Did anyone else become an adult late in the game?

[OneSeriousPerson]

40 is around the corner, and I don't have kids, property, investments or a viable profession (freelance my whole life and my industry is getting slaughtered by tech).

I also happen to come from a family of settled white collar professionals who all have their shit together and essentially see me as a lost cause.

Is there anyone else here who came to "grown up life" late in the game who can share their experience of becoming a respectable adult despite having delayed? I'm feeling like a fuck up here and am starting to look at retraining options/have applied for jobs, but starting to feel deflated and slightly depressed.

Me!

I lived abroad for years and was still clubbing three nights a week into my mid-30s. I am only a homeowner because my husband already had a house when I met him. I had a kid at 40 (surprise pregnancy), started my pension at 42, and started training to be an accountant at 44. I am now part-qualified and work as an accounts manager for a small company.

I remember a cousin who used to be on here a lot referring to me and my brother as 'failed adults' in one post. News to me. I must have been about your age at the time.

It ws objectively pretty daft, but it's true I had some significant issues in my life. Newsflash: so has everyone else. It's just as reductive to think of your contemporaries as a collective bunch of sorted professionals as it would be to think you 'haven't grown up yet'. And it's damaging you! Give them ten years and see if they still look quite as sorted then. Life is long and complicated.

I bet quite a few of them think of your life as a dream scenario. Having said that, it's clear that you're ready for a new direction. It's definitely not too late to retrain (I started a second degree at 39 and a new profession at 42). I'm glad I did as it has meang I have interesting work and a pension etc. All good things. I wish you the very best.

I suppose I was pretty late. I qualified into my profession in my late 30s, and it’s going well; prior to that I kind of flitted around various different office jobs. I was single for most of my 20s and early 30s. Met DH at 36, and now married with one kid. Always rented, bought for the first time a few years ago. Although I had a great time in my 20s and 30s, when I hit 35 I did start a conscious move towards “sorting myself out” by the time I reached 40. I was ready to move on.

No family of my own, no career, can't drive and don't own my home. It's too late for the first two and I don't care that much about the latter two.

Yes I’m very much one! Need to find a career and job and pension and all of that. Fun innit?

Me.

It used to be a lot easier to be a bit of a bohemian and not worry about such things. Now at 40 I’m a bit scared. The days are slipping by so fast too.

Yeah, I did. Sorry, I can’t say I’ve got my shit together yet but I’m a few years older than you and have bought a flat and retrained! On the downside I looked at my daily planner today and realised I started it about 5 years ago and have only done a few to do lists in it. Perhaps that method doesn’t work for me, right?

I did write a five year plan and I’ve done most if not all of it, I’d recommend that actually, broadly, what do you want your life to look like in 5 years?

It’s shit. Mid-life crisis club. My observation is that it’s actually worse for those who had kids late and now look at their lives and think they’ll be over 60 by the time uni etc. is done. I’m kind of glad I’m not in that position, though I do envy it too.

To add, I’m currently watching my DS be a huge success - amazing GCSEs, A levels, exceeding at uni work, straight into a high paying graduate job. I’m so excited and relieved for him.

I said to DP there’s a part of me that feels like a huge loser for not having managed the same. He pointed out that mine and his situations at that age were very different and we had very different parents. DS has been encouraged and supported and is naturally academic. I just about passed my GCSEs, his mum let him bunk off enough that he had left school by the time GCSEs came around.

Between then and now, life hasn’t been easy. Turns out we both have classic ADHD brains which explains a lot. DP had an injury that causes him too much pain to work. I have a very small start-up business that may or may not work out. I’ll never catch up with those who have it all together at this point as I’ll have to earn enough for DP too.

About yo turn 52, and still not there.

as a LP aged 46 I still feel like I am playing catch up! trying my best after years of freelance to launch my own stuff but it's difficult when you are the only one paying the bills, cleaning, running a business, looking after a child. I think I may have some success in the next year or so - finally! Keep your fingers crossed for me!!! All these people who have pensions etc - I can only dream of it! But suspect things will change soon.

So reassured I'm not alone, although tbh those of you with kids posting aren't helping that much. I never yearned for them or anything, but at least having a kid or two is like a "see, I can do something adult" badge!

I'm about to hit 40 and there are literally 20 year old in better situations than me. I also don't even have the excuse of not having been given options in life, my parents were really encouraging.

In my defence, I couldn't have foreseen by sector would be shredded like this by tech.
In my non-defence, I also spent a lot of time bouncing around from country to country which has added to my "on paper" shit show of a set up.

Now I'm going into a kind of frantic death spiral where I'm compulsively going to completely random interviews and googling apprenticeships I could do while simultaneously wondering whether I should leave the country again. I have a partner of 10 years who is just as bad as me, we are currently not living together and are in different countries, I miss him!

Why the fuck is my life so convoluted? It didn't feel this hard 3 or 4 years ago. I really hate it when people say this but I do actually wonder whether I am neuro diverse because I can't find any logical reason for why I am so continuously scattered. I can be totally committed to an idea, research the fuck out of it, apply for shit, pour weeks of legwork into making it happen and then overnight can wake up, trash it all and jump on to something different, it's fucking exhausting and depressing. I actually have a job offer (public sector) but am nevertheless going for an interview tomorrow for a place on a hotel management course

Not having kids does NOT mean you’re not an adult.

Op you're not alone!
I retrained in my thirties (prior to this had always just got whatever entry level job I could without any plan for a career - care work, hospitality etc)
Learned to drive in my thirties. Finally moved out of a houseshare, managed to get on the property ladder solely because lovely partner had the deposit. No kids and don't plan on having them.

Always felt I was just scraping by and couldn't understand how my peers seemed to have it together. Did actually find out later that I am neurodiverse though (ASD) which I suspect had a role!

It does at least sound like you've had an interesting life so far, and that is valuable. We don't all have to fit the stereotype of a good little capitalist (mortgage, hire purchase, pension) it'd be very dull if we all did!

Why on earth do you think those things make you an adult/mature OP? I’ve known people who tick all the boxes (career, marriage, big house, etc) who are pathetic, overgrown babies. I can think of two men off the top of my head who are successful in the conventional sense but who behave like revolting, spoilt children (petty, small-minded, throw temper tantrums when they don’t get what they want, that sort of thing). I never judge people by meaningless status symbols. I judge them as individuals.

The people who impress me most are the ones who do their own thing and don’t care what society thinks of them. Give me an eccentric, bohemian individualist any day. For me, maturity means individualism. It means knowing who you are, having your own principles, and being your own person.

I get it OP, I think 40 is the scary age where you can't pretend you're young and have plenty of time anymore...at least that's how it feels.

At 30 it didn't bother me that I didn't have those things, but staring down the barrel of 40 feels a bit more depressing. I will hopefully get my driving licence this year, almost 20 years after my first few lessons...(why the fuck didn't I just stick with it then, oh yeah because I never seem to fucking stick at anything that's why...)

I'm also renting (will probably never be able to afford to buy) and in a job I don't enjoy, and haven't had much in the way of a big career - I travelled a lot and bummed around for my 20's (which I loved), then went to college in my early 30's and started working in more 'professional' roles, but I don't fit into the corporate world, and have no interest in moving up or progressing.

It doesn't help that all my best friends are in long term relationships (I've been single for a few years, never seem to be able to make a relationship last), and have their own houses. I just feel like a teenager compared to them.

My father was sick I was helping to care for him until recently, and I know this has taken over my life a bit the last few years. He died a few months ago, and I swing between feeling that life is precious and short, and I should make the most of it, go live my dreams and do something amazing - and feeling like I have no motivation to do anything, and I don't know what my dream job even is so where do I start. It all feels a bit overwhelming.

Sorry that was long, just want you to know that there are others out there who feel the same.

ME!
I had a lot of adverse childhood experiences which (along with late diagnosed ADHD) delayed my maturation process considerably.

I’ve essentially had to pay a therapist for years to help me learn how to deal with my feelings and be gentle on myself. To raise me!

My schooling was shit and I just grew up in a very ordinary boring town with low aspirations. Simply surviving was the aim of the game.

I knew I didn’t want to marry a local boy and settle down so I set about travelling, living all over the world, joining various scenes, clubbing, music I even had a stint living in a few different hippy communes.

After a few years in minimum wage jobs, I finally decided to apply myself to getting a degree and qualified in my 30s. This led to a professional wage and year by year I’ve started to grow up but it’s taken me a very long time.

I’m still renting.

I do cringe when I think of all the proper grown-up friends of DH who met me over a decade ago and I was so immature emotionally, financially and in every way really.

We used to visit them and I’d feel as though they were the adults in the room talking about grown up things like mortgages, savings and they’d have beautiful homes while mine was just a mish mash of bits like a teenagers bedroom spread out through wherever I was renting.

Its been lovely lately visiting them again and feeling finally more on a par with them. It shows me how hard I’ve worked on myself.

I needed to be on safe/ non- triggering/ chaotic ground for long enough to coax my brain out of fight or flight in order to start making a success of myself and I feel that finally in my 40s I’m there.

It’s never too late!

PS lots of adult things are not necessarily good.
Having a kid is only good if you have the emotional capacity to raise them well with a partner who is genuinely invested in working as a team domestically.

Having a mortgage is okay as long as you’re not killing yourself trying to pay it off. Sometimes the European renting model is better to help people live within their means.

Plenty of "adults" who have kids, mortgages, pensions etc, are actually very, very childish and immature in many ways.

Some of my colleagues in their 40s/50s/60s have all these things, but can have moody strops that make them seem like teenagers.

I agree with this wholeheartedly.

Not wanting to delve too deep OP but what is driving the feelings you have about where you should be?

On paper I look like an adult but assure you that I am still waiting for the feeling inside to catch up - and I say this as a single parent, responsible for other small people.

Remember the age old saying ‘comparison is the thief of joy’ - hopefully that isnt too trite as not meant that way at all.

@OneSeriousPerson I've noticed you said you've bagged a public sector job offer - Well Done!

One big step to a good pension investment at the right time to invest for the next 20 years or more.

Plus you can climb up the ladder, earn more and add to your pot.

I'd say your efforts to knuckle down are starting to open doors, keep going and don't give up, you have time to turn this around. Best Wishes

My uncle got a mortgage and became a first time buyer in his late fifties or early sixties.

I'm on the verge of starting a career at last. Had mental health problems in my teens so didn't do as well as I should have at school. I went to uni at 26. Managed my degree but due to physical health problems didn't go to work, then had kids and that did a lot of damage physically. I will finally be starting my teacher training in September at the youthful age of 48. I do have a mortgage but that's entirely down to DH being successful not me.

OP, I really recognise a lot of what you’re saying. I also tend to get distracted by the could do this, could do that aspect of career/life decisions. None of them are really perfect, also, if we were inclined to be a bit more conservative we could still decide that, but probably decided not to for good reason. The five year plan really helped with the overall direction of things. It was just a few words handwritten as a mind map. I also did the Myers Briggs personality test, have to take it with a grain of salt but it did give me some insight into myself career-wise. There are free versions online. I don’t have kids btw, and I’m not going to.

@Hartley99 Has it 100%.
I would go mad if I compared myself other people half my age.

I've embraced gratitude - I'm not in pain, nothing needs fixing/replacing, I have food, light and heat, a roof and I'm still relatively fit enough to walk or cycle places. Touch wood, I consider myself very fortunate.

Bought a house at 35, DH has just set up his pension at 38. We’re only now building savings after stopping paying for nursery.

It’s never too late. Open a stocks and shares ISA (easy to do; read Martin Lewis) and do a standing order for whatever you can afford per month.

If you don’t have a pension start one TODAY. Again, easy to do, something like the Vanguard SIPP, split your money across 4 medium risk funds and do a standing order. Claim tax back via tax return on the amount you put in if youre a higher rate payer, it’ll soon add up.

Can you look at retraining? Start saving die a deposit for a flat? It’s not too late but don’t procrastinate.

*for a deposit