I turn 30 today

[roro_1990]

Feeling crap as usual when it's my birthday but even more so this year. I tried to combat the existential dread about my shit life and how much I messed up my youth. I wrote down 29 things about my life that I enjoyed in my 29th year last night.

I managed to get 29 things written down despite the fact that I felt miserable for most of the year. Just reading that list you'd think I was this happy, adventureous, curious bloke who does a lot of cool things. But such a list doesn't reveal the subjective mental pain and loneliness I go through day by day.

Managing to do 29 ok things in a year doesn't compensate for the position I find myself in, though. I deactivated my Facebook last night just so I wouldn't have to go through the embarassment of having about 3 Happy Birthdays posted to me. I feel lonely around my parents because I don't have much in common with them. I feel lonely around my partner because I don't feel love anymore. The only half glimmer is seeing my child smile.

I still live at home with my parents, which is most instances is seen as a failure for anyone over 30. My relationship is failing but I don't know how to end it because my partner and child live with me at my parents' place and my partner can't afford to rent a place of her own even with my help. Social housing would be an option but there'd probably be at least a 12-month wait.

I've tried therapy to combat my high levels of neuroticism but I invariably give up after a few sessions. I'm too afraid of meds to give them a proper trial.

As for my birthday itself, I've nothing planned except a meal in some Korean restaurant with my partner. I went for a walk alone this morning and grabbed a coffee. Most people who turn 30 have large parties reflecting their social success in their 20s when they met lots of new people in various life circumstances and befriended them.

Oh life.

[gregarious_introvert]

Happy Birthday, Roro.

A meal in a restaurant is the most elaborate celebration I have had for any birthday, so I hope you enjoy it; I spent my 30th birthday alone after turning up for work and finding that I didn't have a job anymore, so it could be worse.

I'm not sure that "most" people who turn 30 have large parties - the ones who don't aren't visible (this is the issue with social media and why it's so easy to make unfavourable comparisons, because those who aren't able to show an interesting side to their lives aren't posting anything). Enjoy your day and celebrate those 29 things you enjoyed, rather than worrying about what others do or don't have.

[limey123]

I just had a very small get-together with a few friends when I turned 30 (I was then living in Germany). For my 40th I did absolutely nothing and that suited me best. In my experience, birthdays get less important as you age.
I agree with GI, try not to compare yourself to others, as we're all on our own paths. Keep in mind the 29 things you did find that you enjoyed and hold on to those.

[limey123]

Originally Posted by Kooky Monster

In terms of social media, I have one account, an Instagram account. I don't post anything and I don't follow people, including my best friends. It creates for a better headspace.

If only many more people followed your example!

[Dougella]

Happy Birthday! Hope you enjoy your meal out.

When I turned 30 I was still living at home, still suffering with depression. Five years later I live with my boyfriend and my depression has lifted a lot, I still have SA but things are a lot better.

[anxiouslondoner]

Happy birthday!
I was terrified of turning 30, it felt like a gun pointed at my head, whereas now I'm 43 I just think "meh", I haven't sorted my crap out by now so I never will. Now because I don't share my date of birth on Facebook I got exactly one response last year from someone who wasn't family (thanks friend)

Anyway at least if you want to do something big and a bit crazy, now is exactly the time to do it, if you can. Admittedly Covid may make that a little difficult depending on what that is, but you can make plans for if we ever get out of this horrorshow of a year alive.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by roro_1990

Most people who turn 30 have large parties reflecting their social success in their 20s when they met lots of new people in various life circumstances and befriended them.

Do they? Or is that a bit of self-torture roro? Many people turn 30 in a desperate, ****ed up state - suicidal, addicted, lonely, divorced, traumatized, poor, estranged from their kids, and so on. And even the ones who do throw the big party probably have their secret miseries and regrets - married to the wrong person, hate their job, etc.

I really sympathize roro. Turning 30 was horrific and nearly triggered a nervous breakdown. It became much harder to fool myself that I was still young and that, one day, I was gonna 'do something'. I sort of hung on to the delusion throughout my 30s (with increasing desperation), but admitted defeat, at last, when I turned 40. 40 was like death. I just gave up.

Like 'No Longer Human' I was in a pitiful state on my 30th. Now, at 43, I'm still in pain. I still feel regret and despair, but it's a calm despair. The intensity of the pain has reduced. That's the one good thing about getting older, you feel things less intensely.

At least you have your daughter. Maybe you feel trapped by her, but ten or fifteen years from now, you'll look at a young woman and be amazed that you produced her. And if she is happy (which I hope she is) that will make you happy. And when you are old, and you look back over your life, hopefully she'll make you feel like it was worth living and that you did achieve something.

[Indigo_]

Originally Posted by roro_1990

Most people who turn 30 have large parties reflecting their social success in their 20s when they met lots of new people in various life circumstances and befriended them.

Originally Posted by Moksha

Many people turn 30 in a desperate, ****ed up state - suicidal, addicted, lonely, divorced, traumatized, poor, estranged from their kids, and so on.

Neither of these are the norm, they are extremes at either end of a spectrum, the latter even more so.

The majority, I would imagine, have a small gathering involving close family and friends. The majority, I would imagine, approach their 30th with some semblance of regret 'I didn't do this in my 20s' and hope 'this decade, I'm going to...' etc.

Anxiety and mental health can really twist how we perceive the majority or 'normals' live.

[roro_1990]

Originally Posted by Indigo_

Neither of these are the norm, they are extremes at either end of a spectrum, the latter even more so.


Anxiety and mental health can really twist how we perceive the majority or 'normals' live.

Yup, distorted perceptions is precisely how I'd describe my thought process for the last five or six years. The problem is that my thinking is so distorted that my observations into how other people live, whether on social media or through seeing people offline, feel like they give me real, genuine, accurate insight into peoples' actual level of happiness.

[roro_1990]

Thanks for the happy birthday messages by the way, they were much appreciated. I wish I could say my 30s so far has involved positive change, but I've felt even more despondant than ever and took to drinking two or three beers every night since I turned 30, just to take the edge off. Oh well.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by DiamonD

@roro

I do hope you had a nice Birthday. I hate them! Birthdays are pointless when you get older and i always find them the most depressing day of the year so this year i didn't celebrate it and from now on i won't either. People now know not to send me a card or it'll go straight in the bin

Amen to that Diamond. I HATE birthdays. They are literally the worst day of the year for me, and have been since I was a teenager. As for the biggies, like 20, 25, 30 and 40, I’d rather have had a tooth out than gone through them. When you suffer from mental illness, especially one that holds you back as much as SA, birthdays are just an agonising reminder of lost time. With every birthday I have died a little. Now, at 43, I’ve pretty much given up on life, and am weirdly happier for it!!

[limey123]

Originally Posted by DiamonD

I just focus on what i do enjoy in my life and what i do have control over

Sounds like a good policy. Fix/improve what you can and then let the rest go.

[Jwalk]

I stopped really celebrating birthdays when I was about 12 because I hated all the attention (although I still liked getting presents, whereas now I could take or leave them). I only went out on my 18th because it was on a Saturday and that was a night we usually went to the pub anyway. Post 21 my birthday rarely gets a mention, other than a card from my parents, so its like they never really happen. Consequently I didn't really have the angst of turning 30 like most of the people I knew. I always considered 21 to be the end of "youth", so 20 was more my angst year. I doubt anyone makes it to 30 without having a list of regrets or things that they didn't get around to doing, even those annoying "no regrets" people. I'm not even sure how common big parties are for your 30th? The ones I've been to were always pretty small affairs, compared to the 21st, 40th, 50th, and 60th parties that I've been to.


Weirdly, I do have a lot of angst about turning 40, but I think that's because I associate it more with being middle aged so I guess its more of a vanity thing. I don't think its functionally any different that being 30.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by DiamonD

Just wait until you get to 40!

Ugghh...you said it. Turning 40 was like dying. Physically I’m still here, but spiritually, emotionally, etc, I’m dead. I feel like a shell. We massively underestimate the psychological impact of those numbers. I bet turning 30, or 40, or 50, has triggered countless depressions and breakdowns.

The first 40 years are like climbing a hill. No matter how miserable and horrible life may be, at least you feel you are climbing upwards, towards something - maybe something better (that’s what you tell yourself anyway). Turning 40 is like reaching the top of the hill and finding nothing there. You realise that you weren’t really building towards anything at all. Now I am falling down the other side of that hill, at increasing speed, desperately trying to slow my descent by grabbing at branches and boulders on the way. As for what lies at the bottom, I don’t even want to think about it.

Up to 40 everything you do (travelling, partying, relationships, going to university, etc) is ‘an experience’, something that might help you in the future, something you can learn from, something you will tell your grandchildren about. Beyond 40 that stops. You no longer feel like you are going anywhere. I am unlikely to have kids now, let alone grandchildren, so it’s not like I’m going to be sitting a child on my knee (not that there would be anything interesting to tell them). Maybe that’s why I can’t be bothered to do anything now. I just think ‘what’s the point’? It’s not like it’s for anything - or anyone. Actually, you could define the midlife crisis as just that - the realisation you are no longer building towards something.

[Dougella]

^ So at age 39 you can do everything you might want and at 40 suddenly everything is cut off and you can't do anything?

I don't think that's the case, I think that's your state of mind. Lots of people, particularly men, are getting married and having children in their 40s, there's no reason people can't travel in their 40s and people start a completely new career and go back to university to study in their 40s and beyond.

I also think we have to try to see reaching certain ages as a privilege. Many people don't get the chance to reach these milestones and if we are that is something we shouldn't take for granted.

[choirgirl]

I've been so low in motivation since reaching about 39 and a half. It's a ****er of a birthday if you don't have anything to show for it. I can't seem to get myself out of it. But I've got to try.

I liked turning 30. I spent my 30th birthday chilling at home and reading. That's where my head was at. But it should have been a rocket under my arse, because of the sheer amount of sustained effort required to get anywhere in life at all by that era. If I'd woken up then, concentrated on the bare minimum of what I wanted to achieve, forget what I'm supposed to be doing or what might be nice to do, and stopped ****ing about, maybe I would have been in a better position five or so years later.

There's a bit in Dubliners that spoke to me in my early 30s, the frustration, the stagnation, but the sense that somehow you could still turn this oil tanker of disaster around - from Two Gallants: 'He would be 31 in November. Would he never get a good job? Would he never get a home of his own?......Experience had embittered his heart against the world. But all hope had not left him.....He might yet still be able ....if only....' And that's the difference between 30 and 40!