.

My husband says we are currently in 2005 all the time by mistake.

since my country elected
trump to his first term, I have felt like I have been in some sort of time bubble where time moves both incredibly slowly and incredibly fast and possibly skips around. I know this is not the case, but it still feels off.