I once imagined my life like a very organised Pinterest board: soft-focus wedding photos, a mortgage with a decent interest rate, children with names that worked equally well on toddlers and surnames. There would be a hallway runner. There would be sourdough.
Instead, there is me. Forty-ish (depending on the lighting), unmarried, childless, mortgage-free in the least impressive way possible, standing in my kitchen eating hummus straight from the tub and wondering when exactly my life zigged instead of zagged.
This is not a tragedy. It just isn’t the brochure.
We are sold a narrative early, aren’t we? Not aggressively — no one sat us down with a PowerPoint — but softly, like background music you don’t notice until it stops. Grow up. Fall in love. Get married. Buy a house. Have children. Repeat until death, with a tasteful funeral and a decent turnout. Deviate too far from this and people start speaking to you in the same tone they reserve for mild illnesses or long-haul flights: How are you finding it?
There is something uniquely destabilising about realising you’ve followed all the rules — been kind, worked hard, drunk the green juice — and still the expected prizes haven’t materialised. You begin to suspect a clerical error.
When you’re younger, the future feels like a promise. When you’re older, it starts to feel more like a suggestion.
I used to think not having these things would feel like a loud absence — a constant, echoing lack. Instead, it’s quieter than that. More like a room you don’t go into very often, but sometimes you catch sight of it in a mirror and think, Oh. That’s still empty.
Weddings happen to other people now, with alarming regularity. I attend them loyally, wearing dresses that say thriving while my insides whisper curious. I cry at the vows — not because I want them, necessarily, but because they represent certainty. The confidence of choosing, and being chosen, in a world that increasingly feels like it’s run by algorithms and vibes.
Collage: Cherish Yourself
There’s a particular grief in letting go of the future you always assumed was coming. On weddings that didn’t happen, children that didn’t arrive, and learning to love the life that stayed
Children, meanwhile, exist in my life as beloved satellites. I adore my friends’ kids in the way you adore something you can give back. I marvel at their small hands, their total faith in tomorrow. I feel tenderness, not envy. Which is reassuring, because envy is exhausting and I already have enough admin.
And the mortgage — ah yes, the mortgage. The ultimate adult merit badge. The thing that proves you are serious. I have no mortgage, but I do have flexibility, stories, friendships that have deepened into something almost architectural. I have moved cities, countries, selves. I have loved in ways that didn’t end in ring boxes but did end in growth, which is the least Instagrammable outcome of all.
Here’s the thing no one tells you: lives that don’t follow the script aren’t failed lives. They’re just… unscripted. Which means you spend less time hitting beats and more time improvising. Sometimes you fall flat. Sometimes you surprise yourself.
There is grief in this, absolutely. You are allowed to mourn the life you thought you’d have. The imagined Christmas mornings, the shared surnames, the hallway runner. Pretending you don’t care is far worse than admitting you do. Grief, when acknowledged, tends to soften into wisdom. Or at the very least, into better dinner party anecdotes.
But there is also hope — not the shiny, promise-based kind, but a quieter, sturdier version. The hope that meaning isn’t linear. That fulfilment doesn’t arrive as a bundle deal. That love shows up in many disguises: friendships that feel like home, work that lights you up, mornings where you wake up and think, I know who I am today.
I no longer think of my life as unfinished. It’s just differently furnished.
There may still be love. There may still be a house. There may even, God help me, be a mortgage one day. But if there isn’t, that doesn’t mean I’ve missed the point. It might mean I’ve found another one.
And if this is not the life I imagined, it is — unexpectedly, imperfectly — still a life I recognise as my own. Which, when you really think about it, is the only box worth ticking.
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All opinions and observations are written reflections that are personal and subjective, not factual claims or advice. If you are struggling with your mental health, please seek support from a doctor or qualified health professional.
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