As a junior in college, it’s starting to get real that I'm becoming an adult.

It’s quite scary because I don’t feel ready to be an adult, and yet younger children are starting to look up to me. I still have to google how long to heat things up for in the microwave, but within the next 2 years, my university will be giving me a degree that pretty much says I'm a real adult now, time to start suffering.

Even though I'm growing up, at least I know my friends are growing up alongside me, and we are all just as clueless. Here are some texts you may receive if your friends are all becoming adults too:

1. “Can you help me take my Linked-In photo?"

Instead of when we used to say “can you take my Facebook profile picture for me?” now we’ve evolved into the professional version of Facebook. If you can believe it, this photo is even more important than that Facebook profile photo, because this one is for actual adult purposes!

2. “I can’t, I have work.”

I know this has been something we’ve probably all been saying for years if you chose to start working through high school like I did, but now it’s becoming a more frequent excuse, and a lot more work is typically required for said job at this stage in the game.

3. “I can’t, I’m broke”

This is a typical thing you’ll hear college students say, especially as the concept of money becomes more and more apparent to them. We aren’t all actually broke, but we’re broke in the sense that we can’t afford, and shouldn’t try to afford, to do that thing our friends want us to do.

4. “Graduation”

Any text that even mentions this word is one that automatically indicates adulthood. For years we talked about our high school graduation being so far away, and college not even being a thought in our heads, but then suddenly you’ve not only graduated high school, but you’re more than halfway on your way to graduating college!

5. “Want to come over for a dinner party?”

Now we’re really becoming adults because we ask to host parties at each other’s house that feature food and bringing housewarming gifts, or desserts. Usually, this is our mother’s area of expertise, but now we’re becoming our mothers!

6. "I think I'm having a midlife/ existential crisis!"

This is a classic text to receive, because as we're all growing up, we realize the universe is really big and we're really small, and have no idea what we're going to do with our lives. But don't worry, everything will fall into place.

7. “Should I get wine?”

Now we’re (almost) officially able to celebrate our little triumphs (or failures) with some wine, and the answer is most likely always yes to this question. A true sign of being an adult is planning events around wine (trust me, I'm practically an adulting pro).

8. “OK so I’m free exactly 59 days from today, does that work?”

Becoming an adult is challenging because everyone’s so busy all the time that you have to start planning wayyyy in advance, and you have to start using your calendar app on your phone to keep track and not forget about said plans.

9. “Remember when…”

This is always an important and meaningful text. Even though you may all be growing up and entering your own paths of life, you still love to reminisce about the ‘good old days’ when you weren’t stressed all the time, and things were a little easier.

Growing up and becoming an adult is quite stressful for anyone involved, but if you have a good set of friends who will be by your side as you go through the process together, you’re going to be just fine. Next time you send or receive any of these texts, think of how crazy it is that you’re turning into an actual, real, live grown up!