Hitting the thirties....does anyone else feel like it's all downhill???

[MarieW]

Well I hit thirty last year and I coped. Now I'm 31 I feel sooooo old.

Does anyone else feel like this? Okay so life has been difficult but I used to be so gorgeous. I'm still the same dress size but seems to me nothing on my body looks as good as it did a few years ago. My bf tells me I'm being paranoid but it's more than that.,

I smoke and drink ( not excessively ) and I exercise moderately, eat reasonably healthily but it's like I've hit the "no way back" button and everything is dying. Maybe it's just me.

I'd be interested to hear from other 30 somethings.

xxx

[NEONINK]

Try hitting the 40's sweetheart... It's just around the corner from me.

 

Hey! It ain't downhill from where you are!

[moimeme]

You do realize that the thirties are considered a woman's sexual prime?

[MarieW]

Moimeme, lol yes i know that and boy is it true!!!! Wish I felt as confident as I did a few years ago though, but I guess I just need to learn to love myself.

Thanks Neonink, 40 isn't that far off I guess. Hopefully by then I will have got to kow myself a lot better. I shouldn't worry really, so many women i admire are in their 40s and beautiful.

[Clancy]

I agree that the thirties are a woman's prime. I find the women I am most attractied to are in their thirties. The astonishing Catherine Zeta Jones is thirty-four today.

[Fancy]

I'm 32, and while I can see some tiny little lines creeping in around my eyes, people guess me to be in my 20s. I'm actually feeling better in my 30s than I ever did in my 20s. Drinking a lot of water and exercising is a big part of that.

 

I'm not trying to get on your case or anything, but drinking and smoking will age you faster than you realize. I see it all the time. And hey.....be glad you can still fit into your clothes!

[nicolez66]

I know what your talking about. I'm 35 now. I was a very petite lady my whole life>4"11 & about 90/ 95 lbs, very happy with myself, felt good about my looks and my body( thought i wanted to gain a little weight). well when i turned around 33 i started gaining weight and did not realize it right away and one day i woke up and i was 130 lbs, with the belly thing, thicker face & arms & legs, wont even mention my behind...lol. It might not sound over weight to most of you, but remember im really short , so it did have a impact on the way looked and felt. One day acually took off my work uniform and put summer clothes on and OMG nothing fit me. I have been trying to lose the weight so i feel better about myself, my matabolizim slowed down and made it really HARD to lose weight. Im down to 120 lbs now but it took 8 months just to lose 10 lbs ~frowns~ Sad thing is i thought this stuff happened to you when your more like in the 40's......boy was i wrong.......tell me the crazy mental part of it will go away soon. I miss my head ya know....lol...

 

 

Thanks for listening to me whine........

[reasontosigh]

When I turned 30, there was a show on TV called "thirtysomething". I thought to myself that if I was going to end up like the whining yuppie wannabes that were portrayed on that show I should just crawl in a hole for the next 10 years. Of course when I mentioned that to one of my girlfriends her response was "What are you worried about? You're only 30! Thirtysomething isn't till next year!"

 

Not like I was worried about that on my 31st birthday - I was in a bar that night with just the bartender and a shell-shocked Vietnam Vet watching the Gulf War unfold on TV.

 

Basically, "30-something blahs" do happen but the feelings, at least for me, were fleeting. They just come and go, usually when one is blah about other things.

 

And actually, nicolez66, I thought I'd go thru all that when I hit 40 but it seems the opposite happened. I started to get excited about all kinds of possibilities! (btw, I'm 44 now)

[Girlie]

I don't feel 30's are old at all. I think a mature, strong, intelligent older woman is as good as it gets. I'll be hitting them in about a year and a half and I think I look and feel better than I ever have in my life. I know that I'm way more confident and composed than I was in my early twenties and hope to keep that going. I know a lot of guys my age and a little bit older who are just dying and trying to get in the pants of these little 20 year olds and I think they're totally intimidated by older more mature women and I so think they are missing out. Just my opinion.

[cdn]

Um. Just trust me when I say it's going to get much, much, worse!

 

[meanon]

Um. Just trust me when I say it's going to get much, much, worse!

 

LOL cdn there speaks the voice of experience

 

Marie you may not be so hot but you can do so much more with what you've got when you hit your stride in your 30s. You get to know yourself better, you're more confident - people find that attractive - it more than compensates.

 

Enjoy!

[Thinkalot]

Hello...I had a slight crisis/tantrum when I turned 30 in June last year. I do some freelance writing. Here is an article I wrote on the subject for a local paper...I thought I'd copy it here for anyone who has the time/inclination to read!!! Cheers all...Thinkalot... (age 30 and loving it!...kinda)

 

*******

 

 

THE TRICKY ART OF TURNING 30

 

It creeps up on you, silently, stealthily. Then all of the sudden it's there and you realise with a strange mix of happiness and fear that you are about to turn the big 3-0. Aged 29-and-counting, Thinkalot (!) explores why a year can mean so much...

 

**************

 

30. It’s just a number isn’t it?

 

As a 29 year old woman looking down the barrel of the gun, I can tell you with some certainty, that no, it isn’t. For many, including myself, the 30th birthday milestone looms ominously on the horizon, a stormy cloud bank over otherwise calm waters.

 

Happily, we amble through our teens and twenties, confident we will have somehow magically achieved everything we wish for by the mystical age of 30. It may be career success. Or maybe it’s marriage and kids. Whatever the aim, the deadline is often the same, most of us, in our youthful optimism, echoing a hauntingly familiar phrase, “I’ll have done that by the time I’m 30”.

 

Then all of the sudden it’s there. The 30th birthday. Some rare, blessed people may have ticked all the appropriate boxes. But many others, like me, will have just as many crosses as ticks, and feelings of insecurity, panic and perhaps even a sense of failure begin to emerge.

 

A quick poll of the younger folk in my office revealed that most have indeed fallen under the “by the time I’m 30” spell.

 

“ I certainly hope to be settled down by then, maybe having kids,” claimed 21 year old Ben, “I really hope I have those things by the time I’m 30”.

 

17 year old Mitch agreed.

“By 30 I hope I’ll be a really cool Dad,” he said, “knocking the ball around with my kids”.

As a fresh faced 21 year old, I too, was filled of visions of the future. With confidence I declared that I would start having kids when I was around 30 (of course I would have found my soulmate by then). An ambitious young journalist, I was also determined to be a known name in television within 10 years. Meanwhile, in my spare time, I planned travelling the world. Sure, it was a lot, but 30 was a long way away after all.

 

Recently I realised with a jolt that 30 was no longer “a long way away” but almost a reality. The shock hit me one day when my young netball team-mates began discussing birthdays. I emerged as the oldest of the bunch and quickly became labelled as the “grandma” of the team. It was not a good moment.

 

That night I began reflecting on my life, ruthlessly assessing my achievements, comparing where I was, to where I had thought I would be. I had achieved a lot, but a lot didn’t match up. Did that mean I had lost the plot? And how did I compare to those of the same age around me? 30 is by no means old, yet time, which had once seemed to stretch on with comforting certainty, suddenly seemed much shorter. I became convinced I would have to act fast, get serious and become responsible if I was to achieve all my elusive goals. The fun, free days of my twenties seemed about to vanish forever.

 

As I stood there, on the brink of a turning-30-tantrum, those around me didn’t help. I was bombarded by outside pressures and expectations.

 

Well meaning parents and friends began asking whether I would be married soon, and of course, when would I start having babies (there is a general assumption among many that the biological alarm clock should surely be ringing by 30 and there can be no perceivable excuse why tiny, squirming bundles of joy should be delayed any longer)? Others were more interested to know how my share portfolio was going, and did I own my own home yet?

 

My reply- that I wasn’t particularly interested in nappies or the sharemarket, and planned on a lot more overseas travel before I threw down anchor- raised more than one eyebrow. I began to wonder if I’d fallen off the straight and narrow after all.

 

Eager for reassurance I turned to those of the same age around me. Thankfully, I discovered I was not alone.

 

 

One of my friends, Joanne, is a successful 30 year old career woman in

Sydney. While not quite in the Bridget Jones / Desperate & Dateless

category just yet, she admits she is not immune from the odd moment of 30's

blues.

 

"It normally doesn't bother me", she recently protested, "but sometimes

I look around me and everyone is in couples - and I have nothing to talk

to them about. It's as if pursuing a career puts me out of touch with

normal people. The other day I was at a barbeque full of married people

in their twenties, with women obsessing about baby names. I was bored

out of my brain. I’m not desperate to get into a relationship and I

don't want to become a baby factory - is there something wrong with

me?".

 

Others reminded me that it isn’t just the search for the fabled Knight in Shining Armour which can cause anxiety. One 31-year-old woman I know is happily settled with a nice home, a husband and children. Yet she hasn’t achieved the round-the-world trip she dreamed of in her early twenties and fears that now she’s over 30, it’s too late.

 

When quizzed, the men in my circle generally seemed to be slightly less affected by the big 3-0. Even my partner, who turned 30 last year, was heard declaring, “It’s just another birthday isn’t it…I’m not bothered at all” (he is obviously from Mars and doesn’t understand the complexities).

 

Some of the male species however, could relate to my fears. My friend Neil, a snowboard instructor in his 30s, summed it up,

 

“I know people expect me to be settling down by now, instead of moving from place to place, following the winters and snowboarding. Sometimes I even wonder if I’m getting too old for this and should be doing something more mainstream now that I’m in my 30s. But the fact is I love what I’m doing and I’m slowly learning how to happily accept my choices- even if my life is different from most”.

 

And that was the comment which saved me from despair. A light went on as I realised that acceptance is what it’s all about- accepting yourself for who you are, regardless of your choices in those first 30 years. There is no right or wrong answer, just as there is no right or wrong way to spend the next 30 years. The main thing is being happy.

 

My lovely parents, who both turn 60 this year, were also quick to point out that there are plenty of milestones to conquer after the age of 30 and that it’s never too late to create the life you want. When I turned to them in search of some parental sympathy at the least, they simply laughed. Age is relative and faced with the prospect of entering their aged pension years and being labelled by society as “old”, they didn’t think turning 30 was anything to cry over (in turn, my 85 year old grandmother keeps reminding them that 60 ain’t that bad either).

 

So back to my checklist…

 

At 29, I have found a man (the one with no 30’s hang-ups) (tick). I have no kids (cross), but neither do I want any just yet. I don’t own a home (cross), but I have travelled a lot and plan on seeing a lot more before I settle down (tick). And far from being a big name under lights in Sydney (cross), I chose to leave the big smoke a few years ago to work in regional television on the coast, where I have a great lifestyle (tick).

 

I might not have ticked all the boxes I created at age 21 (or for that matter, everyone else’s boxes), but I am content as I am. And while I plan on enjoying my last couple of months as an irresponsible twenty-something, I have resolved to enter the new decade with a smile rather than a scream.

 

And when it’s all come and gone, I might just keep on being irresponsible for a while longer. I’m only turning 30 after all.

[/i][/b]

[Arabess]

Oh GOOD GRIEF!~!!~ You guys are all still spring chickens. I turn 40 tomorrow.....

[HokeyReligions]

I would love to be 30 again! I would love to be 40 again!

 

Lemme tell 'ya. I was 28 two days ago. You are going to wake up one morning next week and a couple of decades will have gone by and you'll think to yourselves "what happened?! I don't remember time flying by so fast!" And the popping you've been hearing in your knees for the last few years is now accompanied by some discomfort and you realize your knees don't extend quite as much as they used to.

 

I'm telling you -- it's going to happen to you next week!

[Vivid_29]

Marie - I just turned 30, a week and half ago. At first, I was dreading my 30th b-day, but once it came, I actually felt OK about it.

 

Don't feel bad about it. I think women in their 30's and 40's are sexy as hell!!!

 

~V

[Thinkalot]

Originally posted by Vivid_29

I think women in their 30's and 40's are sexy as hell!!!

 

~V

 

Bless you Vivid

[flannelpajamas]

I can completely relate! It's a weird feeling.........I'm trying to take it as it comes and figure out the life lessons.

[SoleMate]

I'm [color=yellow]41[/color].

 

Deal with it, you little kids.

 

There's prolly someone out there saying, "I wish I were 85 again!!!!"

[SoleMate]

Vivid...you're my man. Or you could be. Interested????