If you were anything like me as a child, you wanted nothing more than to grow up. And if your mother was anything like mine she would simply say, “Don’t wish your life away, you’ll wish you were this young again someday.” And as most young children do, I did not listen to my mom. Instead you wanted to grow up because you thought people would take you seriously and that everything would be easy. You found yourself wishing your years away. When you were 12 you could not wait to be 14 so you could go to high school. Then when you became 14, you realized it was not as fun as you pictured it when you were 12. So now you could not wait to be 16 so you could drive. Then when you were 16 you wanted to be, well you get the picture. I still find myself looking ahead to the next big step of my life, even though I am not entirely sure what that is. Even though my mother was right about growing up (as much as I hate to admit it). There are a few major details she forgot to leave out.

Things Do Not Get Easier

As a child I really thought that growing up would fix all my problems, and make things easier. However; I have come to find out that things get more complicated. At the time middle school seemed like the scariest place on the planet. I found myself wishing the years away, counting down the days until it was over. So I could move onto high school, where surely things got easier. Then in high school I found myself doing the same, wishing for college. Then when college came, you guessed it, still wishing for something better. I thought that growing up would fix all my problems because you have more autonomy over your life. In adulthood you have free range over where you work, because if you do not want to work somewhere, you simply do not apply. As a child I thought that adults did not face conflict, there were not bullies, people were civil, and everything was peaceful. Well that was a nice thought, but so very untrue. I guess we are always wishing that things get easier in the future. I feel that the most ironic thing is, we find our past to be easier than what our present situation is now. I think I felt that as an adult everything was the way you wanted it to be. You did not have to go to school, live with your parents, there is no curfew, made money, and got to hang out with your friends whenever you wanted. While this may be true, there are so many things that come with adulthood that certainly do not make it easy. While you may be on your own making money. You may find that you do not have time for anything else, because work consumes your life.

Work, Work, Work, Work, Work…WORK

That’s right, Rhianna was on point. Work consumes your life. For 8 hours a day, five days a week (if you are lucky), you are working. And when you are not working, most times you are complaining to your friends about working (sometimes this occurs while working). Or you are worried about the work you will have to do tomorrow. As a kid I thought that work was nothing like school. I thought you would actually like going to work, and it was better than school because you got paid to be there. Adulthood seemed so great because you would go to work, come home, and then be able to do whatever you wanted. But most times you either come home to do more work or you just pass out. Maybe that’s just me though. But I’d like to assume everyone else does it too. Work gets in the way of a lot of your plans, the plans I felt everyone had every day after work. You know what my plans consist of? I usually do not have any. Besides coming home and falling asleep, so I can get up and work tomorrow.

Money

As a child one of the most exciting parts of adulthood (at least to me) was money. I could not wait for the day I could buy something without having to ask my parents if I could have it, then asking them to pay for it. What I did not realize is that while you may be making money, you are also spending it. Spending it on bills, loans, and necessities, leaving little money for recreational use. Money makes everything an up-hill battle. You want to move to a nicer area, but you’re not sure you can afford it. You want to take a new job but it does not pay enough to keep up with your lifestyle. As a child I felt that adults had so much money, to spend on whatever they wanted. However; now as a working adult, I realize it is quite the contrary. Definitely wish I would have understood the reality of money as a child.

Friends

As an 8 year old, I thought my best friends would remain my best friends forever. However; as you grow up you begin to form values and opinions that may not be shared by your “friends.” Hence why they are now “friends” and not just friends without quotation marks around them. In elementary school friends are easy to come by. You see people for who they are, not what they are. However; as you grow older, people change (sometimes not for the better). The best friend you had in third grade is now a 16 year old who seems to have nothing in common with you, and quite frankly you cannot stand them. No one warned us that our friends would change, that they would grow up to do things that we wouldn't like, and that we would actually grow apart.

Making friends in adulthood is not necessarily easy. Everyone seems to be at different places and most people already have their group of friends, and feel their circle does not need to grow any larger. In other words most of us are alone. If your friends are anything like mine most of the are engaged, married, have kids, are in grad school, or no longer live near you. So basically I am alone. Totally did not see that one coming. Even at 20 I thought that things would stay the same.

Everyone Around You Ages Too

I think this is the hardest part of growing up, because it is something you never really thought about as a child. As an 8 year old I did not understand age. There were three kinds of people. Kids, big kids, and old people (you know anyone over the age of 22). I did not realize that as I got older so did the people I loved and cared about. And that as people age, they certainly do not live forever. I definitely did not take the people I loved into account when I was wishing my life away. When I was wishing to be 14, I truly was only thinking of myself, not all the people around me. I took them for granted for sure, not once thinking, “I wonder what they will be like, where they will be when I am this age.” I was only really thinking about where I would be, what I would be doing, what I would look like, who I would become. No one else was really a concern in my future thoughts. I wish I would have known that people I loved and cared about would not be here as I grew up, because with old age, comes dying. I think if I would have realized this as a child, I more than likely would not have wanted to grow up so quickly.

There were definitely things my mother left out in her vague statement of “Don’t wish your life away, you’ll want to be here again.” It probably would have helped if she would have explained why. But who wants to scare their child into staying a kid? If she would have told me all the woes of becoming an adult would I have listened? Probably not. Being an adult looked so much more fun from the perspective of an 8 year old. Being in high school, driving a car, and then going to college. But just like with anything you realize it is not all that you thought it would be. The “fun” of it wears off and you realize it was not as fun as you once thought. I think that is where our parents get the last laugh. They don’t tell you all these things, because when they hear you say the words, “I wish I was a kid again.” They can finally say, “I told you so, I was right.”