10 candid perspectives from people who are 30 and over about the challenges of growing older

Dealing with being older

When we're young, we often feel like the present lasts forever and things will take a lot of time to change. However, as time passes, we realize that we have to confront a lot of realities, some good and some bad. It's up to us to decide how to adapt to new roles, evolving relationships and different responsibilities. Reddit user u/tywalker215 posed a question to the community, asking, "Reddit users, 30 years old and over... What is the hardest part about getting older?" Here are 10 of the best answers that people had to offer:

1. Confronting impermanence 

For me, it's coming to grips with the impermanence of the moment. I feel like we're hard-wired to operate under the assumption that we always have more time. But windows of opportunity do close, permanently. People you neglect will leave, never to return. Everybody you know will leave, one way or another. The good times never last (nor do the bad times) but the impermanence of my life and the things I cherish have really been kicking me in the d**k lately. u/DuffShotGod

2. Weak joints

Random bulls**t health issues that prevent you from doing the things you want. u/PuzzleheadedRow7118. Sometimes knee sprains and injuries appear from years of neglected minor injuries that are now escalated. Be sure to get some resistance band work to strengthen your knee. There’s a lot of physical therapy exercises you can get from YouTube if you can’t afford PT. Obligatory talk with your doctor of course. Proper nutrition, warm-ups, bandwork and hot baths go a long way in recovery or injury prevention. u/Iconicschmoobie

3. Losing loved ones

Seeing my parents getting significantly older and losing elder family members. u/Agirlwholikesreddit. That is a tough period, I agree. May I say, that after a while, I got past that. As Lucien says, "Everybody dies." I am now the oldest in my klan. As my brother used to say, death is like walking the pirate's plank. Only now, no one else is in front of you. Keep in mind that each person that pre-deceases you has been spared the grief of experiencing your death. Your suffering of their death has spared them that grief. For what it's worth. u/calcteacher

4. Perception of time

Time goes by faster. u/thedeathmachine. The trick to this is to keep finding new things to do. There have been months that I have done nothing but work at my boring job and spent the evenings watching repetitive content on YouTube, and other months where I have a creative project to work on. The former disappear, the latter seems to last forever. But it has to be something new. Once whatever you were doing becomes repetitive then time speeds up again. I think that our perception of time - at least over relatively long periods - is based on the number of new experiences worth remembering we store over that time. Obviously, the older you get the fewer new experiences you have, but you can game the system by searching them out. u/IndigoFenix

5. Sustaining friendships

Maintaining friendships and/or developing new ones especially if you relocate or travel extensively for work. Not impossible just not as easy as teens and twenties. u/Catgurl You really have to be intentional about it. I've (39F) been single off and on over my dating life and have made and maintained solid friendships. My sister just divorced her husband after 18 years and suddenly realized she has no friends (besides me of course). It's easy, and sometimes necessary, to make your family your entire world. However, when that changes, I can't imagine it's a good feeling to have very few outside connections. u/CaptDeMorgansTheorum

6. Hair thinning

As a dude, hair thins out on top. Apparently, it migrates to your nose/ears/eyebrows. Not a ton, just a wild hair here and there. I have to pluck my eyebrow. The other is being sore. Sleeping wrong can ruin your morning. Who thought resting could make you sore. u/CpuJunky See, I knew that happens to guys, but no one talks about how that happens to girls as well, it just looks different. I've recently discovered that female pattern baldness exists and that I'm starting to show signs of it (basically, hair thinning out in the front) and that it migrates to your chin! I'm a woman and have to pluck my chin hairs! I hate it! u/kpmelomane21

7. Missed opportunities

Realizing all the opportunities you missed. u/EsprestonEsquire This is the big one that’s up there below watching your parents get older and more helpless. You realize that the common phrase 'it’s never too late to x' is a bullsh*t phrase. It actually can be too late to do something and even if you can it may not be the same. Life also comes with sacrifice, so to do that thing you will have to sacrifice something else you don’t want to or at least compromise somehow. u/ralphanzo

8. Losing fascination with the world

I'm a big gamer and book reader and one of the worst for me is that there's a lot less sense of wonder and discovery to be felt. The past few years have been especially rough [praise Baldur's Gate 3 for being the best game to come out in probably 10 years] but the older you get and the more you experience, the less new experiences there are. You eventually settle on which one is the best or your favorite and there's little to no incentive to venture outside of that game/series because you already know before playing/reading it exactly what it's going to be like. MOST things are egregiously formulaic and once you recognize the formula you can never turn off knowing what it is and how everything follows it. Few things are ever a surprise or unpredictable or mentally challenging. u/Cookie-Jedi

9. Not understanding technology

It's really easy to fall behind on technology. Like, scarily easy. Over the last few years I've had to make an effort to set a little time aside and make sure I'm keeping up. Otherwise, it's too easy to lean on technologies I've already mastered and think it's good enough. For example, newer/better versions of programs like how Word and Excel restructure their UI for no f**king reason every couple years, new smartphone features, AI, at least passing familiarity with whatever new social media is popular, digital cash services such as Venmo. I also switch from iPhone to Android and back every couple years to make sure I know how to use both in a pinch. u/Z0ooool

10. Young people assume they know better

Losing relevance. Young people act like older people are clueless about things... and with regard to pop culture, they're usually right. But that's because culture loses relevance after you've seen it change for 50 years or so. I'm sure some people give up and stop learning at some point but at 63 I'm not there yet, I can't stop learning, I don't even know how to stop. Older people aren't clueless, many of us are clued in better than younger people simply because we've studied the human condition longer. If you've seen 35 episodes of life, you need to recognize the value of people who've seen 50, 60, 70 trips around the sun and they were learning the whole time. u/blinkyknilb