turning 30 feels like a milestone everyone jokes about, but not many talk honestly about the changes that come with it.
was it the physical changes? the mental shifts? the silent pressures?
if you’re over 30, what reality hit you the hardest — and how did you deal with it?
would love to hear your experience.
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You can’t recover as fast as a 20 year old . Little things start to ache here and there . There is pressure to have your life more in order i suppose. Technically though turning 30 is really not all that bad … you have more wisdom than when you were young and you’re still physically in your prime . 30 is a beautiful mix of still being young but also being wiser
That I wasted my twenties.
The funny thing is that my forties are no different.
Having all the time in the world to save money, buy a house etc, and then suddenly being way behind and fighting to catch up.
I was warned but didn’t listen – time starts speeding up big time. I’ll be 34 in a few weeks. These last 4 years have felt like 6 months.
I stopped playing contact sports the year I turned 30. It was mostly related to work pressures, but it was clear that I was not as quick as I was up to my late 20s, and injury recovery was getting noticeably slower.
How fast it came. Scares me how fast the next 30 years will come.
Constipation
Definitely the back pain, imo anyways
Hangovers. The hangovers are fn terrible at 30 compared to 5-10 years prior to that. Gets worse every year and is why I don’t drink.
Don’t undervalue your mental health. People say take care for your body but honestly even if you feel ok go to a therapist for a few weeks every year even if you just talk about your achievements and how well you’re going .
If you take care of your health your 30s should be significantly better than 20s in all aspects. Most issues people say happen in your thirties should not be happening until at least your mid 40s and if you are active and eat right not until your 50s.
My metabolism coming to a screeching halt and my guts not being able to handle junk/processed foods anymore.
I’ve always been active. It’s just that in my 20’s I could drink beer whenever I wanted, eat fast food, smash a box of cookies etc. As long as I worked out 3 or 4 times a week, I’d burn it all off. Everything that’s not fruit, vegetables or meat that I’ve prepared at home makes me gain weight now.
If I eat processed/junk food now it’s almost a guarantee that I’ll have diarrhea. Even smashing a whole bag of chips gives me the runs now.
All in all, it’s a good thing because it’s made me live a healthier lifestyle but damn I miss being a glutton.
Time starts to speed up. I realize I have to work towards what’s meaningful for me. Body aches are more common. So health and exercise become more mandatory
Your 20s will dictate the position you’re in and how you feel when you turn 30.
I worked super hard during my 20s and now I’m 31 and have a positive outlook for the next decade ahead. Still working hard.
When you change your age range on tinder to go milf hunting and realise they’re just a few years older than you and actually want a relationship with you 😭
But 35 is actually a million times worse for some reason.
30 is still young and not much changes. 35 realllllly hits you.
Most humbling one is that no one fucking cares about you. Most people at 30-40s already have kids, marriage or career. It is very lonely in a sense.
Nothing.
It was turning 20 that mortified me.
The IBS
That was about it
Every aspect of my life is more stressful at 30 than it was at 20. Slowly lost the happy go lucky that I used to have and become jaded.
Literally nothing changes. That’s what you should know.
Ear and nose hair growth. I mean, what the fuck?
I can’t read without glasses anymore.
Time aspect, Time absolutely flies. Lack of time for yourself.
That if you don’t have kids and your friends do, you tend to lose those friendships or you just aren’t as close as you were.
That I’m single and the woman available at this age either have 2 kids or are mentally unstable (hence why their single)
Your dating pool shrinks exponentially if you aren’t someone who’s gunna let themselves go
How anticlimactic it feels
Your older relatives are about to start dying, and it’s up to you to continue the “family,” and to decide what that means to you. Is it Christmas together once a year? Do you send cards? Celebrate achievements and mourn together?
That turning 40 happens a hell of a lot faster than words can explain. 30’s are over in a blink of your eyes.
A little different, and a little less depressing then some of the other responses here.
I don’t know how to feel about this one, because technically, it’s a good thing. . . but the way it pans out kind of annoys me.
I was smart when I was younger (I would like to think I still am, but back then I was really smart for my age to be more specific) Lots of ideas, lots of questions. My approach back then, and my approach today towards anything is pretty much the same; solving problems, learning things, leading things, teaching things, et cetera.
At thirty, suddenly. . . everything you do just carries more weight. Regardless of merit. You speak, your opinion is taken more seriously (regardless of whether it’s a stupid opinion, or a good one that would have been rejected off the cuff if shared by a younger person). You have to be careful with your words now, because they are more likely to be taken seriously by your peers, your juniors and your seniors. Carelessly thinking out loud carries the risk of being interpreted as serious and considered input. Asking questions is no longer received as someone trying to learn or understand, but instead as someone indirectly suggesting, or criticizing.
On the flipside, old abandoned ideas you may have had, but couldn’t get anyone to consider seriously. . . well, now magically, suddenly those ideas might be worth listening too.
Age and bearing have an outsized effect on how responsive people are too you. It’s a good thing technically, aside from the whole great power/ great responsibility aspect to it. . . but it’s really annoying coming to the realization that many of your ideas and plans in the past were not rejected on their own merits, but based on the biases people carry towards younger people.
Nothing. My 30s were a smooth ride. Peak years actually
The cost of mistreating one’s body becomes significantly higher and takes longer to recover from. Drinking, sleeping, intoxicants of various kinds, you name it: recuperating is just more of a slog.
Not travelling in my 20s, not working overseas, not leaving my home city. That’s my only real regret, lack of character building experiences.
So I’m planning on doing a solo contiki and remote work next year overseas to scratch that itch.
Other regrets are not staying in touch with old friends, but making that effort now. Loneliness is hard.
Other than that, letting myself get fat, weak, and soft (physically and mentally). But I’ve been harder before so it’s just a matter of sustained effort and I’ve been going solid for the last 3 months without fail.
I just got over turning 30. I’m turning 60 this year, by the way. 🤣
Turned 60 this winter. It hit me 1000x harder than 30.
30 was a cakewalk, but realizing my kids were half way through school to grade 12, teen and tween, and they didn’t need or want me around as much was hard to deal with. But I knew I was raising adults to be independent was some comfort.
Time moves fast. Other than that, I felt the same as I did in my 20s. Oh and hangovers last longer
I am 38 now, and I will let you know my 30s were the best years of my life so far. I feel more confident and respected professionally. My relationships are no where near as chaotic.
There is still obviously stress, but I feel more capable than ever before.
I know it can be hard, and you may feel like you are losing something. But I will say things got better in many ways.
Honestly that all of my mates and even acquaintances would start drifting away. Its so damn tough to get together now even more so to rebuild. I’ve made new friends before but without school and the fact that everyone is in different places in their lives now it’s tough to find camaraderie in the way that i had when I was younger
lol the time thing for sure. I’ve blinked from 30 turning to 34. The days seem to just fly.
Also your physical health. The lbs come so much easier and quicker. I have friends who were health conscious in their 20s and those habits pulled through to their 30s and they look great.
The others who were on the verge or careless? They ballooned up even more
Nothing really. I didn’t feel much different when I turned 30 then early 20s. I’d say late 30s is when the aches and pains started.
I’m 42 now. Nothing is surprising. It’s pretty much what I’ve been led to believe.
I feel like the 20s are a time when you could still sort of claim ignorance or immaturity if you did something dumb, and you could get away with more. Almost like a big kid cosplaying an adult. Hit 30 and That. Shit. Is. Over. You’re an adult with the full consequences and no benefit of the doubt. I had kids in my early twenties, but still in the back of my mind felt a little like I hadn’t really grown up yet. 30s will shock that right out of you.
The aches and pains. I totally thought that was my 40s, but all my crazy living in my 20s is catching up to me quickly.
That i am all alone, my family didn’t even care to check on me, I live abroad
I’ve learned that comparison is the thief of joy.
Seeing that people exactly my age have thousands, even hundreds of thousands of dollars saved away and are in incredible shape financially.
My 30s has taught me to relish in the time and situation I’m in. My child is healthy, happy, we have a roof over our heads and a job that provides.
Sure my body aches, I have less than 1000 dollars to my name, a child that depends on me, and my eyes look a little more tired everyday, but it’s all worth it. Every second.
Minor event other than a twinge of sadness that my 20s were done. Other than that I was well into my sportsbikes and still fit enough to ride them. Glory days.
From 15-43 I felt exactly the same for me. Now, at 44, starting the see signs creeping in. Couple groans when I stand, can’t see the text on my phone (just enlarged my Reddit font 😩), sleep got worse, and in general I don’t care about anything (in a good way). 30 is a breeze. My only piece of advice is find a workout/physical routine you can do every single day and just fucking do it every single day without question.
I’m going to be 33 this year, and it feels like just yesterday I was being a little man whore at all the nightclubs in NJ. Now I got musculoskeletal issues, crippling anxiety, and a while bunch of regrets. Noone warned me about this.
That was the year my daughter was born. It was an “oh shit” moment. Now I have to be a real adult. Best thing that ever happened to me.
Nothing tbh.
I made a decision to go back to school in my late 20’s so turning 30 during school had like zero impact on me emotionally. My pressures came at age 31 for the final push through school but it was Covid in 2020 so I didn’t even think about my age lol.
Turning 30 kind of flew past me and I didn’t notice any crazy pressures or anything because of the timing.
Other than that I gym pretty frequently so I don’t really get body pain or any physical issues either. And I got married at 35 after I met my wife when I was 33 so just a bit of dating after I got vaccinated until I found the right partner.
I guess the biggest pressure I have now is people keeping saying “fill the house with lots of babies” lol but that’s not really pressure either imo
The grey hairs started coming in
🤣 30 is nothing… pretty much the same as the 20s.
Physically I was about the same if not a little healthier in my 30s.
More mature and stable in my 30s.
Literally nothing hard about turning 30.
It was the 40s that got a little rough that I should have prepared more for in my 20s and 30s.
And by that I mean I should have eaten healthier, and kept more active… it’s harder to get back in shape in my 40s now.
The shift between ‘getting ready for stuff’ & actually doing the stuff.
20 years you get ready, then one day you are doing it. But in reality it is nothing like what you planned for, because you planned with information from 10 or 20 years ago.
My skin. Almost instantly it became dull, dry and started to wrinkle. I had to change everything about how I took care of it.
Nothing comes to close to how under prepared you are to see your parents getting old.
Fatigue
Got a job that I am still at , had kids, a new house all while in my early 30s. It really began a become boring/settle down phase in life that I never faced in my 20s. Meeting old friends becomes rare, kids activities consume you, priorities change and you really start thinking about your future rather than just living in the now. The 30s still flies by as a blur though.
The 40s is when things start to hit hard.
Hangovers are now a multi-day event and come with crushing guilt.
Watching your parents age. You might notice little changes here and there when they are in there 30s, 40s and ’50s, but after 60 or so, each year becomes more noticeable.
I know it’s a pain in the ass sometimes, but call your parents if you’re lucky enough to still have them. One day, picking up that phone to call them won’t be an option.
Ferris Bueller said it best: “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”.
You really need to plan out ahead of time how you are going to recover after drinking.
“I’m only 25, I have all the time in the world to save money.” Said the same when I was 35. Now that I’m 42, I’m worried I won’t have enough to retire by 65.
I lived 4 lifetimes. I miss 10 years ago. I really do. But I also love my current lifetime.
Don’t lose your health! I’m once again, recovering myself, I’m happy that I can do what I can do and improving at it.
You lose a lot of wiggle room and can end up feeling trapped by responsibilities. To spouse, kids, parents, etc
How much more fun 30s were than 20s
For me it was – you can still feel as good as you did in your 20s, but you have to work twice as hard to stay there. No more crappy food, no more alcohol, exercise every day.
In a few years, it will sink in that someday you’re gonna die. You could choose look at time as finite and every little inconvenience will piss you off. Or you can choose to look at any experience as a lesson big or small in your spirit’s journey for growth. The latter will make you much happier.
For me, three major things happened around 30:
Subtle but noticeable physical changes that reminded me of my mortality
A certain apex of emotional maturity that brought about general contentment
Altering my perception of the passage of time on an aggregate scale
Physical Changes – I noticed quite quickly that my metabolism changed. In my 20’s, I could exercise spontaneously and sparingly while staying thin and toned. I could stay up until 2 AM, eat an entire pizza by myself, get 12 shots drunk, and still get up at 6 AM and go about my day feeling fine.
At 30 and thereafter, I need Zyrtec to even eat two pieces of pizza without getting heartburn. 2 drinks got me drunk and I felt hungover the day after. I had to start putting in consistent effort at exercising to stay trim and I needed regular and early bedtimes to feel rested. Additionally, I found myself pulling muscles and getting sore in my back from physical labors that used not to affect me at all.
Emotional Maturity – While I was already pretty at peace with myself and my life in my late 20’s, by the age of 30 I was even more serene. Only the most life-changing or devastating news causes me emotional upset. My regrets and past shames and embarrassments melted away and those few that came up after seemed not so bad. I became very adept at accepting events and routines and found myself very at peace with my routines and my life, grateful for what I had and not pining after what I did not.
After 30, time has passed with remarkable speed. The day-to-day drudgery of adulting feels long in the moment but an eyeblink in retrospect. But I’m not stressed about it- things come as they will and I do my best to influence what I can for the better. What I can’t control is pointless to worry about. I enjoy my modest life of peace, steady work, a blessedly loving marriage, a small circle of close friends, and the inane pleasures in the comfort of home and the surrounding community. It’s a simple but happy life, and the older I get, the more grateful I am for it.
Friends disappearing and (not so) silent pressures.
Friends get married, having kids, move away, etc. And even if you can still hang out you just feel that you no longer carry the same importance as you did before.
But that kind of increases the “silent” pressures – get married, have kids. For me it’s not silent at all, which is why I put it in quotes. I’m surrounded by aunties telling me to hurry up and get my own family. But even without their constant reminders, the pressure is still there. Whenever I’m with friends I just feel a desire to be important again, to have some -a wife, kids – prioritize me.
That you’ll have to think really hard and do quick mental math when recalling how old you are.
In my 20s, it meant more to know exactly how old I was. I was 25, or 27 etc. That number used to actually mean something, as a gauge of distance from youth.
When you’re in your 30s, it matters a lot less so I just forget. Just today my 6yo son told me I was 33 and it took a solid 30sec of thinking before I concluded I was in fact only 32.
Lots of people alienate you if you decide not to have kids. That was so disappointing to discover. Also, wounds heal slower than before.