The Quarter Life Crisis

Back when my only concern was where the next piece of pasta was arriving from. 

“When I hit 25, I’ll be getting botox” has become my mantra with my twin (and anyone who would listen) since I was around 19. 25, the elusive age where, in my head, I would suddenly wake up and need botox, a personal trainer to speed up my metabolism and a counsellor to help me ride through being old.  

In steps the quarter life crisis. A midlife crisis at 50? No, I’m having a quarter life crisis. At 24 and a half, to be exact. A lot of my friends are engaged (two in the past 48 hours, to boot), several have had children, and many more are moving in with their significant others. I, on the other hand, am sat in my pyjamas at 4:30pm on a Sunday watching Homeland whilst inhaling a bagel (it’s ‘protein’ though, so it’s okay). It’s not that I don’t feel fulfilled, but that everyone else is moving ahead of me and doing the grownup stuff.

At the start of each week, I’ll begin to think about how every morning I’ll get up, pick out a bomb outfit for work and absolutely kill my week, both in work and at home. Being brutally honest, my alarm goes off at 6am every weekday morning, and instead of seizing the day like all good self help books advocate, I hit the snooze button until around 6:20, which is around the time I’ll throw myself out of my bed, trip over my hair straighteners and try and dash around my house, ready to be leaving at 7am looking semi-human. My normal breakfast is porridge with a spoonful of Nutella (no avo on toast here, folks) and my morning tea is Tetley with milk (no bulletproof coffee here either). At the gym, I’ll scroll social media whilst warming up, and will mentally will my body to keep going through the cardio which it is having to endure, so that I can look semi decent on the beach this year.

I have spent many hours examining my hair to check for any signs of, shock horror, a grey hair. Twice, I have found one. And twice, I have stared in absolute horror at the find, only to begin to imagine what my hair would look like completely grey at 30.

I am yet to master how to stop a leak from a pipe, or know how to change a tyre on a car. What I can do, however, is drink a whole bottle of wine in under an hour and still be standing – who’s the real winner here?

It’s all of the little things like this, that lead me to feeling unfulfilled and having a ‘crisis’ (albeit largely satirical, nobody panic) at the age of just under 25. Do I need botox? No. No I need more damned sleep and a moisturiser which does its job. I will also not stop laughing to avoid more wrinkles, and I will not stop drinking my wine in a bid to look better on the beach.

Sure, my crisis is coming at me full tilt whilst all of my friends are planning their marriages, their nurseries and where the sofa is going to go in their new flat, but whilst they are planning their new lives, I am rummaging my way through my current one, and finding things to laugh at in each situation.

I am learning to become more independent, after having several fantastic housemates over the years who have been both friends and life counsellors whilst I’ve sat on my bed eating a McDonalds and complaining about another round of life drama which, in the grand scheme of things, are either very minor, or so ridiculous that it’s now become funny.

 I’ve started to care less about what people think of me, and more about what I want to do with my life. I used to be embarrassed when people found out I had a fitness Instagram and a blog, where I would express my internal monologue on a wider platform. Now, I’ll happily tell people what I’m tapping away on my laptop about, and I will happily snap away photos of myself for my fitness Instagram without feeling awkward if they asked what they were there for.

I am in a very fortunate position to be buying a house of my own next year, completely solo. And whilst I can’t help but feel a sense of excitement for officially being a home owner; I am mostly excited about owning my own dog, which I will name Thor.

 There, I said it. Judge me and my dog name choices. But this is how I will spend my evenings, scrolling Pinterest for my little castle of my own, whilst simultaneously wondering how many dogs are too many dogs to own in one place.