To wonder if other 36 year olds have their shit together?

[peterpaneffect]

On the outside, it could appear that I have it figured out.
I live with my fiancé in our house we bought 3 years ago, lovely area in the suburbs, 2 kids, wedding planned for next year, about to have a family holiday, he has a good job, i run a small business.

When in fact I feel a complete mess!

I am gaining weight and really struggling with self esteem. I hate my business it bores me senseless and only really makes the bare minimum we need. I am terrible with money, i spend it on clothes & eating out, no savings.

I just feel like a failure, approaching 40, still haven't figured out a solid career, losing myself appearance wise, struggling with mh.

Anyone else?

Essentially you do have your shit together but you are not enjoying it or feeling much of a sense of achievement. When you are in your 20's you get jobs, meet a partner. Then you go onto buying houses and having kids. Then life gets harder work because of the kids and some of the sense of achievement or excitement about new projects seems to go away. The trick is to claw back some time for personal achievements.

Thinks like savings is easy to change, start with a small amount and begin to save....look over your budget and see where you can cut back e.g. only allow yourself coffee out once a week or something. Start to do some activities for you. Think what else you want to do with life and start planning for it. Work out what's leading to the weight gain and take small steps to combat it. Think about your work, you might not love it but does it provide the income to do the things you love?

For me, I began running with couch to 5k and ended up doing a half marathon. I changed my job but had to spend a few years doing things to build up my cv. I now have more money for travel which is the big thing I really want to do. At the moment it's small steps because I need to valance my teens needs too.

I’m often asked (mainly at work) how I ‘do it all’ and the answer is
(a) I don’t (smoke and mirrors in excellent operation…with a lot of inelegant swan feet going just under the water)
(b) DH is an equal partner and we cover for each other all the time and
a healthy dose of (c) luck!

I also recognise the ‘who the hell thought I was responsible enough to bring up children’ thing. I’ve always assumed everyone felt like that.

When I was younger I always assumed adults had their shit together, I've come to realise no one does really! It sounds like you're doing well for yourself though, a home and family (yes people can do well for themselves without these things too).

"Having your shit together" is not a thing that exists.

Every single person on this planet is flailing about careening from crisis to disaster desperately trying to cling on.

The ones who look like they have their shit together are the ones who have accepted this, and learnt not to care too much. At the moment, my car is falling apart, I've just discovered I've not got nearly enough tucked away for retirement, I eat too much crap, and DD is going through a particularly difficult stage and I don't know how to help properly. It would break me if I thought too much about it, so I fix the bits I can, and try not to care too much about the bits I can't. (Although given that the optician just told me I might be diabetic, I probably need to get my shit together on the health one).

Even endless money and power doesn't mean you've got your shit together. Elon Musk doesn't have his shit together, Rishi Sunak didn't have his shit together, (Keir Starmer may have thought he did, and then this week happened.). Not even the Queen had her shit together.

So flail away, safe in the knowledge that you're not alone.

People who have their shit together aren't trying hard enough.
They stay in their lane.
They live in the mediocre.

The only people I know who appear to have their shit together are really boring, a comfortably retired couple who don't seem to do anything apart from mow their immaculate lawn & clean their immaculate car.

Nothing wrong with that though. It's their life, not yours.

I turn 36 this year.

No house (still renting) because I started having children far too young (eldest DS turns 18 next year). Only just starting out in a career this year after spending my entire adult life raising children, 2 of whom have SEN, and then training for said career for years.

Married (happily) but literally drowning in debt: I've also been in debt my entire adult life, due to a combination of domestic/financial abuse, poor decisions and poverty. Only managed a 'typical' holiday abroad once. All our other holidays have been camping/eurocamp.

Ground down, suffering with anxiety and feelings of massive failure (despite a first class degree, happy DC etc).

I think you're doing fine tbh, OP.

36 - decent job, happily married, 2DC, no major body insecurities or health issues (touch wood!)

But - still renting and fret about it daily - e.g. is it better to buy a flat or change the DCs school to buy a house, or stay in our rented flat another year...

I am also not fantastic at housework and am 5/10 minutes late for everything.

I think everyone's got some things 'together' and other bits where they are just flailing about a bit!

I’m 38 with two “adult” I children I had when I was 18/19. I’ve been single since I was 25. You would think I would have my life together by now but I’m no where near. I go to work, pay my bills and the rent. That is my life and I wouldn’t even know where to start for it to become anything else. Cut yourself some slack. I bet you’re doing better than you think you are. It’s all something that can be sorted, so I would start with something easy enough and go from there. As my mum would say, it will all sort itself out eventually.

I do have my shit together. I have a job I love and I am very good at, and I keep changing it to keep it interesting, I have a house, and savings, and choices in life. I have a family who loves me. I have no children (by choice) so can enjoy not having any dependents and only taking care of myself. I have been single and partnered and equally happy. I have loads to look forward in life and lots of things I still want to do. I don't have any crises going on in my life. I am very resilient and use humour to deal with problems, and find it easy to learn from bad things and move on quickly. Most of the stresses and anxiety everyone else talks about feel quite alien to me. But to be honest, I don't know many others like me.

I’m 56 and don’t have my shit together. Nobody has their shit together, everyone else is just pretending.

as you get older you realise not having your shit together is fine, you learn to care less about most things

What do you mean by having shit together.

I just deal with life. Stuff happens, I make decisions and deal with it. I can’t know everything but I’m capable of learning and so I just crack on living.

I have a job I like, a house we’re renovating, a partner I love, and kids I’m proud of. I’m not sure what else there is I need to achieve. I know what I’m doing most of the time, thanks to age and experience, but when I don’t I don’t panic. I just learn or ask for help.

I don’t feel a fraud or an imposter. I’m just me. The best me I can be. I try to be kind to people but don’t get walked over. I try to be fair but if needed prioritise my families needs.

I would say I do have my shit together. I don’t worry about things in life I have no control over. I’m happy with what I have and am very comfortable in my skin.

I'm Turing 36 this year. My partner & I own our own home, both have good jobs. We have a beautiful 10 month old son, I'm currently on maternity leave.
From the outside my life looks lovely but I've never felt more stressed in my entire life. There is so much more to worry about since becoming a parent!
I don't feel like I have my shit together at all & I go through my days in a blur just winging it. I think a lot of people must feel this way though.
My life was so easy 10 years ago when I lived at my parents & had zero responsibilities.

Hmm 🤔 this is quite thought provoking OP.

I am 35, 2 beautiful kids, house in a lovely area we’ve had renovated, lovely cars, exciting holidays, big social life and lots of friends…however …

2 children were years of IVF we haven’t told others about. Eldest has been diagnosed with autism (although again you wouldn’t know on meeting him) . House was a nightmare and cost so much to renovate and incredibly stressful. My weight is also tricky and I’m now on injections to help, husband works 16 hour days to pay school fees and holidays etc and then I don’t have a job - which is in itself trick as I’ve taken myself out the job market to make up for DH working so much and I look after the children. So outwardly we are like you and look like the model family but underneath I question my lack of job, weight gain etc

But I do think I’m very lucky / blessed and happy so regardless of whether everything is perfect or not (I don’t think perfect exists) as long as you’re happy- everyone out there has struggles x

The truth about life is you can never be perfect in everything so delegate or outsource what isn't your strength.

When I was 36 I had the amazing career and home and health. But no partner or kids. I thought I had time then I had a major health issue! I'm back on an even keel now but we had the pandemic and now it's too late for kids.

So I would say don't take health for granted. In terms of spending now is also the perfect time to reel it in and spend only in line with your values. If you love clothes, get your colours done professionally and build a beautiful minimal curated wardrobe where you buy less, spend more per item if you wish, and get multi use from everything you own. Etc.

Think my username is a bit of a giveaway - and I'm muuuuch older than you.😊