Quarter-life Crisis

Thoughts on turning 25.

I turned 25 last month.

I’m not sure how I feel about it. 

I definitely don’t have a list of “25 lessons for my 25th birthday.” I don’t feel any older, any wiser, or any smarter. If anything, I feel like I know less than I have my whole life. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about my past recently and one thing I can’t seem to shake is the following question–

who the fuck lets eighteen-year-olds make so many decisions? 

I regret so much from when I was eighteen. I regret taking out over $100,000 in student loans, the Harry Potter tattoo I got on my rib cage, the boy I fell in love with, letting myself lose my identity and friendships for a relationship, starving myself, wasting my time trying to be somebody I’m not. The list goes on further than I’d like to admit.  

I thought I was so old when I was 18. I thought had my shit together (I didn’t) and I thought I knew who I was and what I wanted to be. I was voted “most likely to succeed” by my senior class when I was 18. I was going to live in D.C., work in foreign policy, and have a successful career above all else. I didn’t feel like I belonged and I convinced myself that it was because I was destined for some greater purpose making the world a better place, bigger and better than my hometown. I didn’t need to fit in. I didn’t need an easy comfortable life because I was going to make a difference. 

I wish I could go back in time and tell my 18-year-old self to first and foremost cut the narcissistic bullshit, but also to slow down and stop constantly trying to get to the next goal, the next phase of life, the next achievement. There was so much time. There is so much time.

My biggest fears at the time were gaining weight, being abandoned by the people I loved, and not living up to the expectations I had placed on myself and the perceived (but nonexistent) expectations of others.

Fast forward some years later and I’ve gained nearly 70lbs since I was eighteen. I’ve learned how absurd it was to be fearful of that for so many years. I’m disappointed that it took becoming my own worst nightmare to be able to deconstruct that shame and fear I carried my whole life. It took a lot of work but I genuinely like how I look now. I gained weight but I also gained a sense of personal style, greater confidence in myself, and more time to spend on the things and people I love instead of constantly worrying about my body. Most importantly, I lost my internalized fatphobia and disordered eating that robbed me of my girlhood. 

Between then and now I have been abandoned by people I loved. Failed friendships and relationships hurt deeply. Some almost broke me but it’s true whatever cliche things they say about hindsight. I’m now incredibly grateful for those who left. Sometimes I think of where I’d be or who I’d be if they had stayed. Some other version of myself that probably would’ve ended in unhappiness, regret, and resentment. Sometimes now and then when my anxiety takes hold, I’ll still get twinges of fear and intrusive thoughts in the back of my mind telling me that those I love secretly hate me and are going to up and leave without as much as a goodbye. I’ve gotten better at distinguishing my anxious thoughts from reality with the help of SSRIs, a now almost fully formed prefrontal cortex, and the knowledge that even if abandoned, in the grand scheme of things, I will be fine. 

I’m still actively wrestling with my last fear. Its grip has left me exhausted for years, fighting to live up to the arbitrary and conceited expectations I placed on my own life when I was a teenager. I’ve recently come to terms with the fact that past me would be horrified when looking at my life at 25. I’ve gained weight, I moved back to my home state after swearing I’d never return, I don’t have a high-powered career making real change in the world, I don’t have a large group of close friends, my chronic illness took control of my life, and I struggle severely with my mental and physical health. 

As I consider what I really want in life– creativity, softness, happiness, balance, and community, I’m still haunted by the expectations I placed on myself when I was someone who thought what college I went to and what prom dress I wore would be the most important decisions I ever made. I don’t want the career I worked so hard to get. I don’t want a life of greatness. I want a life that has balance, that makes me happy, and that allows me to be creative, do things I love, and care for my community and others without pretension or guilt for not making some great sacrifice. 

I have no great insight as to how I’ll get there, but for now, I’ll start by allowing myself to not have it all figured out. I have time.