Who do you know (of) who may be Gen X or older, who still have the mental state of a child, teen or college student?
Why hasn’t their youth ever left their minds? How were they still able to hold onto their youths like that? And what are their outward appearances like?
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One of my college friends is less changed – physically and in mentality – than the rest of us. He never married, and still attends many sports events. He has done well in business, allowing him to own racehorses. Which suits his personality. He was always fun to hang around with. He still is. Many people revert to who they used to be when they’re around old friends, so his Peter Pan quality doesn’t seem odd.
I know some who are stuck in their favorite time of life. Band years, high school, college… They still dress and act the same.
Then there are others who are emotionally stuck at the age when trauma happened.
This crowd is the one that hasn’t missed a class reunion in 50 years. That’s why I quit going 30 years ago. Don’t get me wrong I enjoyed high school, but I didn’t peak in high school. I’ve still got people in my life that never really grew up and they can be fun on a limited basis. I don’t always act old, I’ve got grandkids to entertain, but I try to act my age most of the time.
My uncle is in his 70s and makes everything into an immature joke. It’s so bad that everyone else in the family just avoids him as much as possible, because he has the mentality of a middle school boy. I asked him to leave the hospital when he came to visit my father (his brother-in-law), who was dying, because he made an inappropriate joke about one of the nurses within 30 seconds of walking in. I wasn’t in the mood for it that day.
He always acts surprised that no one else finds his humor funny.
I work in education, and I highly suspect he may actually be on the spectrum.
My ex best friend. She’s a slob who thinks she can do whatever she wants, but wants to tell other people what to do. She’s terribly unethical and immoral. She’s so impulsive, she constantly gets herself into situations she needs saving from.
My wild teenage daughter is more responsible than her.
Being around her is like taking care of a toddler.
This is a weird question. Unless someone is mentally handicapped, no old person still has the mental state of a child or teenager. Are you talking about those people who peaked in high school or college and are now stuck in that same mindset? Or are you talking about people who have maintained their free spirit and still engage in adventure and creativity? Or are you talking about someone who has failed to mature because they are stuck in a cycle of addiction and/or irresponsibility?
I have one friend for about 30 years. He is 9 years younger than me and about a foot taller. We’ll go to a restaurant together and when the wait staff approaches my friend would lean over to me and say, “mother, what do you want for lunch?”. I always laugh hysterically and the wait staff always thinks what a devoted son. If we have to go to the pharmacy ho goes down the incontinence product aisle while I’m in the aisle I need to be in and he holds up a large box of adult diapers and shouts out “mother, is this what you need?” Again, I’m laughing out loud. So, he and I act like teens.
And when I go to a restaurant with the grands, I always ask for extra straws so the kids and I can shoot the paper wrappers at each other.
Here’s a basic rule for maturity:
If you abuse (or just overuse) alcohol or drugs, you kinda get mentally “stuck” at the age when you first started doing that.
I was 15 when I started seriously drinking alcoholic beverages, and also 15 when I started smoking marijuana.
I KNOW I act like I’m still 15 too much of the time, even though I’m 66 now (and a Boomer).
I’ve seen that rule “play out” hundreds of times. My 55-year-old (GenX) brother started drinking when he was around the same age I was, and he acts like a teenager too much of the time too. I’ve seen friends do it.
You just have to KNOW that’s why you’re behaving that way.
As for outward appearances, most of them/us look a lot older to other people than they/we think. The ones who get to me are those who try to DRESS as if they’re still 20 when they’re 70. They look ridiculous but somehow, in their addled minds, they think they look “hot.”
Seriously, though, start paying attention to how people act and compare it with their alcohol/drug history, and you’ll what I’ve written is true probably 98% of the time.
Do you mean youthful as energetic, open, and curious — or as immature and incapable of caring for themselves?
My little brother and oldest sister, 45 and 54 respectively, both still act like they are 16. They take responsibility for nothing, shamelessly take advantage of others. Neither has ever had a serious relationship. They’re awful and I avoid them as much as possible.
I know people older than me who are basically children. I try to avoid them.
Some of the childishness is evident in their mimicry of Trump (I live in suburban Massachusetts, where many people have transferred their faith in God and religion into faith in and mimicry of Trump). The mimicry of Trump consists in false bragging, or outright quoting of Trump’s stupidities.
I have a neighbor in his 70s whose entire persona was based in hatred of Russia and communism until Trump was elected president. If I criticized a policy of Reagan or Bush in the 80s and 90s, he’d say, “You should move to Russia.”
Today, he sees me in the yard and stumbles over to announce: “I like Putin and I think he likes me.”
I know a woman, actually we’re buddies, who said she never listens to any music except from the 70s, when she was in high school.
I think the music from the 70s is fine, but that was 50 years ago! There are so many artists now. There are genres of music that didn’t even exist in the 70s.
My brother is well into his 40s and still relies on our 80 year old parents to cook, do laundry, and clean for him, and he doesn’t bathe regularly either.
Why of course I know this person, it is me.
I’m(49), I play a a game made for 13 year olds. I ask questions like I’m 5 and I act like I’m 15 years old.
I adult. I’m good enough at it to keep a job ans have raised my son(20) as a single father since he was 7 years old.
I love Tom & Jerry still. I don’t take anything seriously. I don’t get stressed out or freak-out about things. It’s all just life.
I try to have as much fun and entertain myself as I can.
Life maybe the longest thing we do but we are only here for a short time and we don’t know when the end is coming.
I literally have a sign on the outside of my house by my front door
WARNING CHILDISH ADULT.
More than once I’ve had people knock on the door and ask to speak with the CHILDISH ADULT…
I see people as being multifaceted. Some ppl are serious as a heart attack and others are goofy and lighthearted but most of us are a mix of different qualities. I do find that the things that irritate me the most are usually qualities I don’t want to admit to myself that I also have.
Back in the late ’50s a couple moved into the garden apartments on our neighborhood with two children. They had a daughter Patricia ‘Patty” about 10 and a son, John Junior about 8 years old, who never spoke a sound and ran around always wearing a white football helmet. That helmet earned him the nickname Johnny Unitas.
His sister was OK, and told us kids Johnny Junior was a mute. She was a very kind girl, always sharing her M&Ms and Milk Duds with us and keeping an eye on Johnny Junior. Johnny Junior never bothered anyone, usually just sat silently on the curb watching us kids playing stickball or hide and go seek. He could sit on that curb for hours on end. Sadly, he was often clobbered with snowballs every time it snowed, but not by me. The family moved away after a couple of years. If he’s still alive he would be in his early 70s and I’ll bet Patty is caring for him.
I wouldn’t say necessarily mentally like a child or college student, but being GenX and most of my friends the same, we’re not exactly our father’s version of a 50 year old either…but I don’t personally know anyone who’s stuck in the past. I think a lot of GenX has somewhat of a Peter Pan quality though…we just don’t take this shit that seriously, none of us are getting out alive.
We have a friend in our group that married young and was married for over 40 years. Her husband was very abusive. They are divorced and now she is wild! She dresses like a horny teenager with bootie shorts and bikini tops and has lots of random sex. She’s in her 60’s but looks older because she also drinks a lot. We just protect her as much as we can and we understand that maybe she feels like she missed out on some things. But it’s weird. The rest of us are talking about our grandkids and she’s talking about who she had sex with this week. She’s barefoot and dirty dancing on a table in the Mexican restaurant and we all want to die of embarrassment. But we love her.
My wife’s nephew, in his mid-50s. Lives in his mother’s basement with a woman he is supposedly no longer in a relationship with.
His life is one disaster or mishap after another.
Mentally, I’m (60M) barely out of my 20s with regression to pre-teen boy humor.
Not every joke about the Amish, boobs or dick punches is funny. But lots of them are.
The schmuck who calls himself the President
Those are the ones who still live in the same small town, associate with the same people, and go to all the school reunions where they say, “Wasn’t high school great. Remember when I scored in the big game!“.
They peaked in high school, went to university or college in the nearest city, married and divorced their high school sweetheart.
They have no understanding of why anyone would move away, marry someone from another part of the country, or travel internationally. They openly mock it.
It’s like they’re stuck
it’s pathetic
I sometimes jokingly ask my husband why I stay. He says because it’s as he’s told me: You can’t legally abandon a child (meaning him).
Men never mature. Ever. They may pretend to be adults on the outside but they’re still little children inside. This is a direct consequence of the biological process that allows humans to have big brains. It’s called neoteny.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoteny
If you ever see a man acting like an adult, he’s faking it, and a liar.
The truly great thing about being 62, is being 62 with all the wisdom and humor that has come from a life of taking chances and making mistakes and learning the whole time. The other great thing about being 62 is not putting up with people who don’t act their ages.
Um. Dancing joyfully at a Depeche Mode concert and voting for MAGA? The disconnect is astonishing.
My mom struck me as youthful and before her time all her life, into her 80s.
She was sharp and witty in a kind way.
She dressed appropriately for her age and didn’t “act like a teenager” (which I interpret as impulsive) but did say sometimes that her friends seemed a bit “fusty” – kinda stereotypically old.
She was learning new things all the time, that may be the ticket.
Some people grow old but never grow up. I work at an inpatient detox facility with women with severe substance use disorder. Many of the women there are extremely emotionally immature. They cannot emotionally regulate themselves (i.e., women in their forties having tantrums over stupid shit like what sweater they get to wear). They cannot take responsibility for their actions: Everything is always someone else’s fault. They whine. They complain. They act like toddlers. Except toddlers are cute and adorable. A grown woman acting like a toddler, not so much.
I am possibly the most immature person I have ever interacted with. I had to grow up before 7, because my mom died the week after I turned six and my father turned to the bottle. 3 months later I cooked the entire Thanksgiving dinner by myself, using a cookbook. The bastard found several things to gripe about and nothing good to say about my cooking. That’s when I started thinking about running away to my grandparents. At least I got some childhood for 8 years
At this point in my life (67) Id rather have friends (and I do) who are energized by the teen inquisitive spirit rather than the latter who are depressed and overly worried about health, money and death.
I think I might be one of those other people, at least part time but probably most of the time. I can act like an adult, but even then it’s more of a 30 year old adult, not a 64 year old.
You want to know how I do it so I’ll tell you.
Growing up I remember seeing afults at 40 and 50 and thinking “that’s how adults act.” They were serious and earnest and most seemed really unhappy. I dreaded becoming an adult. But then when i started hitting those milestones, I realized that I just don’t know how to act my age. Simple as that.
I guess I’m just a example of psychological neoteny defined as:
“Psychological neoteny refers to the retention of youthful attitudes and behaviors into later adulthood, suggesting a continued plasticity of mind and personality
Woohoo!
That’s sounds a lot better than being immature. lol!
Frank Turner has a great song called “Photosynthesis”, came out in 2008, I think,
I remember hearing it for the first time and thinking, “this is me!”
“I won’t sit down. I won’t shut up. and most of all I will not grow up!”
“Still” is an odd choice of words to me because I don’t know any advanced age people who are “still” emotionally immature. Realistically, we become like children again when we hit 70 or so. I work with seniors, and they are more immature than my preteen boys.
They say……….If you have not grown up by the time you reach 50, you dont have to.
My SIL. She’s 66 years old and never grew up. She was coddled her entire life, her mother made excuses for her until the day she died, she’s a recovering alcoholic who hasn’t worked in 20 years as she can’t get a job due to DUI charges. She gets SS and is on Medicaid but wastes what little money she has. Thankfully, she’s not my responsibility.
ME ME ME ME ME ME ME ME ME 😆
That would…probably be me. I’m 55, but seem much younger, I know that, due to a combination of physical and mental health problems. I struggle with learned helplessness and health anxiety. I’m not actually daft, though, and when talking about my particular intellectual interests, I can sound almost grown up lol.
Any other early thirties folks reading this and seeing potential futures they risk having become their own? This thread is like a cold shower in both good and bad ways.
People that never grow up are obnoxious. If they smoke weed they’re 100% worse.
Hello. I’m fully middle aged. I get accused of this sort of thing all the time, sometimes as a complement, and sometimes more as judgment.
I didn’t have kids. Too many movies and books about people bucking the system and traveling. Discovering themselves instead of becoming cogs in the machine.
So I moved around and took the highest paying jobs I could get, usually sales related, sometimes food. I lived poor, but it was feast or famine, so it wasn’t always hard times.
I partied, but it was always more about doing things. Hiking, surfing, lake stuff, mountains and oceans. Sports. Being healthy and outside. Meeting girls.
Now, I’m older, and everyone else has been busting their ass for the last 25 years. They have 20 year olds, or ten year olds, or new borns. They’re exhausted.
You know how many naps I’ve taken? You realize how often I get sun? I haven’t had microwavable food, chips or candy in the house forever. Maybe some dark chocolate, or a six pack. But I’m not eating left over mac n cheese or dinobites. It’s just a completely different life.
And as a result, I’m basically still a kid. I don’t really know anything about being a parent or husband, or having a real career. I live life on easy mode. But, there is a catch. A lot of the traditional adults do not like people like me. And that’s putting it lightly. There’s towns in America I basically could not live, and people everywhere that will not hire me. They want cogs.
I blame social media for some of it. I know a few who weren’t the most popular during their teen years for whatever reasons, one perhaps being some late bloomers. They were okay and had been going on with their lives. But then social media took off and some are now attempting to relive their younger years using it.
It’s funny how you put that. I am one of those people. A walking anachronism in so many ways. I don’t drive (which apparently makes me super weird. You should see the looks when I mention it). I’m an urban, city streets loving sort, still love an adventure, and absurdity.
But, I’ve become very isolated since I moved (spouse’s gig) from a long-established home in a city surrounded by like-minded and feeling friends to this place where I know no one. Not for lack of trying.
I now live in what can only be best described as a suburb (kill me now please) and the ppl my age seem 20-30 years older.
They look at me weird, younger ppl, even 40s, treat me as if I’m invisible. I’m just … done. Peace out.
I used to be fun. I used to laugh a lot. I used to enjoy being around people younger than myself, and we hing out together, worked together. Ppl older than me, too. In the city vibe, that age stuff didn’t matter. We were just sharing experiences.
I don’t know what they thought of me, though.
I mean, I still laugh when I fart and play video games, but I also can take care of myself and make a marriage work for 23 years so far. I’m not sure what age that makes me.
Yes. Childhood friend is 57 acts 17. Brain dead from drugs.
I only several people that act this way. All of it is because of severe trauma that happened to them or chronic drug/alcohol abuse
I know a guy who is perpetually five – in a good way. He is delighted with life and will make friends with anybody, enthuses over things, bounces, full of ideas.
My cousin is a product of agent orange. He will be a child for the rest of his life.
I treat him like I would treat any child his mental age. We just hang out and do cousin stuff within reason. He is really into sports so we watch sports and alk about that a lot.
That would be me I guess? I’m still the same guy as with 20 or so. Just with more experience under my belt. Aside from getting older my life hasn’t changed much in the past 30 years or so (well aside from suddenly being poor now), so I don’t feel like I’m stuck in the past, I’m just myself and that’s it.
Very old people in my family sound and act young even if they look their age. It’s because they think young
Their optimism and enthusiasm is contagious and uplifting
It can take a long time for all of a person with CPTSD to bring all of themselves into present time. It’s generally a gradual process.
I have a friend (ex best friend) who hasn’t changed in over 20 years. Still ‘too depressed’ to finish her qualifications and switches at the end of every year, still will never message or initatie any interaction – includong her own virthday celebrstion, still makes excuses because she was feeling down, and would rather ghost people than have any disagreement with them.
I get depression is hard, I am and will be on medication for the rest of my life, but everything to her is depressions fault. She has been living the same year every year since we finished school. I sound harsh but I had to learn how to live despite of it and be proactive to weather the storms it brings. It feels like she is still a child and expects everyone to do the heavy lifting in her life for her. Which is why we are no longer best friends. I can’t be that person to her, me, and my family.
My (47M) younger Brother (44M) still likes to act that he’s only 6 years old when he wants to relax and doesn’t feel like gaming. He works in IT and is a model adult when dealing with customers who don’t know that their PC needs to be plugged into a power source before it will work. But when he gets home of an evening, if he doesn’t go directly to his own PC I need to resign myself to entertaining a toddler for the next hour or two.
Or until little diddums decides he’s hungry and wants his dinner now Now NOW
He’s not really mentally retarded. He does it just to get a constant grin out of me and if he’s on a good run an uncontrollable laughing fit.
He still sleeps with his childhood teddy bear though. It stinks to high heaven having never been washed but its so old that the fabric would most likely dissolve in a hand wash, and it would certainly be torn to pieces in a machine wash.
People pulled down into addiction didn’t continue to grow.
Addiction will do this
Autistic and socially in some ways still childlike, hard to explain, but then I’m uber responsible and high achieving in other areas.
Some friends who are not autistic are less worldly and have nothing interesting or deep to talk about.
My therapist agreed id stay perpetually young in some areas. I had party times in my youth but held multiple jobs for no reason, and very conscientious.