In June this year I hit a major life milestone, I left behind the days that were my 20’s and opened up the next chapter of my 30’s. Like most young people, I had a plan of what and how I wanted my life to look like when I turned 30 and typically it involves being married, having the house and having children.
My 30th year was the closure of this chapter of thinking and the beginning of a completely new direction in my life, some of the major changes that happened within a matter of weeks of my birthday included:
The breakdown of my engagement, I was engaged to a wonderful man, however we both started to realise we were very different and wanted different things in life.
I had to sell my dream house, with the break-down of my engagement, I no longer had the need or the financial means to sustain paying off a 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom house.
My employer made announcements of major restructures and my job was a casualty of this and as such, was made redundant.
When I talk to people and the topic of my life and recent events comes up, most people are absolute horrified and give me their dearest sympathies because so many things have gone wrong for me. But I always correct them in saying that it’s really just the universe giving me a push in a new direction because the elements of my life that have changed, weren’t really working well.
I wasn’t really happy in my relationship, I had a burning desire to go travel and backpack around the world and my fiance’s idea of backpacking was flying first class and staying in 5 star hotels. Whilst the house was beautiful and a dream, it was far too big and too much work to clean and whilst my employer offered great benefits, I hated my job and thought my boss was a goose. So these events, whilst they have all presented challenges, was really just the way of the world telling me it’s time to take a risk, do something new.
Having been on my own now for a few months, I have really started to spend time and reflect on the relationships of my past and I am quite concerned about the things that I have done, and the directions I have taken. Whilst the longest relationship I have ever been in was 4 years, I have been in consecutive relationships with different men for over 12 years.
Now whilst I have never cheated on anyone, I have really only had a couple of weeks before getting involved with the next man, this is not a lot of time to deal with yourself and understand who you are.
Another thing I have really reflected on in my past relationships is that for every relationship I have been in, I have metamorphed into what my partner at the time wanted. If he liked to play football, I would watch football, if he liked to go to the beach, I would go to the beach. I have never really taken the time to reflect on what I wanted to do, nevertheless find a partner who had similar interests.
Perhaps one of my biggest regrets in relationships has been that i have jumped into bed with everyone of my partners, I have never taken the time to get to know them before spending the night. Perhaps this is why the relationships all seem to be going pear shaped, because the relationship is complicated by sex very early on and I don’t take the time to get to know someone before releasing the chemistry.
Another learning from past relationships is that I have never allowed them space at the early onset of them, instead of keeping my own interests, hobbies and friends, I have pretty much ditched the life as I knew it in favour of spending every waking moment with my new lover. Whilst this is human nature to want to consume yourself with your partner, it is certainly not healthy, and given where all of my past relationships have gone, this clearly isn’t an effective relationship strategy, or coping strategy.
So why do I write this article? Because I know I am not alone, I know so many women do the exact same thing I do when I get into a relationship because it is so easy to do. As a woman, we have this constant reminder in the back of our minds that we have a biological clock and once you turn 25, your biological class starts ticking much quicker than ever.
I have also seen a lot of single women get to the age of 30-35 and start dating every man possible in order to find a partner, once they meet a guy that will settle with them, within a matter of months they are engaged and pregnant and have settled with someone that they would never have dated 10 years earlier.
In society as well there is also a major double standard, firstly, men can date women 10 years younger than them and its’ socially accepted, but women really only have a few years leeway to deal with, with this in mind, a 30 year old guy is not necessarily going to be interested in a 30 year girl, especially when her objective is to get married and have children ASAP. Why would you go for a 30 year old girl when you could go for a 25 year old girl who still wants to have some fun?
As a 30 year old woman we can certainly date older men, however this presents another challenge in that older men also have baggage, generally they have ended a relationship or marriage and may have several children, this means that you have to deal with an ex-wife, a couple of children and you know your man’s income is being stripped down significantly thanks to child support payments.
Now I don’t know what the answer to these questions are, but I do know what I am going to do… I am going to forget about turning 30 and pretend I’m 18 again, I am going to travel the world and live the life I should have been living over the past 10 years and if I don’t meet a man, well that’s life, I really don’t need one.