To ask what's an adult problem that nobody prepared you for?

[Midge1978]

For me it's keeping the bathroom clean. I don't think I ever saw my mother clean hers but it was always immaculate and rosey smelling. I can't seem to keep on top of the mould monster in mine!

This thread must have been reading my mind. I'm 50 and can tick a lot of the boxes that I I've read. Seriously, being a parent of a young person with mental health issues. How come nobody ever told me? Why the hell are prospective parents not told about headlice? As for money!!! How does a houses get cleaned for 50+ years?

My mood is a quite low and I'm worried a lot of the time. I'm looking after a mentally ill daughter, money is tight and I have been bullied at work. My dad 82 is getting quite ill and if he lives a long time he will need care. He already can't be left alone.

What happens if the boiler breaks? Schools need to teach this stuff. I wonder if I would have chosen a better (ex) husband if I had placed monetary value ahead of 'I fancy him a lot, we have great sex'.

My DS 19 seems OK but is he really? What the hell am I going to wear to work tomorrow ? Is drinking too much wine going to kill me?

Midge thanks for starting this post. Reading the posts has make me feel less alone. Thank you!

Er free health care isn't shit and there is something that can be done for ibs, Google Fodmap diet and maybe count your blessings.

Thankyou Racheyg. Such is life. Its crap though isn't it, everyone has problems in their life and lots think theirs is the worst, to them it is, I used to think my world was crap, and now it is but I look for the good in every day and thank the world I'm here to feel thankful.

That you're never 'finished' cleaning the house.
That falling in love doesn't always mean happily ever after.
The sheer mental load and that there isn't a more grown up grown up to take over, and that it's all down to you.

for icanttakemuchmore and for namechange.

I don't know if this has been said already - haven't read all the way through yet - but mine was an adult woman thing.

The first time my fanny farted I was totally what the actual fuck?! I remember just sort of looking at it in shock. No one had told me that fannies farted. I soon found out that yes they do, this is not even a little bit unusual and all adult women let it be a nice little surprise for their daughters/nieces/whatever.

That said, I'm not purposefully keeping it from my nieces, but I'm not really sure how to bring it up in conversation. "So niece, you know your fanny. Well it can fart."

Knowing how credit works. how bad and good credit affects you when buying a house or car.

Aging parents: incontinence and/or constipation, frailty, loss of confidence, how a urinary tract infection affects cognitive ability, the damage caused by hospital induced delirium etc...

That you need to start saving as soon as possible age definitely by the time you start working...

Pension. See above.

Parenting is relentless... and that you'll be more tired than you'd ever imagined on a day today basis. And not just when they're babies...

That looking after children with additional needs will take more ingenuity than you ever thought you possessed.

That managing anger is mega important.

That adulthood is literally just a seesaw of responsibility and loss swinging up one way or the other again and again until you're beaten.

How hard parenting can be. I was terribly broody for 'babies' but strangely didnt think much beyond that.

What it's like to watch a parent you love get ill and die, and know you have to go through it one more time (unless i die first).

That 'freedom' as an adult isnt really much cop. Yes you can eat what you like, but know you'll feel unhealthy and gain weight. You can spend money on what you want, but all the essential stuff still needs paying. You have to get up and go to work to get money for dull stuff like fixing the boiler, that school admissions cant be talked round etc etc.

That most important decisions are grey rather than black and white, and it's hard to know if you made the best choices.

In hindsight my parents gave me a lovely childhood and protected me from a lot of the crap of how adulthood can be, but it's meant that growing up has sometimes been a shock. Though to be fair, early adulthood was great as it was pretty care free and full of potential. Mid 40s and its not potential, its 'as good as it gets'.

Finding out that your body doesn't twang straight back after having a baby, like women in films. Realising after 6 months, that the saggy mess where my flat tummy used to be, was never going away, whatever weight I was.
Not being able to stay with my DM for the last few hours she was alive, because it wasn't convenient for anyone to have my DCs for the night midweek (I completely appreciate that it wasn't, and I understood their pov, but it just seemed unspeakable, that it simply meant I had to tell her I couldn't stay with her).

So sorry for those of you going through such immensely difficult stuff right now.

Mine feels trivial in comparison, but one thing that makes me feel constantly crap is the fact I was assured throughout my education that if I did well, I would be able to get a great job. I did well academically and did usual student work whilst studying for A-levels and degree, even had a year working abroad in the middle of my degree. Have realised that getting a decent job is far more to do with personality and your face fitting, than it is your qualifications and skill level. Ended up earning £14.5K pa full time working in an office job a trained monkey could do. Basically couldn't afford to go back to work after having children and am now in the trap of being qualified, but not young and fresh out of university and available to work insane hours the length and breadth of the country, and hence am still jobless. It scares the crap out of me that I'm 37 but have no pension. The lie that women can 'have it all' irks me massively.

Also, the sheer amount of work required to keep a house in good condition. It's relentless. And expensive if you're as useless as I am at DIY.

Living with hidden disabilities, disabilities in general I suppose.
Frailty and vulnerability of aging parents.
Teens, worrying about their choices when you have no input into their lives any longer.
Not knowing who you are any more as every ounce of energy is spent looking after or worrying about others.

That at the age of 51, you'd still be grateful for a handout from your parents.

Never realised just how hard things would be... my parents didn't agree with the choices I made in life... they let me
Get on with it ... but I wish they'd sat me down and prepared me for things more. I think this is why I'm so protective of my dd- I don't want her making the same
Mistakes i did.

Parenting revolting teenagers... when I am barely more responsible and mature than they are!

namechange - I cannot begin to imagine how that feels for you, but maybe I can give a tiny bit if comfort, as someone who lost my beloved mother young. Though I thought I would never smile, never mind be happy ever again, I have gone on to do both, to grow up, to marry and have children who have brought me more joy than I could have imagined possible . In one sense, I still miss her 30 years on, but at the same time I am just so grateful to have had that relationship to get me started and I remember her with such love and gratitude. Yes to some extent her loss shaped my life, but it certainly hasn't left me with a lifetime of grief - on the contrary, it has given me a resilience to deal with what life throws up, a model of a loving relationship and an ever-young, beautiful memory, untarnished by age or decline.
I wish you peace xx

That it's almost impossible to have a decent life on one income [unless you are loaded]

The relentless school run!

That time really does go by more quickly as you get older. When I was at uni I remember my mum saying "as you get older the years go by more quickly" and I remember thinking "yeah, right, daft old bat". Turns out she was right and in the blink of an eye I'm in my forties and the years really are going by quickly!

Also, hindsight is a wonderful thing, if I knew what I know now we would have made different choices which would make our old age better and more financially stable than it's likely to be.

Trying to reassure my beloved dd that just cos her dad has bipolar, doesn't mean she will.

I am abdicating my position as an adult. My mum recently told me that as I'm "the sensible one" out of myself and 3 sisters that I will basically get heaped with the responsibility of sorting out her funeral etc when the time comes. No thanks, I've decided to climb trees instead, much more fun!

When I think about adulthood I think the one thing I was unprepared for is the sheer amount of THINKING that goes on in order to organise life - I think that my DH and kids think that things just magically happen, if I died tomorrow they'd all be stuffed!

The daily drudge of cooking meals. Somehow just didn't realise how boring and seemingly pointless to cook day in and day out. Used to live cooking before marriage but it is So tedious now

I've always hated cooking. I'm told I'm quite good at it but I really hate it. I like eating though. There's a thread about cleaners at the moment. I wouldn't get a cleaner but I'd pay a lot for a personal chef who also washed up and cleaned the kitchen post-meal.