to be utterly depressed about turning 30...???

[mummee09v]

i turn the dreaded 30 in a few days and i am so bloody miserable about it.

its a fact that everythings just gonna go downhill from now on. my looks, my figure, my health, my career opportunities. i have been looking in the mirror lately and thinking i look rough. i am really into fashion but i am now starting to worry i am too old for a lot of stuff. i used to sing in a rock band but haven't bothered since my DC2 was born earlier this year coz i think i am too old for it. i have never had a career as such coz i flitted from job to job in my early 20's then have been at home with the kids since mid 20's. and now i just feel like a boring housewife. getting older is shit.

please someone kick my arse and give me some positives. i ought to be grateful, i have 2 great kids, a great fiancee (who i am treating like shit at the minute coz i am so down) and some good friends. but i am just trapped in this gloom hole that i can't climb out of.

yeah, I did have a real style crisis in my early 30's. Had put on a bit of weight. Didn't know what suited me. Had some dodgy haircuts at that time .... On a deeper level, lost confidence through not working, felt I had to constantly justify to myself and others being a SAHM..

mummee - do that singing, do some exercise, do some voluntary work to help your self esteem and find out a bit more about a job you'd like to do (I had a severe lack of career confidence and volunteering really, really helped me)

There's a website called

Do-it.org.uk which will help you find the prefect thing.

Good luck x

the perfect thing, not the prefect thing ...... (der)

This is awful, I feel terrible for you. It genuinely is downhill - fast - from here. I wish I could think of somehting positive to say but really, there is nothing. You know about the incontinence thing, right?
Just try to enjoy the last few worthwhile days you have left and avoid thinking about the yawning pit of despair that your life is about to become.

HTH.

LOL fairycake!!!!!!!!!!

I loved turning 30, my 20s were pretty dire so for me it was a release becoming 30

The best thing is sex is so much better, I find reaching orgasm easier and they are more powerful

30's far better than 20's IME........however I need more convincing about 40's as am now 47

I feel so much younger at 31 than 21. i had the wieght of the world on my shoulders at that age.

My 37 year old friend has just had his knee joint removed so he can be fitted with a prosthetic leg after he lost his lower leg in a motorbike accident. He will also have to endure further major ops to repair his left arm that only has 40% use atm.

Nuff said.

The best enhancer of mood and looks is enough sleep. I don't know how old your kids are, but I would advise you do everything you can to get the full eight hours at least once a week.

Second on my list is regular meals. If I am busy I sometimes don't eat lunch until teatime, and that isn't great either.

Sorry if it all sounds obvious, but for me,if those two are taken care of, I have the energy to tackle the other stuff. HTH

My sonewhat harsh advice to anybody complaining about getting older is to think about the alternative i.e. not getting older i.e. kicking the bucket. Maybe it's not so bad after all, no? Be grateful for your life and realise that there is beauty in it.

I haven't read all of this because tbh I think worrying about being 30 is a bit silly. Sorry but it just is.

I am 50 next year and can honestly say that life has got better and more fulfilling as I've got older. My twenties were crap and I only really began to mature as a person in my thirties - we're the product of our experiences and if you deny the positive opportunities you have as you get older you deny yourself the chance to develop further.

Thirty is a piece of cake. Forty is better. I'm looking forward to my fifties and beyond . Why waste your life worrying?

I'm 35, the 30s are where you gain all confidence and become a woman!

By the way you are not just a boring housewife - you are a mother and that is the most important job in the world. Never underestimate how hard it is.

Too bloody right Ali

Your 30s are your most glamorous decade, by far, providing you nurture and cherish yourself. And you know so much more than when you were in your 20s, and can put it to good use to improve your life.

Enjoy it! This will be the best decade (and the defining decade) of your life, if you let it.

Well the alternative to turning 30 looks a whole lot more grim.

Thirties are great. Old enough to realise which hairstyles look crap, old enough for the zits to be reatreating, young enough not to have your mums jowels and "laughter lines ".

Wait 'til your past 40 - then you get the zits AND the wrinkles! [bastard emoticon]

childhood - getting fcked up by your parents;
teens - getting fcked up by your hormones;
twenties - getting over the self-esteem issues and eating disorders caused by stages 1 and 2;
thirties - realising that the past was just bollocks and your parents are just (mostly) harmless imbeciles. Going for lunch - with wine and sniggering at how naff teenage girls look in their identikit uniforms. and not having a crush on that 10 year old kid from Twilight.

Thirties kick ass. Be who you want to be!

i hated my teens. i was badly bullied at school and treated very badly by my first couple of boyfriends. i was geeky, skinny and awkward and hardly any boys fancied me.

then i got to about 20 and i don't know what happened, maybe i "grew in" to my looks? but i learned how to dress and realised i had a pretty great figure, so i learned to show it off more and also sorted my hair and make up out. then suddenly everywhere i went i noticed men staring at me after years of being invisible. i became the girl i had always wanted to be. i became more confident so in turn became more popular and finally felt good about myself. i am sorry if this sounds big headed but i suddenly went from the girl no one noticed to being the centre of attention everywhere i went and i loved it. so i loved my 20's.

so i spent my 20's making up for my awful teens by enjoying my new found confidence and enjoying actually being seen as attractive rather then feeling ugly. then when i started singing in bands that got me even more attention and admiration just doing something i loved and it was amazing.

and now i am turning 30 i feel like i am going to lose my looks and become invisible again except this time i will never get it back.

i have read this back and i know how it sounds and i know some people will read this and think "shallow woman!!" and maybe i am but as i said before i feel like my looks are the only thing going for me.

I was feeling quite good about being 44 until I read that! It's not that bad.

PS: I do empathise really - I remember having the crisis that you are having early at 26! never had one since.

Timeforme - Happy Birthday!

OP - don't worry about the owning a house thing. I think prices will drop loads yet and when you eventually buy, you will get so much more for your money than your peers did 5 years ago, they will be the envious ones.

yes kerry i will definitely be following your tip lol

thanks for all the nice posts x

and mudandmayhem yes i really hope house prices drop more as well, even though they are slightly cheaper than they used to be they are still pretty much impossible to afford unless you're on at least 40k between you which me and dp certainly arent!!