This morning I was on the phone with my aunt talking about how I never really adjusted my wardrobe to what I thought was appropriate for my age. I don’t know if anyone else can relate, but sometimes I wonder if I come across as trying to dress younger than I am. It’s funny because even in my 20s and before that I thought about this on a subconscious level. But once you actually step into that stage of life, you realize that maybe we give people too much credit for being so self-aware about their image.
That conversation led us into a bigger reflection about societal roles. Being in your 20s doesn’t feel all that different from being in your 30s, yet the expectations shift. There’s this pressure to settle into certain roles like marriage, kids, and career milestones. At the same time, there’s the confusing experience of mistaking lust for love or attention for real affection. It’s a double-edged sword: on one hand it filters out the people who don’t have depth, but on the other hand it can leave you sad about how surface-level connections were.
For me, being in my mid-30s feels strange. It’s like I skipped an entire chapter of what my 20s were supposed to be, and I’m still figuring out where I fit now.
Most of that decade I spent with much older men. Relationships that, looking back, robbed me of a certain innocence. I don’t love framing it like I was a victim, but the truth is I didn’t get to just be in my 20s. I wasn’t out making mistakes with friends, traveling, figuring out who I was. I was surviving. Sometimes barely. My tumultuous relationship with my bipolar/psychotic (truly had bipolar with psychotic features-he once thought the neighbors were speaking to him in morse code when they were turning the lights on and off) That constant feeling of not being safe crept inside of my bones and haunted me.
And then right as I turned 29, the pandemic hit. Suddenly it was just me. Solitude. Silence. Too much time to think. So much time with just me after spending my every waking hour taking care of someone else emotionally and physically for years. My nervous system was dysregulated and I was forced to figure it out. That’s when I started painting..and that cracked something open in me. It gave me this space to finally meet myself. But it also made me realize how much I had missed.
Now, here I am in my mid-30s, and it’s a bizarre mix. On paper, I’m supposed to be settled, stable, maybe married, maybe raising kids. But in my head, I feel stuck in the mindset of my 20s, trying to live out experiences I never had. It doesn’t feel like I’ve eased into adulthood. It feels like I got catapulted into almost 40 without the middle part.
“When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about. ”
Moving Back to Cleveland
After the pandemic, I found myself back in Cleveland, which feels like a homecoming and a reset at the same time. It’s where I grew up, but I’m returning as this different version of myself-an artist, a teacher, creating a life that actually feels like mine. I’ve been teaching painting workshops out of a gorgeous barn on the countryside. By guiding other people through their own creative process, a new part of me has been born.
But even here, even while I’m doing something meaningful, I feel the timeline pressure. Most of my peers are married with kids. They’re talking about mortgages, family vacations, and PTA meetings. I show up to the same hometown as a 35-year-old single woman, teaching art classes and painting murals-everyone is so supportive of my path but the solitude can be loud. There is a price to putting everything into your dream. Partially because it was safer than experiencing excruciating heartbreak again.
It Hit Me
Recently, someone said to me, “When you have kids someday…” and it hit me in a way I wasn’t prepared for. It brought up all the feelings I’d been trying to ignore-the truth about time, about biology, about choices. I’m 35. I still feel like I’m in my 20s, but I’m not. And there’s a real chance that the things “people my age” are doing-marriage, children-may not happen for me in the traditional way. For a moment, it made me feel sad, like I wasn’t doing life correctly. Like I was late for something I didn’t even know how to catch.
Making Peace With It
But then I remembered what my life has actually been. All of the detours and heartbreaks and solitude gave me my art. Moving back to Cleveland gave me my community. Teaching gave me a sense of purpose. I am not behind. I am on a different road.
I believe everyone’s life has its own plan and timing. God’s timing. The weirdness, the setbacks, the delays-they’re not punishments, they’re preparation. I don’t know exactly what my future holds, but I do know it’s been designed on purpose. And that gives me hope.
So yes, sometimes being single in your mid-30s feels awkward and lonely and out of step. But it’s also where I found myself. Maybe that’s the real lesson: life isn’t linear. Your story isn’t late. And you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be.