A Difficult Age

My son is 4 and people often tell me, ‘that’s a difficult age’…in fact parents are constantly warned about tricky patches in a child’s development.  Well-meaning onlookers will happily mutter ‘ooh dear, the terrible twos,’ [real meaning], ‘excuse me, your child (aged anywhere from 1-4) is having a tantrum.’ [Yes, thank you!]

But no one warned me about my mid-to-late-thirties, and by ‘my’ I mainly mean Tom’s.*

We’re not alone in this.  It really is a difficult age (cue foot stamp!) Many of our friends, whether they are single, or in a relationship, or parents, or not, have experienced a similar thing.  There are many reasons for the trickiness, some are personal to the individual, but several we have in common:

In the work place you may suffer one of the following frustrations:

1) The Rapunzel blockade...you’re trapped in (hopefully) a metaphorical tower. You feel claustrophobic, due to boredom, frustration or lack of fulfilment and want to break out.  But it is a long way down (in salary usually) and there’s nothing as straight-forward as a door to walk out of.

2) (Disney alert!) The King Louis effect. No, not the king of the swingers, blimey!  More the - you’ve reached the top and had to stop - bit (or as high as you/your bosses have any interest in you going), and that is what’s bothering you, thank you.

3) Or the Dolly Parton - Working 9-5 dream: a fulfilling job where leaving at 5pm is acceptable, or perhaps a part-time/job share position that actually works well.  You may have reclaimed that work-life balance, for whatever reason is important to you, but it is a very tricky thing to pull off. Sad but true. (By the way, in case you’re ever tempted, Working 9-5 is an amusing, yet very hard song to karaoke! #shouldvestucktoDisney.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you).

Outside of work, life takes a sudden turn for the fragile.  Your children, your partner, your parents, your friends add a vulnerability to your happiness. Ambitions, that you never even had, annoy you as they fall by the wayside.  For example, the average age of a 2012 Olympic synchronised swimmer was 22.8.  How infuriating, how limiting!  According to a google search, at my age, I still have three remaining Olympic career options: Show Jumping, Shooting or Sailing, phew!

Onwards and Upwards

Whilst these issues are certainly harder to resolve than my 4 year old’s (food, sleep, a cuddle, Star Wars) – I believe they are not impossible to tackle.

Step 1: Dream a Dream, little or big or medium sized, whatever fits and takes your fancy.

Step 2: Follow that dream. 

Both steps are hard; they have their hurdles, and yes, I know, I’m not 26 years old, it’s not on my list of events….but that doesn’t matter.  We (you’re coming too) can get over, round, through them any way we like, it’s not even cheating.  So come on Dolly, Louis, Rapunzel, whatever your name is....grab a trampete, get a step-ladder, poke them with a stick, or just push them over as you go.  Better still, get other people to knock a few down for you…. I intend to get a whole band of merry (wo)men to come with me. 

I am not ‘over the hill’ – my onwards is still upwards; downhill hurts my knees anyway.  And I won’t be walking (I really dislike walking)…..I think I’ll skip and stomp and occasionally trudge, when I’m a bit tired. 

But I am going.  These are exciting times!

* My husband’s parents will probably volunteer up some other difficult ages, if I were to predict based on their stories, I’d say from 18months old to current day!