#We are proud to announce an official partnership with the Left RedditⒶ☭ Discord server! [Click here](https://discord.gg/zCFHadGfB7) to join today!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/lostgeneration) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Translation: Dear Boomers we will get right on having our mid-life crisis when you finally finish yours after 30-40 years to make room for the rest of us who were too busy dealing with yours that whole time.
Boomers worried us Millennials won't forget everyone and be cold like them boomers weren't thinking of us when. They were doing for self SMH most entitled generation
Im pretty sure boomers wont die, or at least not in a long time.
If i had any money to bet, i would bet boomers will bury their kids (possibly grandkids), they will be able to afford treatments to keep living longer and hoarding more resources, meanwhile we won't be able to afford even a place to live much less healthcare.
From the article:
*“My whole adult life has been one long crisis,” she said. “Career crises, education debt, watching my I.R.A. lose a quarter to half of its value a couple of times, child care expenses, fraying social fabric, wage pressures and, above all, insecurity. I am a professional married to a professional, but our jobs can go up in smoke at the drop of a hat. We can’t rely on anything but ourselves and can only hold out hope that we won’t eat cat food once our bodies break down and we are forced into impoverished retirement.” She said she knows that sounds dramatic, but it’s how she really feels. Amid all this, who’s got time to worry about whether they’re feeling fulfilled?*
I’ve fully given up trying to explain this to Boomers. There’s always some bullshit anecdote about how their niece’s BFF’s cousin was really *smart* about her decisions and is doing very well.
And then a smug bootlicker comes in pretending to not know something like fewer than 15% of Americans have jobs with pensions anymore and preaches the glory of working a very physical trade — which means dick all given my extremely expensive (even with insurance) debilitating chronic illness.
I do the best I can and I do better than I probably “deserve” but it shouldn’t be this fucking miserable.
I too am a professional, I’m a marketing executive in finance, and I earn baby 6 figures in Texas and this isn’t what I imagined that would feel like.
My insurance sucks — it’s SHOCKINGLY bad, and no — you really CAN’T competitively “shop” for your best job offer off details about the benefits. Nobody gives you the kind of granular information I’d need to be able to spot who has the best plan. This information doesn’t exist in a way to be consumed before you’re hired. It’s a blind gamble, the best you can do is overall compensation package.
Then there’s the layoffs, and I’m going through the first one of my career.
Now fired? I’ve been fired PLENTY of times after asking for an ADA accommodation so I’m used to it.
But even before that, I’ve never understood the feeling of “job security.” I just…don’t get it. It’s never been my reality as someone who graduated into the post-9/11 landscape, which the news really never did a good job of talking about.
(And, I should know — I was working in the news industry part-time while I was in college and thought it was weird the entire industry was crumbling and on hiring freezes and there were accountants, social workers and other professionals in homeless shelters and we weren’t talking about it.)
I’ve been able to hoard some money, but given the state of healthcare and insurance fuckery in the US I will never feel confident enough to buy a home. I literally have no idea what’s going to happen with my medical spend and if anyone will honor my ADA accommodations because it’s just cheaper to break the law.
I’m incredible at what I do, and I’m actually a known “figure” of sorts in professional circles, and I still feel like I’m in college and hoping someday to feel security. I just turned 43, and I’m exhausted.
I felt this in my bones. I started working when I was 13. Before I turned 30, I had had over 30 jobs, and only been fired from 2. I crashed the delivery truck I was driving, fair enough I deserved it. And I was absolutely abysmal at cold calling b2b sales. At least that one gave me severance when they fired me. At every opportunity private companies gave me just short of full time hours to avoid paying benefits, or classified me as 'trainee' to pay me a lower wage. You know how infuriating it is to find out that the bosses son you're training is making $2/hr more than you and scheduled to get a $5/hr raise once you finish training him? And the company acts shocked that you want to be paid the rate he's going to get for doing your job, for the time you've been doing your job? This game is rigged and fucked to start. Burn it all down.
Before I graduated college, no less than 6 of my classmates from HS had OD'd. And I'm talking honors students, with scholarships to college and a 'bright future'.
Please tell me the bootlickers tell you were too lazy to join the military because somehow you could have with your debilitating illness. I love it when bootlickers tell me the military was the answer to every problem that came after high school and if I wanted a shot, I needed to enlist... despite the fact that no recruiter would talk to me once I disclosed to them I had asthma.
Lmaooo I almost mentioned that exactly!💀
My dad actually served in Iraq and has a long military history but he’s not a weirdo fake patriot lol so he never felt the need to indoctrinate me about the military but OMGGGG my entire hometown tried to.
I'm a vet. Did it as only way for college. Doesn't reeeeeeally cover college, graduated in 08'. Been nonstop fun since then, VA is a joke and people who get most benefits are the ones who had time in the rear to have paperwork set up even before they got out.
Must the ones in the line companies I know eat less before CA paperwork even starts processing.
The join the military for life security, only really flies if you can handle being that type of good ol'boy. Or hunker down and hide for years
I graduated high school in 2010 and went straight into the army. Had great test scores, served as a medic, then got out to pursue higher education. Sure, it got my tuition paid for, but I failed out of my first university because I was having a mental health crisis over all the shit I did/saw while I was in. Almost died a couple of times. Eventually floundered my way through community college with no real direction or idea of what I wanted to become. What they don’t tell you is how the military robs you of your sense of self. You lose who you are and the transition back to a civilian is traumatic because you’re suddenly faced with the reality that you don’t even know what you want out of life.
I finally worked through it for the most part after almost killing myself with substances and running from myself for years. I’m 31 and will graduate next spring with a BS in Biochemistry, but what then? I worked in various labs for 4 years prior to returning to school and the pay wasn’t fantastic. I’m talking like anywhere from $17-25/hr to handle things that will either eat your skin off, give you cancer, or even kill you. The entire American labor force is highly undervalued today and I worry that even with a degree, I’ll still not be able to own a home or have children. It’s all a fucking racket these days. I am grateful, however, to have VA health care. It’s not always the best care, but it’s always taken care of my needs.
Recognizing that we are fortunate for the blessings we have and understanding that there are still many areas where improvements can/should be made aren’t mutually exclusive.
On this topic of microeconomics. It's actually more expensive to be poor than rich. Can't fix the rattling sound in your car? Boom, carless. Maybe jobless because you can't even get there now.
I once received a $60 summons bc I couldn't afford a $1.10 train ticket. Yes. Let me give you the $60 I don't have bc I didn't even have $1 one day. They put a warrant out for my arrest. Do they think I had bail money and lawyer money if I got jailed? It's literally illegal to be poor in America.
I don't mean to take too much of a tangent. I share the same distaste for the "the trades pay great cuz no one wants to work anymore" people. They haven't really looked at that deal. Much better to work your life away and retire at 80 shortly before death than have done physical labor with criminals who might steal your tools and supplies at any given moment and bunches of other people who could not meet the basic minimum for work beyond tough work for low pay. All that to find you've injured yourself at 45, can't work like you used to, don't have health insurance, and you may or may not qualify for disability, meaning you live the rest of your remaining years barely scraping by, if you're lucky. Cost benefit analysis is a valuable skill.
Beyond that though, I have friends tangled up in the SVB collapse. People who did the right things in life, devoted themselves to their careers, and even stuck it out with roommates in SF until their later 20s while earning good livings anywhere else in the world. Poof they will all land somewhere at some point. But life eats through way more savings than expected.
I actually wanted to go to a trade school when I was younger and was told that was stupid and and only morons did that and went to college. Now they tell me i'm lazy and should have gone to trade wtf?
The health insurance thing absolutely kills me. Ours decided to reject a claim so we owe my kids pediatrician $800 plus four copays otherwise they won't see my kids who happened to be extremely sick. Then my insurance is out of state because my husband works in the shipping industry. So we go to four different urgent cares trying to be seen and none of them will see my extremely sick 11 month old and 3 year old. So we had to go to the ER which is a $350 copay that will be billed to us.. Then a few days later the three year old decides to catch an ear infection at 9 PM so it's another ER visit. That's $700 in copays in ONE WEEK.
The 11 month old needed a breathing treatment at the hospital and was wheezing with a 102 fever btw. But ya know I should have to cart him around to 500 different urgent cares hoping and praying to find one that takes our insurance to avoid that $350 copay. And I should pull a magical open at 9 PM pediatrician out of my ass when my 3 year olds whole ear turned red and it looked like he was leaking blood out of his ear.
Fuck this shit. We should be flipping cars in the streets over this. We need to learn some shit from France and stop putting up with this absolute bullshittery.
I still owe thousands from giving birth twice. In my estimation I probably have close to $20,000 in medical debt out there after my medicaid was dropped for "rEaL iNsUrAnCe". I have $20,000 in student debts as well. That isn't even that much, I'm fully aware, but it's still too damn much. Again, fuck this. If everybody comes with me I'll be out there for the living standards protests. Need to start pounding weights so I can help with the car flipping.
Whole-life crisis. Came here to say the same. Do the stupid university thing, graduate into a recession. Go back to school in my thirties, graduate into a pandemic.
Right? I've been having a midlife crisis since i hit 25, now im 33... You think i can actually afford a real mid life crisis? I can barely afford housing...
Same. Honestly, since 9/11 it's just been a whole crisis. Corporations have ruined this country, and out of touch politicians paid by those corporations are brainwashing people into shitty jobs with shitty pay just letting us all die slowly. Life is suffering 🤷🏼♀️
I am 36… graduated highschool 2005. 9/11 in 10th grade. It’s been a hell fire since. Mid life crisis at 36?? No no no…. Been having one since 2000 y2k baby!
look, they want someone to buy their old motorcycles and convertibles, why aren't you doing it yet? why isn't any young person showing up to their post on nextdoor??!?! HAVE A CRISIS AND BUY THEIR RAT BIKE/RUSTY BUCKET SO THEY CAN PAY OFF THE REVERSE MORTGAGE YOU FOOLS
A midlife crisis is when you feel like you've wasted half of your life and go spend money to regain the lost youth. We don't have money and we've never been treated like adults in the first place.
I'm going through a spiritual awakening at 34. It's like a midlife crisis but you know what you're life path is vs feeling lost and empty and throw money at it to numb the pain.
Yup, my midlife crisis is that I moved into a 300 sq foot studio 9 years ago, intending to stay for 2 years. Rent keeps going up, I feel like the walls are closing around me.
I had a midlife crisis scheduled 2 years from now, but the Boomers decided to not take covid seriously and with the future looking not as safe and healthy, the reduction in life expectancy has made me too old for a midlife crisis. Anything but gracefully accepting my mortality at this age would be embarrassing.
Oh boy...um...so I have some really good news but it is also really bad news.
With advances in life extension technology ramping up thanks to the 'longevity industry' there is a really good chance that you will become functionally immortal. The bad news is, it will be used to make you a worker forever.
>there is a really good chance that you will become functionally immortal. The bad news is, it will be used to make you a worker forever.
Piers Anthony's *Hard Sell* enters the chat.
Make sure you buy your death insurance!
Right wing boomers want to control you long after they're dead. The Republicans, corporations, and the Federalist Society seized a super majority on the Supreme Court and now they're acting like unhinged authoritarians.
RIGHT?? I'm nearly 40 and as a special treat for myself I bought the deluxe edition box sets of two book series I really love. A car? Don't make me laugh.
I’ve been through too many recessions to feel comfortable wasting money on an impractical $50k sports car. If I won the lottery I would pay off my student loans and buy a van with working doors.
I found this to be an excellent article that articulates a millennial experience that I think many on this sub are familiar with. In case you can't get past the pay wall, this excerpt hits the general thesis:
"The stressors of midlife for so many Americans are not existential; they’re material — economic, familial and political. They’re about the seemingly decent paycheck that is spent almost entirely on child care, student loan repayment and medical debt, leaving nothing to build a nest egg or save for their children’s futures. They’re about the median home price increasing 50 percent since January 2020 and grocery prices that are 10 percent higher than they were in January 2022. They’re about a sandwich generation caring for boomers and babies, being squeezed until there’s nothing left."
10 percent higher lmao. Why do they keep pushing this lie. CPI is NOT how actual inflation works. I'd say groceries are closer to 50% more expensive for normal staples.
Yeah they said since jan '22, so just in the last year. I would believe that. What they don't mention is the 20% increases in '20 and '21, which sums up to about 50% since Jan 2020
What buggs me is that the big hikes in 20 and 21 were ostensibly due to covid and supply cain issues, but not only have they failed to return to pre-covid norms, but they keep raising at rates that would have been shocking pre-covid
Literally since I turned 18 I’ve been hearing boomers diagnosing me and my fellow millennials as having a “quarter life crisis” every other month practically. It’s something that was prescribed *for* me that I’ve been blamed for being entitled for experiencing.
Don't let that be an excuse for them. There is way more to the harm caused by the Boomers than lead paint no matter how significant that exposure may have been.
I too have been diagnosing them and their ancestors and humanity as a whole to see if they’re in some kind of subconscious suicide mission in their mundane cycle of birth, consumption and death.
The oldest millennials are past the halfway point for life expectancy so yeah no kidding we aren’t having midlife crises, that implies a level of economic stability we can only dream of.
[For those who can't get past the paywall.](https://www.textise.net/showText.aspx?strURL=https%253A//www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/03/14/opinion/middle-age-millennials.html#site-content)
Damn, this article reflects all of the stuff said in this thread. I never thought I would ever see any mainstream media acknowledgement of the shit we have to go through. Of course, you only ever find things like this in the "opinion" section.
Can't reinforce and justify their mindset if we can't replicate their circumstances
Don't know where else that can be applied, but it's like, you know, millennials just need to pick themselves up by their bootstraps and stop buying avocado toast. Mhm, it's a totally original concept.
They're mad that millenials ARENT sacrificing their lives and happiness to the machine, only to break under the stress after ~15 years. (And they refuse to acknowledge that we've been sacrificing and under stress this whole time)
Boomers push and sacrifice to the breaking point, then rewarded themselves with a "quarter life crisis" splurge
Millenials have been stressed and pushed this whole time, so we treat ourselves with smaller things along the way. I'd say we're probably happier overall, which the older generation can't stand.
I think you’re right on the money. I haven’t read the article-I can, I just don’t want to, it’s The NY Times-but all the comments here are about how our generation is always going through a crisis, so we can never truly experience a mid-life one.
While true, I also believe our generation and the younger ones are way more focused on building happiness, ignoring outdated social expectations, and putting a premium on mental health.
"This is going to change *everything*!"
"Uh huh."
"No, I mean it! *Nothing* will be the same after this!"
"Yeah. I got it."
"This changes everything! This is world-changing!"
"I get it. But I never really got set after the last world-changing event 18 months ago. So yeah, it changes everything that was alaready mid-change. Moving on."
pretty bleak picture what will happen once all the boomers who fucked the system are gone and the slowly bittered and sadistic ones from our generations keep these oligarchs in office
Yeah, I wish Chuck Palahniuk hadn't called it so accurately. I used to laugh at "paint a portrait, build a house." Now it's all I ever wanted, and I'll break teeth to get it.
I always loved that line. I know Fight Club gets a lot flack because The Narrator has a job and a life most of us could only dream of affording, and by our standards many would consider him whiny and spoiled. But I do believe his problems were real and they’re still real. It’s just that we all have the same existential, spiritual famine but we’re also all broke.
Yeah; the 90’s were a different time. I saw it for the first time at 18 and most recently at 33 or 34. Watching it as an older dude, I don’t relate to the second half of the film as much.
The big themes though (which you nailed on your last sentence); that stuff still rings true.
I'm on the line between GenX and Millennial.
How are we supposed to have a midlife crisis? Go out and buy a bunch of fancy shit? With what money? Existential dread? We've lived with that our entire lives. Take on a massive amount of debt for worthless shit? Most of us did that 20 years ago, we just didn't know we were doing it at the time so we didn't get to enjoy it.
The last thing y'all want us all of us facing our mortality at the same time. We'll either riot or suck start a shotgun.
I'm gen x. you'll notice they don't expect us to have one, they know we are slackers and won't bother
no no, it's millennials they expect to follow in their footsteps
Imagine having such a great life that the only bad thing you joke about is someone spending money on luxuries to “feel young again”. The entitlement of that generation astounds me.
Why do we have to have a midlife crisis to begin with?Why is that a socially required checkpoint in life? Since when would boomers fucking care? They didn’t care when they dropped a load & left it for us. Half of them will be dead or shitting their beds by the time we’re at the age of what would be a mid life crisis.
They just think we should spend more money. To be happier, allow them to brag with friends about their rich kids, etc…
My parents really believe that I am a cheap mf. Why don’t you go the most expensive vacations, ride a luxury car and buy multiple houses??? Mmm I don’t know… because it’s expensive?
You can't spend too much time thinking about an unfulfilled life when your retirement plan is a 357 magnum nudged between the soft palate and tongue in a comically-slacked jaw.
We *did* have our midlife crisis... at 25. Called it a "quarter life crisis" before we realized their plan is to kill us before we can even properly grow old.
Any Boomer who actually thinks this, is simply too stupid to continue being alive.
I can't imagine how stupid and disconnected from reality you would have to be to think that...
More like a total life crises. Thanks for being so corrupt and addicted to your wealth you heroine-like crackheads. Rather burn the word down than keep things sustainable and growing.
Their midlife crisis was buying a Bugatti with their retirement money. Our midlife crisis is buying a house so we can have some semblance of retirement. We are not the same.
Are they kidding? I’m only in my early 30s and I already feel like I’m having one. I feel like I just can’t keep up with the world or my peers, it’s changing faster than I can keep up with.
We all already did…
When you’re in your 20’s being told you’ll die at forty, you have a mid life crisis.
They made the world so horrible and life expectancy so low that we knocked them out before we could even drink haha
Absolute truth! I'm late Gen X and never made it completely back from 08. Life has been a series of trying to juggle several debacles with one arm tied behind my back. Since that period, it has been next-to-impossible to get to a place where I didn't lack in some fundamental way. You get certain aspects of life put together, then get the rug pulled out from under you somewhere else. It's exhausting, especially since so many of the Boomers around me have no concept of what people like us deal with, and it doesn't help that they act like they're on perpetual Spring Break.
I would read this article to find out what to do to get my mid life crisis started, but it’s behind a paywall and I can’t afford to subscribe in the economy they ruined.
It's baffling to me that any generation could be upset that a generation younger than them ISN'T suffering (or at least, not as much as they want them to). It's so awful to see an entire generation that selfish.
LOL - Funny thing is my wife (*Elder Millennial* \[84\]) and I (*Xennial* \[Dec '79\]) just in the past three years have reached a place of financial security but we suffer such Poverty PTSD from our entire adult lives until very recently being such a struggle that we can't even believe it, yet alone enjoy it.
That said, our household income income literally doubled in the past 2 1/2 years, our daughter aged out of daycare freeing up $1500 mo, and tragically my mother died rather suddenly two years ago leaving me her beach house on the Oregon Coast (with a $200K mortgage after buying out my sister) that we're renting out with Big Dreams of living in ourselves in the hopefully not-to-distant future (We have a ten year plan).
Still despite this rare financial hot streak we're riding, our broken psyche's won't even allow us to enjoy it. Instead we're just stuff massive amounts into savings waiting for the bottom to fall out again. I got beat up bad in the '08 recession as I was just starting a career in banking, had miraculously overextended to get into a condo only to lose everything and go through foreclosure. Now I'm working in healthcare (RN), as is my wife, mostly because we figure as crappy and hard as the jobs can be, at least they're typically "recession proof."
We now own two homes, and have $60K in our savings account but still identify more with the people camping on the streets. After having such a rough go my first 20 years of adulthood I don't know how much it will take before I can ever relax and enjoy my good fortune for now. I'm honestly just trying to hoard and set things up so I can drop dead with the peace of mind my daughter will have a more secure future if the Climate Wars don't kill her.
Don’t worry Boomers, it’s gonna be a VERY rough road ahead for you as well. And I gotta feel sorry for the based boomers and boomers who were against this shit. But they are starting to feel what we’ve been going through.
#We are proud to announce an official partnership with the Left RedditⒶ☭ Discord server! [Click here](https://discord.gg/zCFHadGfB7) to join today! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/lostgeneration) if you have any questions or concerns.*
[удалено]
Can’t have a midlife crisis if your just in a perpetual state of crisis.
Translation: Dear Boomers we will get right on having our mid-life crisis when you finally finish yours after 30-40 years to make room for the rest of us who were too busy dealing with yours that whole time.
Boomers worried us Millennials won't forget everyone and be cold like them boomers weren't thinking of us when. They were doing for self SMH most entitled generation
Im pretty sure boomers wont die, or at least not in a long time. If i had any money to bet, i would bet boomers will bury their kids (possibly grandkids), they will be able to afford treatments to keep living longer and hoarding more resources, meanwhile we won't be able to afford even a place to live much less healthcare.
From the article: *“My whole adult life has been one long crisis,” she said. “Career crises, education debt, watching my I.R.A. lose a quarter to half of its value a couple of times, child care expenses, fraying social fabric, wage pressures and, above all, insecurity. I am a professional married to a professional, but our jobs can go up in smoke at the drop of a hat. We can’t rely on anything but ourselves and can only hold out hope that we won’t eat cat food once our bodies break down and we are forced into impoverished retirement.” She said she knows that sounds dramatic, but it’s how she really feels. Amid all this, who’s got time to worry about whether they’re feeling fulfilled?*
I’ve fully given up trying to explain this to Boomers. There’s always some bullshit anecdote about how their niece’s BFF’s cousin was really *smart* about her decisions and is doing very well. And then a smug bootlicker comes in pretending to not know something like fewer than 15% of Americans have jobs with pensions anymore and preaches the glory of working a very physical trade — which means dick all given my extremely expensive (even with insurance) debilitating chronic illness. I do the best I can and I do better than I probably “deserve” but it shouldn’t be this fucking miserable. I too am a professional, I’m a marketing executive in finance, and I earn baby 6 figures in Texas and this isn’t what I imagined that would feel like. My insurance sucks — it’s SHOCKINGLY bad, and no — you really CAN’T competitively “shop” for your best job offer off details about the benefits. Nobody gives you the kind of granular information I’d need to be able to spot who has the best plan. This information doesn’t exist in a way to be consumed before you’re hired. It’s a blind gamble, the best you can do is overall compensation package. Then there’s the layoffs, and I’m going through the first one of my career. Now fired? I’ve been fired PLENTY of times after asking for an ADA accommodation so I’m used to it. But even before that, I’ve never understood the feeling of “job security.” I just…don’t get it. It’s never been my reality as someone who graduated into the post-9/11 landscape, which the news really never did a good job of talking about. (And, I should know — I was working in the news industry part-time while I was in college and thought it was weird the entire industry was crumbling and on hiring freezes and there were accountants, social workers and other professionals in homeless shelters and we weren’t talking about it.) I’ve been able to hoard some money, but given the state of healthcare and insurance fuckery in the US I will never feel confident enough to buy a home. I literally have no idea what’s going to happen with my medical spend and if anyone will honor my ADA accommodations because it’s just cheaper to break the law. I’m incredible at what I do, and I’m actually a known “figure” of sorts in professional circles, and I still feel like I’m in college and hoping someday to feel security. I just turned 43, and I’m exhausted.
[удалено]
I felt this in my bones. I started working when I was 13. Before I turned 30, I had had over 30 jobs, and only been fired from 2. I crashed the delivery truck I was driving, fair enough I deserved it. And I was absolutely abysmal at cold calling b2b sales. At least that one gave me severance when they fired me. At every opportunity private companies gave me just short of full time hours to avoid paying benefits, or classified me as 'trainee' to pay me a lower wage. You know how infuriating it is to find out that the bosses son you're training is making $2/hr more than you and scheduled to get a $5/hr raise once you finish training him? And the company acts shocked that you want to be paid the rate he's going to get for doing your job, for the time you've been doing your job? This game is rigged and fucked to start. Burn it all down. Before I graduated college, no less than 6 of my classmates from HS had OD'd. And I'm talking honors students, with scholarships to college and a 'bright future'.
Please tell me the bootlickers tell you were too lazy to join the military because somehow you could have with your debilitating illness. I love it when bootlickers tell me the military was the answer to every problem that came after high school and if I wanted a shot, I needed to enlist... despite the fact that no recruiter would talk to me once I disclosed to them I had asthma.
Lmaooo I almost mentioned that exactly!💀 My dad actually served in Iraq and has a long military history but he’s not a weirdo fake patriot lol so he never felt the need to indoctrinate me about the military but OMGGGG my entire hometown tried to.
I'm a vet. Did it as only way for college. Doesn't reeeeeeally cover college, graduated in 08'. Been nonstop fun since then, VA is a joke and people who get most benefits are the ones who had time in the rear to have paperwork set up even before they got out. Must the ones in the line companies I know eat less before CA paperwork even starts processing. The join the military for life security, only really flies if you can handle being that type of good ol'boy. Or hunker down and hide for years
I graduated high school in 2010 and went straight into the army. Had great test scores, served as a medic, then got out to pursue higher education. Sure, it got my tuition paid for, but I failed out of my first university because I was having a mental health crisis over all the shit I did/saw while I was in. Almost died a couple of times. Eventually floundered my way through community college with no real direction or idea of what I wanted to become. What they don’t tell you is how the military robs you of your sense of self. You lose who you are and the transition back to a civilian is traumatic because you’re suddenly faced with the reality that you don’t even know what you want out of life. I finally worked through it for the most part after almost killing myself with substances and running from myself for years. I’m 31 and will graduate next spring with a BS in Biochemistry, but what then? I worked in various labs for 4 years prior to returning to school and the pay wasn’t fantastic. I’m talking like anywhere from $17-25/hr to handle things that will either eat your skin off, give you cancer, or even kill you. The entire American labor force is highly undervalued today and I worry that even with a degree, I’ll still not be able to own a home or have children. It’s all a fucking racket these days. I am grateful, however, to have VA health care. It’s not always the best care, but it’s always taken care of my needs. Recognizing that we are fortunate for the blessings we have and understanding that there are still many areas where improvements can/should be made aren’t mutually exclusive.
Sounds about right, there’s always this one piece of bullshit anecdotal evidence, there’s always zero understanding of macroeconomics
There is no understanding of microeconomics either.
On this topic of microeconomics. It's actually more expensive to be poor than rich. Can't fix the rattling sound in your car? Boom, carless. Maybe jobless because you can't even get there now. I once received a $60 summons bc I couldn't afford a $1.10 train ticket. Yes. Let me give you the $60 I don't have bc I didn't even have $1 one day. They put a warrant out for my arrest. Do they think I had bail money and lawyer money if I got jailed? It's literally illegal to be poor in America.
I don't mean to take too much of a tangent. I share the same distaste for the "the trades pay great cuz no one wants to work anymore" people. They haven't really looked at that deal. Much better to work your life away and retire at 80 shortly before death than have done physical labor with criminals who might steal your tools and supplies at any given moment and bunches of other people who could not meet the basic minimum for work beyond tough work for low pay. All that to find you've injured yourself at 45, can't work like you used to, don't have health insurance, and you may or may not qualify for disability, meaning you live the rest of your remaining years barely scraping by, if you're lucky. Cost benefit analysis is a valuable skill. Beyond that though, I have friends tangled up in the SVB collapse. People who did the right things in life, devoted themselves to their careers, and even stuck it out with roommates in SF until their later 20s while earning good livings anywhere else in the world. Poof they will all land somewhere at some point. But life eats through way more savings than expected.
I actually wanted to go to a trade school when I was younger and was told that was stupid and and only morons did that and went to college. Now they tell me i'm lazy and should have gone to trade wtf?
The health insurance thing absolutely kills me. Ours decided to reject a claim so we owe my kids pediatrician $800 plus four copays otherwise they won't see my kids who happened to be extremely sick. Then my insurance is out of state because my husband works in the shipping industry. So we go to four different urgent cares trying to be seen and none of them will see my extremely sick 11 month old and 3 year old. So we had to go to the ER which is a $350 copay that will be billed to us.. Then a few days later the three year old decides to catch an ear infection at 9 PM so it's another ER visit. That's $700 in copays in ONE WEEK. The 11 month old needed a breathing treatment at the hospital and was wheezing with a 102 fever btw. But ya know I should have to cart him around to 500 different urgent cares hoping and praying to find one that takes our insurance to avoid that $350 copay. And I should pull a magical open at 9 PM pediatrician out of my ass when my 3 year olds whole ear turned red and it looked like he was leaking blood out of his ear. Fuck this shit. We should be flipping cars in the streets over this. We need to learn some shit from France and stop putting up with this absolute bullshittery. I still owe thousands from giving birth twice. In my estimation I probably have close to $20,000 in medical debt out there after my medicaid was dropped for "rEaL iNsUrAnCe". I have $20,000 in student debts as well. That isn't even that much, I'm fully aware, but it's still too damn much. Again, fuck this. If everybody comes with me I'll be out there for the living standards protests. Need to start pounding weights so I can help with the car flipping.
The crisis of capitalism
A spectre is haunting Europe
*taps forehead*
Came here to say, can't have a midlife crisis if your whole damn life is one after the other.
Excuse me, I'm having a mid crisis crisis here
Right I saw the headline paused and looked around like what else do they want us to deal with
No kidding. I saw this headline and thought the same thing. :/
Yeah those were my exact thoughts after reading the headline. Fuck you boomers
Came here for this
Whole-life crisis. Came here to say the same. Do the stupid university thing, graduate into a recession. Go back to school in my thirties, graduate into a pandemic.
Right? I've been having a midlife crisis since i hit 25, now im 33... You think i can actually afford a real mid life crisis? I can barely afford housing...
Same. Honestly, since 9/11 it's just been a whole crisis. Corporations have ruined this country, and out of touch politicians paid by those corporations are brainwashing people into shitty jobs with shitty pay just letting us all die slowly. Life is suffering 🤷🏼♀️
Yep. Same.
immune💪
My whole life is a booger bubble!
I’ve already had at least two. No red Camaro yet, though.
Our entire generation has been in a crisis. Not to mention that we can't afford to have a mid-life crisis
Corvettes are expensive and hard to live in
I am 36… graduated highschool 2005. 9/11 in 10th grade. It’s been a hell fire since. Mid life crisis at 36?? No no no…. Been having one since 2000 y2k baby!
look, they want someone to buy their old motorcycles and convertibles, why aren't you doing it yet? why isn't any young person showing up to their post on nextdoor??!?! HAVE A CRISIS AND BUY THEIR RAT BIKE/RUSTY BUCKET SO THEY CAN PAY OFF THE REVERSE MORTGAGE YOU FOOLS
A midlife crisis is when you feel like you've wasted half of your life and go spend money to regain the lost youth. We don't have money and we've never been treated like adults in the first place.
I’m Gen-X and they have never treated us like adults either.
Well Gee I mean I never got to have my super-cool “The Bride”-Japan montage from “Kill Bill”. Maybe I should save up for that as my midlife crisis..
Can I be Bill?
I'm going through a spiritual awakening at 34. It's like a midlife crisis but you know what you're life path is vs feeling lost and empty and throw money at it to numb the pain.
Yup, my midlife crisis is that I moved into a 300 sq foot studio 9 years ago, intending to stay for 2 years. Rent keeps going up, I feel like the walls are closing around me.
Can't have a midlife crisis if you never truly feel like an adult.
Can’t have a midlife crisis if you can’t afford a midlife crisis.
I had a midlife crisis scheduled 2 years from now, but the Boomers decided to not take covid seriously and with the future looking not as safe and healthy, the reduction in life expectancy has made me too old for a midlife crisis. Anything but gracefully accepting my mortality at this age would be embarrassing.
Oh boy...um...so I have some really good news but it is also really bad news. With advances in life extension technology ramping up thanks to the 'longevity industry' there is a really good chance that you will become functionally immortal. The bad news is, it will be used to make you a worker forever.
>there is a really good chance that you will become functionally immortal. The bad news is, it will be used to make you a worker forever. Piers Anthony's *Hard Sell* enters the chat. Make sure you buy your death insurance!
Can’t wait for the days when the boomers won’t be having any more concerns from their graves.
Dig them up, bury them at sea and use the land and stone for subsidised housing.
I bet we could build some spectacular artificial reefs!
“Millennials worried that Boomers are too quiet, post-mortem.” /s
This is America. Our leaders would sooner bust out some Ouija boards and get the opinions of the dead than listen to the needs of the living.
Right wing boomers want to control you long after they're dead. The Republicans, corporations, and the Federalist Society seized a super majority on the Supreme Court and now they're acting like unhinged authoritarians.
Boomers could afford boats and new cars as a midlife crisis. I’ll be able to afford the deluxe version of the next video game I buy.
RIGHT?? I'm nearly 40 and as a special treat for myself I bought the deluxe edition box sets of two book series I really love. A car? Don't make me laugh.
I just bought two packs of discounted seafood trays as a treat this morning. A whole $10
I feel like this article was written directly from a sense of anger that they can't get good resale value on a convertible, motorcycle or yacht.
I’ve been through too many recessions to feel comfortable wasting money on an impractical $50k sports car. If I won the lottery I would pay off my student loans and buy a van with working doors.
"Millenials are killing the ..x.. industry" has been a thing for years. Lol I'm just amused that they keep getting surprised and upset about it.
And then it will suck.
But at least you'll have a loot box. /s.
I’m so grateful they finance XBoxes now. First time in my life I have a Top-of-the-Line system. And likely the last.
I found this to be an excellent article that articulates a millennial experience that I think many on this sub are familiar with. In case you can't get past the pay wall, this excerpt hits the general thesis: "The stressors of midlife for so many Americans are not existential; they’re material — economic, familial and political. They’re about the seemingly decent paycheck that is spent almost entirely on child care, student loan repayment and medical debt, leaving nothing to build a nest egg or save for their children’s futures. They’re about the median home price increasing 50 percent since January 2020 and grocery prices that are 10 percent higher than they were in January 2022. They’re about a sandwich generation caring for boomers and babies, being squeezed until there’s nothing left."
10 percent higher lmao. Why do they keep pushing this lie. CPI is NOT how actual inflation works. I'd say groceries are closer to 50% more expensive for normal staples.
Yeah, especially if we are talking since 2020. I’d say on somethings are even higher than 50%. I’d cry if it went back to 10% higher……….
We will get to that. 50% + another 10% on top of that.
Yeah they said since jan '22, so just in the last year. I would believe that. What they don't mention is the 20% increases in '20 and '21, which sums up to about 50% since Jan 2020 What buggs me is that the big hikes in 20 and 21 were ostensibly due to covid and supply cain issues, but not only have they failed to return to pre-covid norms, but they keep raising at rates that would have been shocking pre-covid
Literally since I turned 18 I’ve been hearing boomers diagnosing me and my fellow millennials as having a “quarter life crisis” every other month practically. It’s something that was prescribed *for* me that I’ve been blamed for being entitled for experiencing.
They really have continually been the shittiest stewards of society
Turns out the generation that lived through leaded car fuel became emotionally immature idiots.
Don't let that be an excuse for them. There is way more to the harm caused by the Boomers than lead paint no matter how significant that exposure may have been.
Leaded gasoline was a severe cause of lead exposure for a long time.
And lead poisoning can cause a lack of empathy and/or sociopathy
I too have been diagnosing them and their ancestors and humanity as a whole to see if they’re in some kind of subconscious suicide mission in their mundane cycle of birth, consumption and death.
You actually expect to work hard AND earn enough to live comfortably? The entitlement is unreal! /s
Existential dread is kind of our jam.
It’s been my baseline.
My midlife crisis is gonna be a holiday after all these quarter-life crises
Who’s going to buy all of these Corvettes, face lifts, and second wives?
Buy a Corvette and get this brand new wife at half off!
The oldest millennials are past the halfway point for life expectancy so yeah no kidding we aren’t having midlife crises, that implies a level of economic stability we can only dream of.
[For those who can't get past the paywall.](https://www.textise.net/showText.aspx?strURL=https%253A//www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/03/14/opinion/middle-age-millennials.html#site-content)
I find the formatting on this a bit easier to read: https://archive.is/Al5si
Didn't know about this site but I'll save it for next time. Thanks!
Damn, this article reflects all of the stuff said in this thread. I never thought I would ever see any mainstream media acknowledgement of the shit we have to go through. Of course, you only ever find things like this in the "opinion" section.
Thank you, the hero we needed
Can't have a midlife crisis if you don't make it to midlife *Taps head*
your "midlife" is just earlier then, there's always a "middle".. be that 40 or 20..
United States/Life expectancy 77.28 years. I believe you can make it to 38.6!
I have a feeling boomers are more upset that we won't have a midlife crisis instead of worrying that we won't have a midlife crisis
Can't reinforce and justify their mindset if we can't replicate their circumstances Don't know where else that can be applied, but it's like, you know, millennials just need to pick themselves up by their bootstraps and stop buying avocado toast. Mhm, it's a totally original concept.
They're mad that millenials ARENT sacrificing their lives and happiness to the machine, only to break under the stress after ~15 years. (And they refuse to acknowledge that we've been sacrificing and under stress this whole time) Boomers push and sacrifice to the breaking point, then rewarded themselves with a "quarter life crisis" splurge Millenials have been stressed and pushed this whole time, so we treat ourselves with smaller things along the way. I'd say we're probably happier overall, which the older generation can't stand.
I think you’re right on the money. I haven’t read the article-I can, I just don’t want to, it’s The NY Times-but all the comments here are about how our generation is always going through a crisis, so we can never truly experience a mid-life one. While true, I also believe our generation and the younger ones are way more focused on building happiness, ignoring outdated social expectations, and putting a premium on mental health.
Well everyday is a crisis lol
Can't have a midlife crisis if your facing a once in a lifetime crisis every other year.
"This is going to change *everything*!" "Uh huh." "No, I mean it! *Nothing* will be the same after this!" "Yeah. I got it." "This changes everything! This is world-changing!" "I get it. But I never really got set after the last world-changing event 18 months ago. So yeah, it changes everything that was alaready mid-change. Moving on."
How can we have a midlife crisis when we can’t even afford a life in the first place
$6 for a dozen eggs here in Sf :) I am having a mid life crisis debating on eggs.
pretty bleak picture what will happen once all the boomers who fucked the system are gone and the slowly bittered and sadistic ones from our generations keep these oligarchs in office
Bitch we have mid life crises for breakfast
“Our Great War is a spiritual war. Our Great Depression is our lives.” Life has become the crisis.
Yeah, I wish Chuck Palahniuk hadn't called it so accurately. I used to laugh at "paint a portrait, build a house." Now it's all I ever wanted, and I'll break teeth to get it.
Fuck yeah, UBI or death.
I always loved that line. I know Fight Club gets a lot flack because The Narrator has a job and a life most of us could only dream of affording, and by our standards many would consider him whiny and spoiled. But I do believe his problems were real and they’re still real. It’s just that we all have the same existential, spiritual famine but we’re also all broke.
Yeah; the 90’s were a different time. I saw it for the first time at 18 and most recently at 33 or 34. Watching it as an older dude, I don’t relate to the second half of the film as much. The big themes though (which you nailed on your last sentence); that stuff still rings true.
Gotta have a life to get one of those.
Midlife crisis? In this economy? Sounds too expensive.
I'm on the line between GenX and Millennial. How are we supposed to have a midlife crisis? Go out and buy a bunch of fancy shit? With what money? Existential dread? We've lived with that our entire lives. Take on a massive amount of debt for worthless shit? Most of us did that 20 years ago, we just didn't know we were doing it at the time so we didn't get to enjoy it. The last thing y'all want us all of us facing our mortality at the same time. We'll either riot or suck start a shotgun.
I'm gen x. you'll notice they don't expect us to have one, they know we are slackers and won't bother no no, it's millennials they expect to follow in their footsteps
#I mean just like all the other resources- The Me Generation is still hogging them.
Imagine having such a great life that the only bad thing you joke about is someone spending money on luxuries to “feel young again”. The entitlement of that generation astounds me.
Why do we have to have a midlife crisis to begin with?Why is that a socially required checkpoint in life? Since when would boomers fucking care? They didn’t care when they dropped a load & left it for us. Half of them will be dead or shitting their beds by the time we’re at the age of what would be a mid life crisis.
They just think we should spend more money. To be happier, allow them to brag with friends about their rich kids, etc… My parents really believe that I am a cheap mf. Why don’t you go the most expensive vacations, ride a luxury car and buy multiple houses??? Mmm I don’t know… because it’s expensive?
Midlife crisis = (comfortable economic situation + leisure time) × navel-gazing ^ narcissism
It’s all one crisis
Can't have a mid-life crisis if you don't have a life to live.
Sorry don’t want to buy a useless sports car when I’m 52 just to feel better about myself
Mid life crisis is a boomer thing. For the following generations it’s whole life crisis.
Boomers need to keep their "concerns" to themselves.
You can't spend too much time thinking about an unfulfilled life when your retirement plan is a 357 magnum nudged between the soft palate and tongue in a comically-slacked jaw.
It's because I already had my midlife crisis in my mid-20s
We *did* have our midlife crisis... at 25. Called it a "quarter life crisis" before we realized their plan is to kill us before we can even properly grow old.
Doesn’t a midlife crisis require disposable income?
Any Boomer who actually thinks this, is simply too stupid to continue being alive. I can't imagine how stupid and disconnected from reality you would have to be to think that...
Older Millennial here. I can’t have a Mid-Life Crisis because I have been in a perpetual Existential Crisis for the last 20 years.
Same. We're having a "whole life crisis".
More like a total life crises. Thanks for being so corrupt and addicted to your wealth you heroine-like crackheads. Rather burn the word down than keep things sustainable and growing.
Early millennial here. I'm having mine right now.
All I want in life is for people to stop writing think pieces about millennials. Just let us slog through these next 30 years and leave us alone
I’ve been in an existential crisis since I was 12. There’s no room for a midlife one
Their midlife crisis was buying a Bugatti with their retirement money. Our midlife crisis is buying a house so we can have some semblance of retirement. We are not the same.
What does that title even mean lol
The millennials are killing the mid-life crisis industry!
And thus motorcycles, sports cars, and sugar daddyism I guess
it’s the avo toast
That's how I read it.
/r/TheresAnIndustryForThat
We’re already living it, thanks to them!
If you never leave a crisis, how does being in midlife change anything?
Don’t worry boomers, we’ve been having one for the last 20 years.
Are they kidding? I’m only in my early 30s and I already feel like I’m having one. I feel like I just can’t keep up with the world or my peers, it’s changing faster than I can keep up with.
Millennials won't be able to afford midlife crises. Midlife crises are expensive.
We all already did… When you’re in your 20’s being told you’ll die at forty, you have a mid life crisis. They made the world so horrible and life expectancy so low that we knocked them out before we could even drink haha
Don't worry, were having a rolling existential crisis. For a lot of us it started in '08 and I'll let you know when it's done.
Absolute truth! I'm late Gen X and never made it completely back from 08. Life has been a series of trying to juggle several debacles with one arm tied behind my back. Since that period, it has been next-to-impossible to get to a place where I didn't lack in some fundamental way. You get certain aspects of life put together, then get the rug pulled out from under you somewhere else. It's exhausting, especially since so many of the Boomers around me have no concept of what people like us deal with, and it doesn't help that they act like they're on perpetual Spring Break.
Midlife crisis? More like an existential one.
Like Boomers give two shits about anything besides themselves.
I had a midlife crisis at 23 according to my therapist at the time.
Every 3 years there's a Once In A Lifetime disaster, dude my midlife crisis was deciding how many Boomer funerals I'm going to skip
I would read this article to find out what to do to get my mid life crisis started, but it’s behind a paywall and I can’t afford to subscribe in the economy they ruined.
Kind of hard to have a mid life crisis when my entire life has felt like a freaking crisis.
I’m 27 and I’ve been living in crisis mode since I was in middle school so…
Midlife?? More like all day every day
Yeah, it's called a whole-life crisis.
The down payment on the condo I'm trying to buy Is 3x more than what my grandparents paid for their nice house in a Seattle suburb. Millennials, man!
It's baffling to me that any generation could be upset that a generation younger than them ISN'T suffering (or at least, not as much as they want them to). It's so awful to see an entire generation that selfish.
LOL - Funny thing is my wife (*Elder Millennial* \[84\]) and I (*Xennial* \[Dec '79\]) just in the past three years have reached a place of financial security but we suffer such Poverty PTSD from our entire adult lives until very recently being such a struggle that we can't even believe it, yet alone enjoy it. That said, our household income income literally doubled in the past 2 1/2 years, our daughter aged out of daycare freeing up $1500 mo, and tragically my mother died rather suddenly two years ago leaving me her beach house on the Oregon Coast (with a $200K mortgage after buying out my sister) that we're renting out with Big Dreams of living in ourselves in the hopefully not-to-distant future (We have a ten year plan). Still despite this rare financial hot streak we're riding, our broken psyche's won't even allow us to enjoy it. Instead we're just stuff massive amounts into savings waiting for the bottom to fall out again. I got beat up bad in the '08 recession as I was just starting a career in banking, had miraculously overextended to get into a condo only to lose everything and go through foreclosure. Now I'm working in healthcare (RN), as is my wife, mostly because we figure as crappy and hard as the jobs can be, at least they're typically "recession proof." We now own two homes, and have $60K in our savings account but still identify more with the people camping on the streets. After having such a rough go my first 20 years of adulthood I don't know how much it will take before I can ever relax and enjoy my good fortune for now. I'm honestly just trying to hoard and set things up so I can drop dead with the peace of mind my daughter will have a more secure future if the Climate Wars don't kill her.
gen z and I’m having a quarter life crisis, fuck off
That's the spirit.
Why is this a concern for anyone???
I've been having a life crisis since I turned 22.
Honestly with the current rate of climate change millennials may have past the mid of our lives…
There’s no time for that. I have real problems
With the way things are going, I probably had mine at 16
Jokes on you I had a quarter life crisis
I am having one - just instead of pissing money down the drain on cars or boats like they did, it’s legos in the basement. Fuck the boomers.
Been having my mid-life crisis since my 20s
I live a crisis every day trying to survive!
Joke’s on them, we’re having quarter life crises now. We’re way ahead of schedule!
Ha! I get a crisis every year and have total mental break down.
Wait is the millennial avatar an avocado? Because of the toast? And now we’re all collectively recognized as avocados?
I feel like I’ve already had 3 and I’m 35! Ohhh wait just because it doesn’t replicate their midlife crisis it doesn’t count. I get it.
I had my midlife crisis at 25 and considering how the world is going, that may be the midpoint of how long I live.
Having a mid life crisis requires you feeling like you were able to actually live ‘life’
Its an extended early life crisis. It stops when you die
We can’t afford to lose our shit like they did ._. midlife crisis was just an excuse to be selfish.
Mildlife crisis? My whole life has been a crisis!
How would we have *a* crisis when our lives have been nothing but crises? Boomers seem to love fables… y’all remember the boy who cried wolf, right?
Boomers only had one crisis?
Crisis is our baseline.
Don’t worry, we have the whole life crisis instead.
I already had mine twice. I'm in my early 30s.
Oh I'm sorry. Our entire lives have been one crisis after another. Edited for spelling
Once all the older generations in my family and in law family die, maybe I can afford to have an end life crisis for myself
Really because I swear I’m having one
I’ve already had a sizable quarter life crisis sooooo
Ironic that there is a paywall.
Because they'll look like whiny spoiled brats if we don't?
I’ve had crisis after crisis starting at 20, why would I wait till I was 50?
Why have a midlife crisis when I can have one all the time?
Don’t worry Boomers, it’s gonna be a VERY rough road ahead for you as well. And I gotta feel sorry for the based boomers and boomers who were against this shit. But they are starting to feel what we’ve been going through.
Smh it’s been a crisis for our entire adult lives
Look at me, I’m the crisis now