Millennial midlife disappointments and expectations around career, housing and children

[Merrymakersq]

https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/40-broke-millennial-dream-lie-4708767?srsltid=AU7gw4VxyVDpV_RZbU9UbG6ZL-1RWiudVPHdQrk07cUwxmUODIfUmqcw

following on from this article where Marissa bate admits life is a bit disappointing as she thought she’d be like Lena Dunham and be hosting women’s hour. I think millennials may be particularly in for a rude awakening as they were sold big dreams as part of the self esteem movement of the nineties. A lot of women were also under the impression you could put off having kids and then found out that wasn’t necessarily the case. Watching father of the bride where Steve Martin has a boomer midlife crisis where he sells his house and dyed his hair. A lot of millennials don’t even have a house to sell! Steve Martin was living the dream. So looking for your stories for a project on exactly this. The rude millennial awakening- from both men and women, particularly interested if you entered a career and put off having kids and found neither the career or the kids happened. What was your millennial midlife rude awakening moment?? The biggest shock, the biggest let down, the biggest disappointment?

What are your opinions OP?

Broke

Everything is fucking expensive

I will likely never own (not bothered about this one, having grown up on an estate anyway)

Can't afford the clothes, make up, hair, beauty treatments that I am supposed to be able to afford

Under pressure to look good and there are younger and younger women popping up

Need a mummy make over and new skin but can't afford it 😩

Husbandless (not arsed one bit but would at least like a Carrie Bradshaw style dating life!), my joining Hinge has been a disaster and I keep getting asked for one night stands

One child - happy but wish I'd been brave and used a sperm donor so I could've had two, but one and done and okay with it

Need to buy 3 months worth of food to stock up with but it's not happening right now 😩

Don’t really agree tbh - yes very hard to have bought a house - and I’m a bit trapped in my 2 bed flat with 2 kids and seriously running out of space - but we can’t afford a bigger place right now so I e make do

mortgage is crazy expensive / everything is

fell into a totally different career path than planned and I’m happy there

but I have zero regrets waiting to have my kids until we were older (late thirties and late 40s for him)

as we travelled the world and had a care free life for many years

I watched father of the bride recently and they were boring old farts tbh - not sure I’d call it living the dream life 😂😂 maybe if you mostly value family and a house as your life goals and that’s what you would be content with - sounds boring to me though

Leaving aside housing, are these experiences specific to millennials? I think all women since second wave feminism have struggled with the notion of "having at all" and most have had to make sacrifices in one way or another. If anything, these things have got easier for (some) women over the last decade or so- WFH, share parental leave and increased help with childcare costs. NB easier does not mean easy.

I don’t remember anyone promising me anything?! Do people really life their lives based on a promise made by someone older? Who are all these older people making these promises? It all sounds a bit odd to me!

I can’t say any of the things you’ve written resonate with me. I had children later because I wanted to, not because someone told me to. If I had the choice of having no children or having to have them in my 20s, I would have picked no children. I also don’t see this vision you’ve described as relevant to my friend’s lives either. I’m not saying that some people feel like this, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a millennial thing. I’m sure people felt like this in other decades!