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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Does anyone else find the passage of time really odd and confusing? What year does it feel like to you really?

166 replies

Timeandspaceidiocy · 15/08/2023 17:42

Five years ago in one way sounds like not that much but also like a solid block of time, but in reality was 2018 which doesn't seem that long ago. Then I think of covid and suddenly 2018 does seem like a different era completely. But still, not like a long ago time.

Then if I think say back to the Olympics in 2012 - that's obviously over a decade ago now - well in 2012, 2007 seemed fucking ages and ages ago then. Even though there's only 5 years between 2007 and 2012, the same as there is between 2018 and 2023.

2012 itself feels like ages and ages and ages ago to me. 2007 seems almost like a different period in human history.

But. It also kinda feels like we "should" maybe be at say 2009 or 2010 by now. My brain can't fully compute it's 2023. I don't feel it was that long ago since I was at uni.

I'm in my late thirties so fully suspect this is one of the side effects of not being a spring chicken anymore Grin

But does anyone else feel like this?

How do you feel about time passing?

Looking back does it all make sense chronologically to you or seem weird and like it jumps around?

OP posts:
Offyoupoplove · 15/08/2023 21:12

(That might also be because it’s the last year I was an adult without kids!)

Ponderingwindow · 15/08/2023 21:13

2000 was just a couple of years ago.

christmas 2022 was about 6 weeks ago.

I’m turning 50 soon and have a young teen. The time warping really started strong during the pandemic, but I don’t know if it’s because of the pandemic or because of my age.

DustyMaiden · 15/08/2023 21:14

38 and 36 years ago My DDs were born , it feels like 120 years ago. 22 years ago DS was born it seems like 7 years.

Woman2023 · 15/08/2023 21:18

Timeandspaceidiocy · 15/08/2023 21:09

When i watch history programs now and they talk about 100 years i feel like it's really not a vast amount of time!

Yes agree with this too @Laiste

This is definitely a feature of getting older, what seemed ancient history when I was young (say First World War) feels closer now I'm in my 50s.

If you add in dealing with a parent who sometimes forgets she's my mother I'm beginning to wonder if we really exist at all.

SamAndEIIa · 15/08/2023 21:19

Brokendaughter · 15/08/2023 20:35

I was going to party like it was 1999, but of course it was still the 80s when that was in the charts, so it was forever away in the future.

Somehow it's now further away in the past than it was in the future when we were all dancing to it when it was first released?

How can 1999 be nearly a quarter of a century ago?

How can there be adults, maybe even with kids in nursery, who never wrote the date when whatever the date was, the year began with a 19?

Covid completely did for my sense of time passing.

At some point, old people radio stations from my youth started playing the music of my youth & I never hear Jim Reeves etc.. who used to be on there, like they think I'm old.
When did that happen?

I hate to break it to you; but there are most likely quite a few adults with kids in HIGH SCHOOL who never wrote the year starting 19…

Say you start being able to write the date from age 4. That would mean anyone born since 1996 would be part of your cohort. So up to age 27.

If we take a Scottish high schooler, many of the new intake starting tomorrow will be 11.

That means everyone born in 1996 or who had a child by 16 is part of your cohort.

In fact, if we consider that many 15 year olds give birth, and kids can leave high school at 16, we are close to having children of parents who have never written the date as “19…” having left education completely.

GreenHillsBlueSky · 15/08/2023 21:19

PinkArt · 15/08/2023 20:09

I've played a 'fun game'/challenge with a few people. Name something that happened in 2021. It can be anything - personal, professional, news story. Just one thing that happened that year. It's strangely hard to do beyond the third lockdown and even then people struggle to say how long that lasted. It's like the year just didn't exist.

This is so true. I can’t remember anything from 2021!

NumberFortyNorhamGardens · 15/08/2023 21:27

As for 100 years…I feel like the 1920s are a lot closer to us than the 1860s were to our grandparents, IYSWIM. They look recognisable. We had motor cars, OK they were a bit of a rich man’s toy but they were catching on. We could catch trains and trams to places instead of going everywhere by horse. You could phone someone (with a bit of faff, but it was possible). You can dress in 1920s costumes without having to give yourself internal bruising with the underwear, or learn new choreography just to sit down. (Why is sensible clothing for women not seen as a revolution equivalent to the overthrow of the Ancien Regime?)

Whereas someone like my Babcia born at the end of the 19th century lived through two world wars, innumerable scientific and technological inventions and about, oh, seven countries by the time the 1960s were up, and her surroundings looked not just like another time but another planet.

BaldButNotOut · 15/08/2023 21:29

If you add in dealing with a parent who sometimes forgets she's my mother I'm beginning to wonder if we really exist at all.

You too eh? Sympathise. It's very shit.

anotherside · 15/08/2023 21:32

I think as soon as you find routine/stability in your life, time starts speeding up exponentially. For many that happens in their mid to late 20s. School lasts forever because you’re every year moving into different classes with different teachers and constantly being set different hoops to jump through.

AuraBora · 15/08/2023 21:34

Yes OP I can totally.relate to this. I am just a bit older than you (40). On the one hand, my life pre DD - 5 - seems like an eternity... yet its also not a lot in the grand scheme of things.
My DS is 18 months and I can't quite believe he's getting on for 2...seems like just a moment ago he was born. It just doesn't seem to all tally up. I think of the start of Covid and in my mind it's just a year or so ago but it's actually getting on for 3.5 now..that's more than half my DDs lifetime and she was only just a bit older than my DS is now..
Next year it will be 20 years since I graduated from uni.. I still think of it being fairly recent but its really not. Its a long time!
It's like I can't get my head around the passing of time sometimes...maybe it's not unusual.
Agree with previous PP that 2021 is an odd year
.can't remember anything about it other than being pregnant with DC2!

user78262102928 · 15/08/2023 21:34

A few things that combine for me:

i routinely got confused between my 30s and 40s. When I was 47 I was just as likely to answer 37 as my real age, and that wasn’t me being coy, it was genuine confusion. I blame having kids for that one - I had the in the first half of my 30s, and they were still “small” (preteen) so it must be the same 10 year stretch.

I vividly remember being at a conference in 2012 when they were talking about how industry would have to adapt to the expectations of millennials entering the workforce. I thought this was odd until I realised, at that point, that someone born in 1990 would be just finishing uni. Totally blew my mind. And it feels like a couple of years ago but those same nearly-graduates are now nearly as old as I was at the time 😱

The covid years. I could swear “lockdown” was most of 2020 to 2022, but the first lockdown was really just a few weeks. I get totally confused as to which year was which.

AnxiousFairyQueen · 15/08/2023 21:34

The weirdest thing for me as I’ve matured in years is that when I was young, World War 2 seemed like a very long time ago.

I was born 27 years after it ended, which I now realise is a very short amount of time. 27 years ago I was 23.

Saverage · 15/08/2023 21:34

I feel like it's around 2005. When I read things like 'ooh that fashion / decor is so 2010' or whatever I can't place at all what people mean. The whole of 2000 - 2023 it just one undifferentiated mass to me. I can't name the music or anything.

Whereas 1970s, 80s, 90s are very distinct decades to me. I don't know if it was just because I was older from 2000 onwards or if everything really is a lot more homogenous and indistinct now from decade to decade.

Dahlia82 · 15/08/2023 21:36

I feel exactly the same OP!! Thought it was just me. Feels nuts that 2018 was half a decade ago. Also can’t remember hardly anything of Covid time (

Namechangedforthis25 · 15/08/2023 21:39

It’s just time speeding up as you get older

1 year out of 40 is a lot less memorable than 1 year for a 10 year old

Museya15 · 15/08/2023 21:39

All I know is my 20s and 30s went in a blink of an eye, they really really did. I'm now in my late forties and the 90s just seem like a lifetime ago, the 80s seem like a different world.

Dahlia82 · 15/08/2023 21:42

I also find it nuts to think that 1983 is 40 years ago. When I was a kid in 1983, 40 years before that was Wartime. Freaks me out

PeloMom · 15/08/2023 21:45

I feel this! My brain is stuck in 2019 for some reason. It feels like yesterday and a different lifetime at the same time

AndIKnewYouMeantIt · 15/08/2023 21:45

When I started having kids I got completely immersed in minutae because I was so busy with the minutae of work and their lives. I did not notice time passing and I was doing things day by day.

Yes, this. It feels like maybe 2016. But I am fully aware on paper that I spent 2017 trying to get pregnant and pushed out a human at the end of 2018 and went "Wow, he'll be at school in 2023" which is somehow now? Except I'm 40 next year. Which is wrong as surely I'm 27.

I look at DH and see 18 year old him but he is 38! What.

AuraBora · 15/08/2023 21:49

Saverage · 15/08/2023 21:34

I feel like it's around 2005. When I read things like 'ooh that fashion / decor is so 2010' or whatever I can't place at all what people mean. The whole of 2000 - 2023 it just one undifferentiated mass to me. I can't name the music or anything.

Whereas 1970s, 80s, 90s are very distinct decades to me. I don't know if it was just because I was older from 2000 onwards or if everything really is a lot more homogenous and indistinct now from decade to decade.

So true! In terms of.world events, trends etc..even personal events I couldn't really place anything in the period up to 2017 when my DD was born, apart from meeting DH in 2011..!

coxesorangepippin · 15/08/2023 21:51

The days are long but the years are short

For everyone

Jennygosoftly · 15/08/2023 22:10

coxesorangepippin · 15/08/2023 21:51

The days are long but the years are short

For everyone

Now that's true.🙂

Longsleepneeded · 15/08/2023 22:12

It's when someone says "30 years ago" and I think they mean the 70's, but no, they mean the 90's!!
Yes to anyone born in 2000 still being a child, there's no way they could have their own children.....

MinimalistMe · 15/08/2023 22:14

Life before covid seems like a different era, I had a baby during lockdown, and those two years are just a blur.

When I think/talk about 2019, it's that 'other time' or the 'time before' or 'back when'.
It is so surreal and confusing!

fullbloom87 · 15/08/2023 22:14

Yanbu I feel exactly the same.
My first born was born in 2005. The time between 2000 and 2005 seems mega long. Then it rushed forward and then slowed right down because between 2010 and 2016 seemed to drag.
2016 seems like yesterday to me. Can't believe it's been nearly 8 years since brexit and trump?!
Weird!!!