Your twenties are supposed to be your glory days.
Your skin is yet to be tainted with wrinkles, nowhere has started to noticeably sag and you have the luxury of being ‘not quite a teenager but not quite an adult’. You have youth on your side. You are in the prime of your life. YOU ARE IMMORTAL.
But in spite of all of these benefits, we still have to deal with A LOT of stress and struggles as we are figuring out who we are. Some of them are stupid, some of them less-so.
CAREER PATH
Whether you’ve recently graduated or are still in the throes of third level education, figuring out what you want to do when you go into the big bad world is TOUGH. Family gatherings are the worst for realising you have no idea what you are doing with your life. Why are old people so obsessed about what you are ‘getting up to’?
PISS OF AUNT MAURA. I’M MAKING MINIMUM WAGE WORKING IN MY LOCAL PUB. I CLEAN UP OTHER PEOPLE’S VOMIT FOR A LIVING. IS THIS WHAT YOU WANT TO HEAR?!
EYELINER
Majority of 20-something gals are somewhat obsessed with their eyeliner, and whether or not it can be deemed as ‘on fleek’. For whatever reason, we feel much more glamorous with black shit all over our eyes.
It might seem trivial to the rest of the world, but messing up your artfully drawn flick at the last moment is valid reason to call in sick to work.
WATCHING WHAT YOU EAT
You may be still a young whippersnapper, but you can definitely notice a significant decrease in your metabolism. When you were in school you could eat chicken fillet rolls daily and never gain a pound.
These days you basically just have to GLANCE at a Mars Bar for it to appear on your arse. You try your best to maintain a healthy lifestyle, but sometimes you just cannot resist the seductive ways of a sultry spicebag after a long day of college/work.
Why is healthy eating so hard? Why are carbs so irresistible? Why does kale taste like the tears of small children? WHY?
MONEY
Why does it feel like we are constantly working, yet constantly broke?
Oh yes that’s right – because we are diabolical when it comes to budgeting. It absolutely kills us to spend €40 on a college textbook or a utility bill, but we will happily blow it on a nice new skirt from TopShop or a round of Jager on a night out.
“Hey, mom? Yeah I drank my rent money again…”
YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE
The sad reality of our generation is that social media means everything to us. We are a union of selfie-taking Like-whores and we aren’t even ashamed of it. How we present ourselves online is a big part of our life, every social event needs to be documented so that everyone knows we are having a great time.
Stressing about what filter to use, whether you look skinny enough in THAT photo or whether that status is funny enough to post is par for the course.
You are lying if you say you never deleted a Facebook post because the only people who Liked it were your Nana and that creepy lad you knew from secondary school who has a Honda Civic as his profile picture.
FINDING LOVE
When you enter the Realm of Twenty-Something your love life becomes a bit more complicated than it had been as a teen. You find yourself no longer satisfied with shifting some random fella on a night out.
You see your friends finding nice guys and gals, and settling down. You wonder where these magical humans congregate because everyone you’ve been involved with romantically in the last six months is a BLEEEEEDIN’ TIK.
Your older friends and family will tell you to calm down, ‘sure you’re only a young wan!’, but you still find yourself considering whether you should freeze your eggs in preparation for your impending spinsterdom.
SIGH.