To think the encouragement to delay real life is a big cause in the explosion of mental health issues in under 35's ?

[rudolphrainbownose]

Okay, so there is a well documented mental health crisis amongst young people , particularly university students, needing mental health support.

Is it just me or is the current culture of delaying "real adulthood" ( staying at school longer, young marriage/ pregnancy actively discouraged and frowned upon, uni unofficially taking the school leaving age to 23 for middle class young people, staying living at their parents well into their late 20's/ early 30's....)

To me it seems discouraging starting real adult life is fuelling this.

1. Young women are told not to expect "security" in relationships, they are almost told to expect being ghosted by a series of men "not wanting to put a label on it," and going on a series of disastrous online dates is better than settling down young. Look how much marriage amongst under 25's is frowned upon on Mumsnet.

But I don't see many aspects of the dating scene today, ("friends with benefits" being cool, sex often expected without commitment before or afterwards on the first couple of dates, having to actually spell out you don't want the guy you are dating online to continue dating others online, being ghosted and blocked for no reason, being particularly healthy for the mental health of young people). Yet this is sold to them as more empowering than settling down into a steady relationship at a relatively young age....

2. I'll expect to be flamed for this, but the active discouragement of having children in your 20's , probably robs a lot of women of a focus, ( because having your own family is often a nice focus), than drifting around without a purpose gives them. This also leads to probably more people experiencing the panic of miscarriage and infertility , ( risks increasing with age), into their 30's.

3. Active encouragement into University without thinking often leads to a horrendously mentally unhealthy lifestyle.

For those with a passion for the subject, or doing a vocational course that leads to a career, of course university should be supported.

But that is not the case for your average student. Your average student goes to uni because, broadly speaking, it's what their college or sixth form expects of anyone vaguely academic. They pick a subject with no fixed career that they are at best, vaguely interested in, ( managed to scrape a B in business studies A Level, hated it the least, so I'll do it at uni to delay working for three years).

They head to uni to study a subject they are not particularly interested in, ith no idea what it will lead to afterwards. Most, have at most, six hours a week contact time, ( often less post covid). They sleep in late, browse the internet and get smashed a few times a week, ( the majority of students I know do not work in term time). Rinse and repeat. And they wonder why living this not very appealing lifestyle leaves students at poor risk of mental health ? And many are encouraged to take on a masters in a subject they are not interested in, with no direct career, to delay entering the real world for another year. They live in a bubble with people of the same age and inexperience as them. Compare that to a 19 year old office juniour being up and about, learning about the world of work, going for after work drinks with colleagues of a variety of ages ?

And the housing crisis means they are still likely to be living at home, ( especially if they are single), until 30. Often treated like overgrown teenagers, still in the habit of explaining to their parents where they are going of an evening. My friend , ( male), was explaining to me that at 28 he was working himself up to staying the night at his new girlfriends as he was so embarrassed to explain where he was to his parents, ( because if he told them he wouldn't be home for dinner as he was staying at his girlfriend's , they'd realise he was having sex).

In short, is delaying marriage, babies, work , moving out and leaving education actually causing everyone to be directionless and unhappy ?

Hmmm.

I'm mid twenties. I grew up on social media really and had a difficult childhood. I also have much of what you speak of: I left my parents house at 16, I am married, we are considering children, I went to uni but worked solidly throughout (due to absolutely no support from family), and now I have a career I'm proud of.

I also have severe mental health issues and trauma. Whilst my childhood was shit I think a lot of this was down to social media and the pressures of being online. There are some really dodgy online spaces that are incredibly easy to fall into and you completely lose your sense of self.

To some extent I find myself having my shit together more than others my age, but honestly I think social media is the biggest downfall, not the lack of young people moving out and getting married by the time they're 20.

I agree with some of what you say, but I'm not sure I understand the bit about women drifting around not settling into relationships in their 20s and starting families as contributing to this. I would have loved a settled relationship when I was that age but seemed to only attract shitty non-committal men, and equally I don't think my standards were v good when I think of some of the poor behaviour I put up with (because of the fact I so desperately wanted a committed relationship).

And at the same time, how often we see women on here putting up with miserable relationships / marriages - frequently full scale abusive ones at that, they've somehow ended up in (I suspect like the frog in boiling water analogy) and now don't know how to leave either because there are children involved and /or they feel trapped financially. So I'm really not sure encouraging women to settle down earlier is the best plan. I for one would have ended up settling for something terrible.

House prices have gone up exponentially, living costs have risen, we are constantly being told the planet is dying, women are still underpaid and under valued, AI is supposedly going to steal our jobs, healthcare is collapsing

But of course it's the young people's fault they are depressed because they are doing it wrong.

They shouldn't be going to uni, even though if they end up in lower paid jobs they are berated for not improving themselves.

They shouldn't be living at home being infantalised even though they have nowhere to live

And they absolutely should be in a steady stable relationship having children in their early 20s even though they have no where to live and they don't know if they want to bring their children into a future that they keep being told may not be good due to global warming and automation.

I can't imagine why they don't just go out there and do it like people used to in the good old days where there was no depression

As a reminder its men in the 50-60 year old age range who are most likely to commit suicide. the ones who were less likely to go to uni, got married and had babies in their early 20s and bought houses.

This sounds much much more like it.

And actually the people who I find to have the best mental health in my generation largely don't have an online presence and didn't have much of one growing up. My wife is a couple of years older than me, has never spent much time on social media (she prefers to use the internet for researching!) and yeah she's got some stuff going on but she is a lot more 'free' than people I know (incl myself) who used social media as a crutch growing up. She doesn't care about what people think of her as much, really lives in the moment and rarely has her phone out. She has had cemented interests that have carried through her teens and into adulthood and is really well adjusted.

AND - she didn't leave her family home until she moved in with me in her mid twenties!

You’re literally saying that without the focus of a child young women have poor mental health. That’s a Victorian and misogynistic attitude. You’ve bought into repression. Well done

I think that if the very basic tenets of CBT - that thoughts are not facts and that thoughts, feelings and behaviours are linked and by changing one you change them all - were taught as a core subject there would be a huge reduction in mental health issues.

Hmmm it wasn’t the case for me, I wasn’t expected to go to uni, I wasn’t expected to excel and uni was a brilliant experience for me in every way possible. My 20s was about establishing myself and enjoying life before kids came along. I didn’t feel like I was drifting.

my friends from school who didn’t go on to further/higher Ed are still living in the same area, even with their school boy/girlf and don’t seem all that happy. I’ve experienced life I’ve gone places I’ve been able to do a lot more because of uni and those experiences and “delaying” real life.

when my children are looking to their future I’ll encourage the same, I already do in fact, do whatever makes you happy, and do it your way. Further education or not, it’s their life to live not mine.

MH issues in my op start earlier than uni years. It’s knowing too much too young, it’s being educated on life and the rest without the tools to understand it appropriately- if a pre teen can search up ANYTHING on internet, but not given the voice to ask about what they have found (and cannot unlearn /see what they have) then it’s instilling anxiety at that point. We can unplug the internet, but we can be more proactive and realistic about how we protect children by giving them access to support, sadly mh is misunderstood, under funded and still being recognised as a society problem.

Delaying “real life” is probably the thing young people do to stall their need to be all things to all people rather than the other way around. You raise some good points but it sounds like an incredibly biased pov, without anything to back it up with, actually it reads like a newspaper article lead.

I did a degree with the aim of improving my future job prospects. Surely that, and getting away from the parents, are the usual driving forces behind going to uni. I don’t think I was delaying real life at all.

I don't know enough about it to discuss well (and doubt any/many on here specialise in generational research) but I expect that you feel that because so many other things changed at the same time. Mobile phones, access to birth control, robust accessible research on so many topics including psychology/behaviour/medicine/healthcare, Internet, better (but still crap) equality, cheaper travel, more exposure to other cultures, more politicised media, social media (most of those things caused by the internet). I'm late 30s and have seen all these things come along when I was a teen.

My generation and those below also have better access to mental health resources (simply info online if not person to person therapy) and are more aware of these things too. And we're more outspoken about it. We aren't like some of the generations before us, where women suffered in silence, working themselves to the bone at home for multiple children and an expectant husband, without a job or money to call their own. Yes I'm generalising (and so are you), but it's known that women struggled massively at least from the 1800s onwards. Various 'mothers little helpers' such as gin, morphine and valium were rife and domestic abuse more common and less spoken about. And in the 70s and 80s valium was still a huge market for women. In the 90s it shifted to prozac. Now I'm not knocking anyone using any of those things (then or now), but the point is women have struggled with their lives, especially if stuck at home with kids, in unsecured housing, unemployed etc. It is researched and documented. So this problem is not new - it's more visible and hitting people without children because there is so much doom and gloom rammed down our throats day in day out. My grandmother had a terrible time as a young mother, with and then without a mostly shit husband, and by all accounts became a stern, angry, miserable mother, and was the same as a grandmother. My mother learned from that and was an angry blameful mother to me. That has generally been spun on its head by gen x and millennials, especially with access to decades of research on parenting styles and work/life balance. Certainly I don't ever want my children to be mentally/emotionally scarred the way I was by my mother (and I'd never mention it to her because the tide of verbal and possibly physical abuse I'd get would terrify me). If that means they're outspoken in needing a break, moving from a job or situation which is causing them deep/long term distress, or getting help, more power to them. I support them and I will always be their safe space - because I didn't have one (emotionally).

Please note I have been to uni, I'm successful and I'm currently home daily with young children (so I am NOT knocking anyone who is too, or any of the other points!), aaaand I've had long term therapy for believing myself to be useless and pointless due to my upbringing. It was nothing to do with going to university or not having kids young (in fact emotionally I'm at an amazing stage of life to have kids, even if biologically it was a bit harder than maybe 15 years ago) and everything to do with the constant belittling, punishing and pushing which was more common with boomer parents than it is in younger generations. My parents did what they thought was right at the time. Now we have access to research that proves better. And in a few decades there will be more advanced research that shows different again. We all do what we can with the information given us.
(Sorry, this is an enormous post, because its something close to my heart)

“MH issues in my op start earlier than uni years. It’s knowing too much too young, it’s being educated on life and the rest without the tools to understand it appropriately- if a pre teen can search up ANYTHING on internet, but not given the voice to ask about what they have found (and cannot unlearn /see what they have) then it’s instilling anxiety at that point.“

This was very true for me. My issues started at about 14 and were certainly connected to internet access.

I definitely feel that getting married and having children relatively young (24) was very good for me and DH, in terms of having a focus. We did go to university first, however, so had the best of both worlds, because we have decent careers too (especially him, as my early career was hampered by having three children).

I really don't think it's possible to have it all, and having children was definitely a big priority for me.

I was all geared up to call you a bellend but I agree with pretty much everything you've said. I'm in my early thirty's and I can relate to some of what you've written.

OP I can't help noticing you've omitted the possibility of focus on a career in the 20s years.

Agree with you, OP. Except there is so much anxiety that start in younger children that is hard to explain could it be coming from their parents, and due to the economic climate? Either way, going to uni for the sake of it is not wise.

I spent my 20s and early 30s an anxious mess, feeling like I hadn't achieved anything, lacking purpose. I struggled so much, went to several counsellors, therapy, Meditation, wallowed in my own existence etc. I had always said I didn't want kids, was put off as a teenager and in my 20s but accidentally got pregnant and had a baby at 38 and it all went, all my anxiety, all those feelings just disappeared. I'm sure its not like for everyone but I just found it so interesting that all that anxiety, years of therapy was solved for me by having my wonderful son!

YABVU Jesus Christ. People are different. Some people like to get a job in their home town, marry their BF from school and start popping out babies at 20, some people like to go university, see the world, find a career, and settle down later. Or not at all.

It's fine. They're both fine. If you try and make people do the wrong one for them, they end up miserable and resentful.

Agree student debt is shit. It should be free.

@happyfeet5 You sound very smug and naive. Good for you that you've met your DP young (DH in 2 years) 🙄and managed to have the finances to be able to TTC in the next year but not everyone is so lucky. Your age shows when you make patronising comments about "if you spend too long ‘finding yourself’ it seems you never do". I can imagine you doing this with the Mumsnet head tilt and tinkley laugh.

Totally disagree. I'm 51. Pretty much everyone I know took that route - university, career, paired up in late 20s, had kids in early to mid 30s. All seem to have done fine. I wouldn't have been ready to have kids in my 20s! I don't think it's this that's causing problems. Social media and the internet in general have a lot to answer for though.

I agree, l have an adult SS who has just got his first home with his first serious girlfriend. Hes late 30s
He lived at home with us till 27 playing Call of Duty etc games with his online 'friends'. Only coming out to eat his meals waiting on the table prepared by his dad He signed up for course after course every year only attending a couple of days a week. I acrually feared he would never move out.

Young women are told not to expect "security" in relationships, they are almost told to expect being ghosted by a series of men "not wanting to put a label on it," and going on a series of disastrous online dates

Strangely, the majority of these posts I see on MN are women in their 40s/50s, separated/divorced after marrying young, had children young, and then find themselves unable to cope without a man because they never learned to, so put up with ridiculous shit from men they meet online.

So true. We were both at uni and got degrees, but we had a baby at 21 (another at 26) and got married at 25.

It gave both of us a focus and a reason to save, buy a house etc.

Hmmm I somewhat agree op

but I think you are missing social media being part of the problem and also that mental health is more talked about rather than people just getting on without more despite being miserable I’m sure back in the day

personally I was a young mum so had to grow up quick however shared custody actually means that Iv had much more freedom than plenty of my friends who are married etc . I prefer it , I like to travel I like to do what I want on my free time and I like that Iv had plenty of relationships, some just casual would hate to have been tied down with one guy in my early 20s . Not everyone wants to settle down

I think young people are depressed because of lack of hope and choices. Even if you were in your early 20s and you wanted to have a family with a partner or husband how would you afford it? Renting and house prices are astronomical compared to average wages for young people. If I had wanted to start a family when I was in my 20s in the 90s, this wouldn't haven't out of reach for me.
I could have bought a small house in a fairly OK location on 2 X average wages. It was possible. This isn't what I chose to do. I chose to go and live and work in London straight out of Uni (without massive debts). Again, this choice was available to me because I could rent a room in a house share for £200-300 per month in Zone 2/3 on a wage of 18K as I started out in my chosen profession. I'm not sure young people have these choices anymore. It just seems so much harder.

Someone else alluded to it, but I don't think we can underestimate the impact of structural political and economic issues on young people. Yes, social media and parenting will play a part but I can't help but think the main problems are structural.

I just hope their time will come as different, younger political figures are voted in who can make changes in this country that will give young people hope.
But at the moment it's hard to see how this type of change will come about? No wonder they are depressed.

I think you have to take into account the mental health issues of earlier generations.

My grandmothers were mums in the 50s, when it was common to prescribe women all sorts of drugs to help them cope with the fact that life was either incredibly limiting (upper-middle-class), incredibility hard (working class) or both. I never really knew my dad's mum, but I cared for my mum's mum when she was dying, and she had brain cancer which lowered her inhibitions. She shared some very sad details of her life. She'd had a horrible time - but back then, there was little understanding of 'mental health' as an issue. And she was a woman who looked like a success story on paper! She went from a very poor working-class family to a university education to a professional job, and very unusually for her time, she was the main breadwinner for much of her life, and she worked almost until the year she died, in her 80s. But from age 14, she felt as if the whole responsibility for the household was on her shoulders.

My mum was a teenager in the 70s. From what I understand she wasn't in the least rowdy and was quite serious - but she and my dad both knew people who killed themselves, went off the rails with drugs, or worse. Both of my parents have mentioned knowing men who raped women, or coerced them into relationships. Of course, marital rape wasn't a crime then. There are a lot of women in that generation who had appalling things happen to them. I've a friend a year younger than my mum who has had mental health issues her whole life, because in her first job aged 16 or so, her boss used to molest her every week before he'd let her go for the weekend.

Then you look at my generation. I'm in my 30s. We're the generation who were told it was cool to be 'laddish' and to make jokes about rape. Look how that worked out.

I think the main reason the current generation seem to have major mental health issues, is that society has finally stopped pushing those issues under the carpet. If only someone had admitted these issues earlier, we'd have fewer generations of women who'd had little or not support.

FWIW, historically, it used to be normal for people to 'delay' adulthood to the early 20s. For much of recorded history, people of that age were still attached to the family home and watched over or cared for by their parents.