Anyone else feel that time is running out

[Rankandfile]

For the last 8 years or so I’ve had this feeling that time is running out, along with a load of regret that I didn’t do more / make different choices. For perspective, I’m 55 this year, have a successful career, love my job, head a department, lived abroad from 30-52 (one year travelling and the rest working) and have 2 teenage kids. I just can’t shake off this feeling that I wish I was in my 30s or 40s and that I’ll blink and be too old to do anything!! Talk me out of this ridiculousness.

@Greyish2025 you're right, the years do seem to go by quicker and quicker and that's all to do with how long you've been alive. When you were a kid a year summers seemed to last forever, but as you get older our brains processes time at a much faster rate.

Oh my god, I do exactly this. In particular I look at other relatives and how old they are/were, and think "if I live to that age I have x years left". It's horrible way to live.

I mean, the only thing certain in life is that it'll end, so why the hell do we wind ourselves so much up about when and how. We should just bloody well live. And. I. Can't.

Time is moving for everyone. You sound like you've had a successful and varied life. I've just read your update that you're divorcing and that's probably adding to your feeling of unease.

I'm 42 and am very grateful for the lovely life I live. My family are happy, healthy and doing well. I've no financial worries, and have a good career. I feel like I've achieved everything I've wanted in life 3 degrees (including a doctorate) a child, husband, friends, mortgage free etc. I don't want anything 'big' (don't know what that would look like), so I try and look for the other joys in life- seeing my dc do well, holidays, walking the dog, sitting in front of the fire with wine and a book.

Hopefully I've the same amount of time in front of me as behind me but I know I'll not achieve the same tangible things I have already but that's ok. I just want to be a good mother, wife, friend etc.

Not read the whole thread, so shoot me if I'm repeating...

To those who have regrets, and having thoughts of "I've not done this that or the other" -

Actually write down in the form of bullet points, what you have achieved.

You'll be surprised, and don't forget, one mans version of achievement, is another mans version of failure.

Please don't put yourself down people?

There's enough negativity going on out there to drown you- you don't need to create a pool of doubt , only to jump in it and not be able to swim.

Like the song by Chesney Hawkes,
You Are The One And Only----

Best wishes

I'm 52. In a second relationship with the love of my life for the past 8 years. I constantly feel like time is running out. I don't have regrets because I don't believe in them. But keep thinking I want 30 years with my man. Chances are slim. We have a nice life. Still working hard but we do nice stuff like travel and food and theatre etc. I have recently heard a few shocks about people I grew up with dying from heart attacks. I feel on constant tenterhooks thinking I'm gonna lose him or I'm going to die and it would be just a tiny part of my life. My parents are very elderly and ill too. Combined with that and menopause anxiety feels like I'm losing the plot sometimes! I'm the happiest in a relationship I've ever been but everything else is hard. I've made a conscious decision that I will spend as much time with family this that I can, I don't want to regret that as it's the only regret I think I can't deal with.

Love the way you're thinking 🥰

I think feel lucky you were born in the 60s70s your life has been much better than life for those born since 2000

I’m 70 and I’m starting to think that time is running out. This feeling is not helped by the long, dark, cold Scottish winter. I know however that the Spring will cheer and invigorate me.

My goals are different now.

I travel to places where winter sun warms me. I appreciate spending time with friends, and continue to try to push barriers/opinions/expectations about women (and now aging women).

Family = contentment now rather than stress and worry.
Children and young people amaze and delight me.

Nothing is permanent OP

I feel exactly the same OP and a very similar age to you.

I keep telling DH that we've only got 20 summer holiday years left before we're old and limited to Cruise ships. Half joking but also half panicking because it's actually true and there are more than 20 years worth of holiday destinations on my list. I worry that I won't read all the books/see all the films/go to all the countries/reach all the goals and that time is just TICK TICK TICK FUCK YOU TICK TICK TICK

I've made some terrible choices in my life and it's now definitely too late for a do-over. That's not to say i can't still do good and nice things, but I have fucked up on some of the things that matter. And I do look at my teenage kids and feel envy, yes. Not in a mean spirited way - just 'you have so much time and choice' and I don't, kind of way.

Having said that, I do have two thoughts that ground me:

Firstly, I am so grateful for having my teen years in the 80s. Thank fuck for all those memories and so little evidence. Proper going out, proper friends not online ones, healthy relationships, reading books and so on.

Secondally, growing old is a privilege. I used to think that was trite, but I have had a terrible tine of losing people recently. I have lost 4 people in their 50's in the last seven months, and it has made me really understand what people mean when they say that.

Try and find some things that you can refer to that will help reframe the time passing thing.

I feel exactly the same, more so in the last few years since I was diagnosed with breast cancer at just turned 48. I was treated successfully but the mortality check has stayed with me. I actually felt upset only the day before yesterday when it occurred to me that I wouldn’t ever read all the books I wanted to, of all things. As many pp’s have said, I don’t think I’m coping very well at the moment either, but that’s a whole other thread.

I wish i had your life.

I'm 40 and I'm very ungrateful for the life I have.

My life is very tough right now.

Can I ask- did you have a good childhood?

Because I think that people with good childhoods go on to live good lives.

@Rankandfile I’m 55 this year, have a successful career, love my job, head a department, lived abroad from 30-52 (one year travelling and the rest working)

What's the issue? You have a good job and you were able to work abroad. I don't understand what the regret is.

There will be millions of people feeling as you do, or at least have done at some point in their lives.

It's NEVER NEVER too late to make a change.

If that only ever results in one day of true happiness, then it's worth it.

I've experienced a lot of unhappiness in past situations and relationships...

I'm now in my seventies, but I've no regrets, if someone tells me I'm too old to attempt something, it's more likely that I'll try.... that I believe, is the key.

Whether you're 20 - 30 - 40 - 50 or double!

You can
You can
You can

Sending strength

YANBU OP.
I’m in my 60’s and feel the same. I look back and cannot believe how quickly the years have flown by. However I remind myself that I have great friends, my health is good, and I’m very active as is my DH, so we pack as much enjoyment into our days as possible. In the quiet moments I look back and wish I’d done more, particularly career wise, but that is definitely too late now! I am lucky to have a good life, but I just wish there was more if it ahead of me.
You are only in your 50’s though, look after yourself, socialise, eat healthy, and exercise so you can be fit enough to enjoy good times ahead.

Absolutely agree OP. I can literally see an egg timer with the sand running out.

I think for me it's watching the effects of ageing on my physical body to realise I am now a 'mature' woman. It does not bother me really but I do feel shocked as to how I got here. I mean I know everyone ages but somehow thought I would be exempt.

Then my parents both dying. Before that someone else was before me in the queue (for dying). Now they are gone I am pushed up to the front and it's very much a feeling of disbelief that they are gone and that 'I'm next'

Finding out my first serious boyfriend had died at 50 from cancer. So the tall, charming boy who I adored and loved is dead. That kind of knocked the wind out of me and made me realise time was marching on.

Even watching neighbours kids who were small toddlers when I moved to my house and now they are on the cusp of being young woman heading to high school feels shocking and really emphaises the passing of time. I don't notice it nearly as much with grown ups but kids changing really makes you aware that time is rushing by.

I'm retired now (early fifties) and whilst I am very happy to be out of the rat race saying 'I'm retired' outloud to anyone just seems surreal. I remember so clearly being the twenty something in the workplace and being a bit dismissive (in my head, not externally) to the 'old guys' in their fifties. Now I'm the 'old guy' the twenty somethings are dismissing.

Also as you say regret over decisions I can now see were bad ones and took me down a path which was not so good. Good men I didn't appreciate when I had them, houses I sold that I shouldn't have, things I worried about that were not worth my time.

The plus thing is that I worry less about things that used to concern me a great deal and now seem utterly ludicrous. I used to be houseproud, now I'm pretty untidy. I used to worry about my weight/appearance, now I'm way less concerned about it. My attitude is very much that only serious illness or death are worth worrying about to any degree. Everything else is just 'noise'
I've also developed an interest in lots of things I never use to be remotely interested in such as art, growing stuff, documentaries on planets, space, world events, world wars. I also have animals now and far favour them over buying 'stuff'.

Sometimes I think about how I want to die. My mum lingered for ages and it was not pretty at all. I hope for a quick death at a decent age. Early eighties will be fine. A quick heart attack in my bed or chair and no long hospital stays. I also don't want to leave any animals behind that have to get rehomed. Apart from that I am gradually making my peace with it the older I get.

I think a lot about if I could make decisions again. I am not worried about time running out but there are some specific decisions which were bad. If you are happy with how things have gone then I suppose it’s more of a general feelings about time passing. I worry constantly, but that is about the future

A couple of years ago I was sitting in a bar with my alcoholic husband and his boring friends, waiting until he'd agree to let me drive him home and put him to bed. I realised that time was literally running out and if I didn't make some radical changes I would have the saddest life ever.
Now I'm in my 50s and single and I still feel that time is running out, but not in a bad way. I have a new hobby and I'm trying to get out more and meet people.
Divorce is really hard, OP. Have you considered talking to a counsellor? Maybe how you are feeling is tied up with mourning your marriage.

Thank you for this ❤️

I think you are me!!!

it really does feel like time has sped up/is running out?

have you read Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver James?

Also when I had my children I didn’t realise that due to the cost of living, uni costs etc that I would be financially responsible for them for so long.
This means I will have to work til I drop and won’t be able to do a lot of the things I would have liked.

oh and I seem to have gone from trying to build a career all my life to being old enough to retire without any period of “having made it” in between.

Something to think about

So you are 55 and you regret that you didn't make different choices in your life? But you also say that you are successful in your career, love your job, are well travelled and have two teenage children.

What is it that you wish you would have done different?

You then say that you wish you were 10-20 years younger. Well, every time I look in the mirror I think that, but why do you? Is it just because you have had a great life and you want to extend it? If so, celebrate that.

If you want to make changes, do so. You're only 55. You say that you worry that you will blink and be too old to do anything, but what do you want to do? If you would like to be a NASA rocket scientist or a brain surgeon, then that ship may have sailed, but if your goal is to write a book, to travel to new parts of the world or take up a hobby, do it. And let us know how it goes.

Does this 4000 weeks book help? I feel it would make me feel worse! I am already pretty low

It kind of does both - it helps focus your mind in the things that matter