What's My Age Again?

That's right I am titling this post after the popular song by Blink-182. I have been thinking about writing this post for a while, ages really, and since my birthday almost 2 months ago (whaaa?) I decided 25 was a good milestone to start at. In honor of this post I am going to put pictures on here of myself from 10 years ago. I can say this over and over again and it makes less sense every time "ten years ago I was 15." That blows my mind. I remember being 15 like it was yesterday.

 My mother in law tells a story about how when she was 30 and had all 4 kids she had a moment one day where she realized she was an adult. When she first told me that story I was about 22ish give or take and it was before David and I got married. After she told the story she essentially asked me if I knew what she was saying, but also went on to say that I would have moments like that as well as David and I made our way through medical school and life experiences in general. I remember after she told me the story feeling like I knew I was an adult by about 21, technically a little before, but definitely by 21.

 I remember when I initially got married in 2007 thinking how different my life was in so many random little ways and beginning to feel the weight of bills and school on my life. Then by the time my marriage started having real issues I feel like I really grew up a lot the last 6 months, so much so that by the time I was officially separated I knew I was an adult. This is not to say that I was 100% mature or that I was always right, more just that I knew I could do difficult things that other people could not in the name of maturity and selflessness. 

What I guess I still find so amazing though is how rude some people still are in such an agist fashion. As of right now I am closer to 30 than 20 and I will only be growing closer to 30 from now on and farther from age 20. I get so tired of moments when I say things like "oh is that Mrs. so-so older?" to a fellow women and getting responses like "Oh honey don't say that! You make me feel old". I could seriously stab women who do that (my violent side right there, I have such a low tolerance for those comments), ESPECIALLY when they are at best 5 years older than me and have like 1 or 2 more kids than me. Get a grip ladies! When I said older I meant like over 60 older not 32. I get so tired of feeling like I am some kind of new-bee mom because I only have 1 kid. Not only that but I would seriously like to think that I am an intelligent person who can have a reasonable discussion with someone even though I'm 5-10 years younger than them. 

I really try to not let my life detours (so to speak) become who I am but they are part of me. There are women who I know who have technically been married less than me if you count my total time being married who act like I have no clue. I KNOW what I'm doing just as much as you do if not more because getting divorced is an EYE OPENER. BUT I don't want to be that way. I just want to have a decent adult conversation with people is that so hard?! I guess I find myself struggling to be given the credit at 25 that I feel like I deserve. I don't want to be treated like some miniature 40 year old, I'm not into that pseudo intellectual stuff. However, I don't want to be treated like some blonde idiot who only has one child and was married yesterday. 

Why do women do that to each other? I struggle daily with how to fuse my life experiences together in a way that I am confident and secure with sharing. Why does communicating with others have to be so complicated! Age means NOTHING. It really doesn't. I see no reason why women of all ages can't be more friendly to one another regardless of how OLD (aka mature) they think the other is. So yea when experiences like this happen I often find myself singing the "what's my age again" song in pure irony. It makes sense though because I'm so tired of feeling like I have to explain myself to people when I simply want to be listened to. What kills me even more is I notice myself doing it to other women and I have tried super hard to nip that in the butt because I don't wan to be perpetuating this agism that we women (Mormons especially since we tend to take on life experiences like having children at younger ages) can get so caught up in. 

So the next time you are in church, school, town whatever just promise me that you can help me by NOT getting so caught up in age and what level of maturity you think someone may or may not be compared to you. We as women already do so many things to frustrate one another lets not make age one of those points of frustration it's just not worth it!