Feeling Like an Adult

[Anonymous]

I am a 56 year old woman. When I was growing up in a small town in the 1960s my mother did not work outside the home, my grandmothers did not work outside the home, and none of my friends' mothers worked outside the home unless they had a family business and they "helped out" in the business.

I have a professional job ($150,000+ a year), two children in their 20s who are both employed and not living at home, a loving husband who I have been married to for 32 years (who also has a professional job), a nice house, a 401K, other investments, and almost every possible indicator of an upper middle class adult life. However, the one time I truly feel like an adult is when I take an occasional day off from work to catch up on errands and other domestic chores. Going to the grocery store at 11 a.m. on a weekday makes me feel like an adult. Going to my job where I earn a respectable salary and where people look up to me and ask me for my input and my opinion does not.

I know this is not rational. The only way I can understand it is to think it must be related to my childhood when most adult women did not work. Does anyone else feel this way? I know that my daughter felt like she became an adult when she got her first professional job, but she grew up with the role model of a mother who worked.

[Anonymous]

I'm (lost, apparently) 37 and don't feel like an adult at all, and I don't have any of the things you have except a full time job (I earn less than half of what you do and don't have any of the other stuff.

I feel like a fraud, like a teenager playing a game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm (lost, apparently) 37 and don't feel like an adult at all, and I don't have any of the things you have except a full time job (I earn less than half of what you do and don't have any of the other stuff.

I feel like a fraud, like a teenager playing a game.

I'm the original poster. I got my first full-time job at your age. I worked part-time until my younger child was in first grade and we were always broke. When I was 37 I never would have dreamed I would make this much money. When I was 37 I was working part time and I made $27,757 that year (I just checked my taxes). If I use the inflation calculator on the BLS page (http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm) that translates into $41,212 in 2013 dollars. Not shabby, but nothing like what I make now.

The intention of my post was not to make you feel bad or feel like a fraud! It was to try to help me understand what makes me feel like an adult.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm (lost, apparently) 37 and don't feel like an adult at all, and I don't have any of the things you have except a full time job (I earn less than half of what you do and don't have any of the other stuff.

I feel like a fraud, like a teenager playing a game.

I'm the original poster. I got my first full-time job at your age. I worked part-time until my younger child was in first grade and we were always broke. When I was 37 I never would have dreamed I would make this much money. When I was 37 I was working part time and I made $27,757 that year (I just checked my taxes). If I use the inflation calculator on the BLS page (http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm) that translates into $41,212 in 2013 dollars. Not shabby, but nothing like what I make now.

The intention of my post was not to make you feel bad or feel like a fraud! It was to try to help me understand what makes me feel like an adult.

Oh, I know you weren't trying to make me feel badly, don't worry. Different things make different people feel like an adult. For me being married and having children would make me feel like one, yet at the same time, I don't feel mature enough to be someone's wife or knowledgeable enough to be someone's parent. My boss just turned 40 and now feels like an adult because he bought his first house. Different things for different people.

[Anonymous]

I was 28 when I lost my mother. Navigating all that death entails forced me to feel like an adult.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm (lost, apparently) 37 and don't feel like an adult at all, and I don't have any of the things you have except a full time job (I earn less than half of what you do and don't have any of the other stuff.

I feel like a fraud, like a teenager playing a game.

I'm the original poster. I got my first full-time job at your age. I worked part-time until my younger child was in first grade and we were always broke. When I was 37 I never would have dreamed I would make this much money. When I was 37 I was working part time and I made $27,757 that year (I just checked my taxes). If I use the inflation calculator on the BLS page (http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm) that translates into $41,212 in 2013 dollars. Not shabby, but nothing like what I make now.

The intention of my post was not to make you feel bad or feel like a fraud! It was to try to help me understand what makes me feel like an adult.

Wow...do you mind if I ask what field you went into that you now make so much more money? Did you go back to school? (I realize this change happened quite a while ago, but still...)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Wow...do you mind if I ask what field you went into that you now make so much more money? Did you go back to school? (I realize this change happened quite a while ago, but still...)

I did not go back to school. While I worked part-time I stagnated, both in terms of income and work, but that was okay because I made the choice to spend time with my children while they were young. However, I was bored to death in that job, and there was no opportunity to move up or do anything else, so when my younger child hit first grade I decided it was time to look for a new job and that I would probably have to go full-time if I wanted to move to a new employer. I found a new job and after working for that company for a few years they moved me into management and I moved up. I actually took a slight pay cut in terms of hourly pay when I moved from that part-time job to the full-time job but I thought there would be room to grow in the job and I was right.

I work hard and I'm competent, but there is no question that luck played a roll as well. If the company I was working for hadn't been growing, and if a couple of key people hadn't left, there would not have been the same room for me to move up even with the same work ethic and skills. That said, I think it is very important that I never dropped out of the work force entirely. I think that getting back in is much harder than moving from a part-time to a full-time position. It also helped that I was willing to take a small pay cut in my hourly rate to move to a position where I thought there would be more opportunities (although I gained benefits when I went from part-time to full-time so it wasn't really an actual pay cut if you take into account the cost of the benefits).

Sorry, I don't want to get any more specific about what I do because I would like to remain anonymous and I've already given a lot of details about my life.

[Anonymous]

I'm also in my mid-fifties. I have two grown children who are married. I've been married for 30 years. I have two master's degrees and I work full time in respected field. I have the house with all the expected things one would have by this point in the suburban family world- nothing extreme, though. I'm not a formal person- kind of casual.

Would it surprise you that I really only feel like a grown up when I wear high heels? ( Which isn't that often...) I am NOT kidding- this is true about me- and I am ALWAYS surprised when someone alludes to my age as older- for instance if they compare me to their mom or something like that. I think it's pretty strange, but it's all perception and attitude, I guess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Wow...do you mind if I ask what field you went into that you now make so much more money? Did you go back to school? (I realize this change happened quite a while ago, but still...)

I did not go back to school. While I worked part-time I stagnated, both in terms of income and work, but that was okay because I made the choice to spend time with my children while they were young. However, I was bored to death in that job, and there was no opportunity to move up or do anything else, so when my younger child hit first grade I decided it was time to look for a new job and that I would probably have to go full-time if I wanted to move to a new employer. I found a new job and after working for that company for a few years they moved me into management and I moved up. I actually took a slight pay cut in terms of hourly pay when I moved from that part-time job to the full-time job but I thought there would be room to grow in the job and I was right.

I work hard and I'm competent, but there is no question that luck played a roll as well. If the company I was working for hadn't been growing, and if a couple of key people hadn't left, there would not have been the same room for me to move up even with the same work ethic and skills. That said, I think it is very important that I never dropped out of the work force entirely. I think that getting back in is much harder than moving from a part-time to a full-time position. It also helped that I was willing to take a small pay cut in my hourly rate to move to a position where I thought there would be more opportunities (although I gained benefits when I went from part-time to full-time so it wasn't really an actual pay cut if you take into account the cost of the benefits).

Sorry, I don't want to get any more specific about what I do because I would like to remain anonymous and I've already given a lot of details about my life.

Totally understand. Thank you!

[Anonymous]

Growing up in poverty made me feel like an adult before my time.

[Anonymous]

I am 50, lost my mother 18 mos ago, and still don't feel like an adult .I think it's because I have never owned a house or had kids.

[Anonymous]

I'm 45. It has been a process. I felt like I was just playing house when I got married at 34 and like a fraud when the universe allowed me to have children. When my father died (I was 39) I still turned to my mother for some things, but it felt like the biggest single step on the road to adulthood. Now that my mother has early dementia I have no one of an older generation to create that feeling of a buffer between me and total maturity. A few traits that still make me think, "grow up already!" are goofiness (mostly with my kids), lack of full interest in a few 'adult' subjects like finance and politics, and social awkwardness. If I could shake those things I think I'd be there.

[Anonymous]

My mother and grandmother were both SAHM and I definitely felt like an adult when I got my own place, and was working and supporting myself.

[Anonymous]

I love this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm also in my mid-fifties. I have two grown children who are married. I've been married for 30 years. I have two master's degrees and I work full time in respected field. I have the house with all the expected things one would have by this point in the suburban family world- nothing extreme, though. I'm not a formal person- kind of casual.

Would it surprise you that I really only feel like a grown up when I wear high heels? ( Which isn't that often...) I am NOT kidding- this is true about me- and I am ALWAYS surprised when someone alludes to my age as older- for instance if they compare me to their mom or something like that. I think it's pretty strange, but it's all perception and attitude, I guess.

Its a boomer thing. (I am 57) We played at being adults for awhile in our 20s then the thing was to act like an adolescent. There is not the "grown up" thing that our parents had. Be a man; be a woman. That concept is not really part of it. I guess be a professional does imply being grown up.