The big 3-0 has me nervous

I am gonna be 26 soon and I still miss being a teenager... Whenever there's mentioning of my age, I call it 25-teen. So in a month or so, I'd be 26-teen.

And as the saying goes: "Growing older is mandatory, growing up is optional!"

Great post. I'm totally stealing one of your signature lines. Sorry about that.

30 -- heh heh.

I guess one of the reason 30 scares me is because it was around that age my mom had a stroke and got dx with MS. My aunt had just turned 30 when she began showing signs of her ALS and my aunt on my dads side was dx with breast cancer. So that's why I'm scared.

Scarey. Yep. Dear, this is true. In just a very few years, I will have out lived my great grandfather (Died ploughing of a massive heart attack, 48), passed the age my aunt was diagnosed with cancer (+5), passed the age my grandma was diagnosed with ms(+3). I think the hardest thing is realizing that tomorrow I could be cold in my bed when my hubby wakes up from an aneurism, be hit by a car, or run into a moose on my way to work tomorrow morning. Or I could keep living and become a hideous racist like my mom, a 105 year old multilingual Alzeimers patient like Aunt Bernice (who informed me she'd earned the right to forget the answers to her questions, thank you very much), or, if I am lucky, a self taught lay theologian with neurologcal problems like my father. Possibilities, negative and positive, abound, and I can't forsee where I will end up (except the racism thing... I will do my best to minimize that as much as I can. No militias for me, thanks)
Dear Thunderbear! Yeah, it's scarey. You loved them, you know what it meant to you and them when these things happened, and now you see yourself coming close to that age, but you know, you aren't them. You are you. Keep your eyes open, be aware, but don't be so afraid that you don't live now for your kids and your hubby and yourself. Because that's what their richest gift to you is, isn't it? your memories of them and the best life you can live now.
Gosh I'm preaching annoyingly. HUGGGSSSSSS and have a nice evening!

Well, that last response was fabulous!

I think one of the best things about getting older is this:

I have always been full of regrets of the past and worries about the future. Every day it was "what will (should) I be when I grow up? why didn't I...? why can't I ...?"

Now that I am getting older, I feel less pressure about this. This is me, and I am just starting to see that it's okay. Mostly because I am slowly letting go of all of the "shoulds" and I am choosing to NOT spend effort and time on people who make me feel bad. And I don't even expect to fit in certain clothes, or succeed in a specific career. Sure, I feel I am disappearing sometimes, that everyone else is younger and prettier and smarter, but it is actually a relief! I LIKE the feeling of disappearing, of blending in- haha. I have been so self conscious all of my life and now I am happy to just blend in and not be noticed.

Having said that, the BEST blessing about getting older is this:

When you get older, your eyesight starts to get worse. So when you look in the mirror, sometimes you don't even notice how horrible you look! It's kind of cool! Which is why I am in no hurry to get glasses!

Wow! Make me feel so much better about those progressives! Thanks, Hayward! HUGGS!

It is harder to see dirt, too.

I know exactly how you feel because in June, I will be turning 30 as well. It's scary to think of not being in the 20's anymore, but the 20's have honestly been the worst years of my life, so I'm looking at turning 30 to be the start of a new and better decade where everything will fall into place, yanno? I'm hoping in my 30's, I'll find love, get married, have kids, finish school... life is just beginning. I wish you all the best in your 30's, from one 29 year old to another

thunder and Amanda, I'll be 30 next August. Where has the time gone? I guess we can all get together and cry while getting fall-down drunk.

oh, and the 30-thing hasn't fully hit me yet. on my 29th birthday, a bunch of people told me I looked and seemed a lot younger!

I thought turning 30 would bother me, no big deal, then I thought 40 would really do it--not so much. But finding that first grey hair--that totally flipped my switch!!!!

Meh, I've been finding gray hairs since I was about 21. I started dying it about a year ago...I have patches of gray at the temples and a gray streak on the opposite side of where I part my hair.

I haven't had to worry about the gray hair thing. I remember sitting at the kitchen table reading an Archie comic book when I was 12 years old and my Aunt pulling a silver hair out of my head. Gray comes early in my family. My Grandmother was completely silver at 28. My mother has dyed her many different colors since she was in her teens so there is no telling when she went totally gray. I've been hold at 70% since I was 30.

YOU COULD BE LIKE A GUY AN GO BALD

I have been slowly greying since my mid twenties. Now at 43 and yep, there's a dusting of it but nothing desperate. It's taking it's time but it started early and I'm dark haired so it shows. Aw, whatever. My dad was grey at 36. My grandpa started to grey at 81. doesn't matter.

In my 60's now and it don't get any easier. BUT, don't give up you never know what tomorrow may bring.

Love and best wishes for many anxiety filled happy birthdays to come Jasmine.

Anxiety is what keeps us awake when all the other clowns have fallen asleep!