Age obsession

So, I don't know if anyone has issues with this or not or if it is OCD, but I had a huge fight with my dad about this last night. So, I am 29 years old and ever since I graduated high school, I have been obsessed over how young or old I look. People have told me this past year different ages and mostly I want them to tell me I look like a kid. I was told last year by a couple people that I look 19 and two other people said I looked 14 or 15 and so over the years people have told me how look really young for my age and I decided why not pretend I am that age. Why not embrace? Me and my dad have gotten in many fights about this, and he tells me that it is delusional, but I don't think so. Tonight, I was arguing with him to please call me a girl and he would not do it and it drives me insane that I wanted to kill myself over this. I feel like I deserve to relive my childhood since I have been going through this OCD thing for 13 years. I live at home with my parents because of the debilitating nature of my OCD and I want to do things like a job and make some friends, but I feel like I am nowhere near moving out. This thing about the age thing is something that drives me crazy whenever I tell my parents I am a teenager, or I am not at the maturity level of a 29-year-old. I know this all sounds crazy, but it is just how I feel. I would rather look fourteen any day than my age. Also, if I dated someone, I would like them to be in their early 20s because that is what I prefer. Please don't tell me to grow up or anything because that never helps me. Please kind comments. Thanks.

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Date posted: 3y

I don’t think I can say much to help but I think this is a valid way to feel. I don’t think it’s necessarily healthy, but it makes sense and I’m a similar way to an extent. I am a bit obsessed with wanting to stay/seem young. I know for me its because I missed out on pretty much all of my childhood and teenage years due to mental health and am behind my peers, also still living with my parents, dropped out of school, etc. I think it could be the same for you too, being stuck on it could be a form of grieving/making up for what we never had, also dealing with the fact that we can’t relate to people around us very well. I know I don’t mentally feel my age either and as long as they’re an actual adult, wanting to date a bit younger (early 20s adult like you said) makes sense. You’d both be at similar places in life. I can’t really judge or anything, but I think you should talk to a therapist if you’re able about pretending. Realistically, even if we’re behind our peers, our life experience over the years still makes us the age we are. Maybe instead of using teens/other adults as references to how our age feels, we could redefine it as our age (for you 29) but acknowledge the fact that it’s different than others and our own experience. We gotta accept the missed time and know everyone is in different places and we can still grow. I get where you’re coming from with mental age but it feels a bit like denial. I do get it, but there are absolutely other ways to relive our childhood, connect with our inner child, and reparent ourselves to get back what’s missing. Sorry this was long as hell I hope it made sense 😅

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Date posted: 3y

@Uugggghhhhh Yeah sorry jfc that was long. But the point is I think the only way to get past it is to accept where you’re at, if you deny it you won’t really get anywhere. You can relive childhood while still acknowledging reality, as hard as it might be

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Date posted: 3y

@Uugggghhhhh Also I kinda take back my dating younger comment. While it’s technically legal and not the worst, there are other people your actual age going through the same thing. You just have to find them

Warriorforever

Date posted: 3y

@Uugggghhhhh That’s okay. Thanks for responding.

Warriorforever

Date posted: 3y

@Uugggghhhhh I understand what you’re saying.

Warriorforever

Date posted: 3y

@Biracialbeauty1 Yeah I got diagnosed with OCD at 16 and I have been struggling ever since.

Anonymous

Date posted: 19w

Maybe it is OCD (please say anything)

I have no idea anymore. I guess this all started with me worrying about whether I was gay, then whether I was a P, then worried about being just attracted to teenagers. After that I started freaking out about not feeling “grown up” enough. Like “I’m an adult wtf is wrong with me for seeing someone who is probably younger and thinking they’re physically attractive. Then I started overthinking not finding older adults (like 30 or 40) very attractive. Like ofc I’m probably not gonna find them attractive, they’re not anywhere close my age. Maybe the desires are half real. Maybe as a 21 yr old young adult I do find older teenagers (16+) somewhat physically attractive. I still think it’d be weird to date one. Maybe that’s the normal reaction I’m supposed to have. If not, please let me know. I just don’t wanna do anything illegal one day and I’m super scared I will. I can’t tell if the fear is my just being afraid of the law though, in which case I might actually just be a bad person. I hate that my brain is just rationalizing thoughts now. I feel like I can’t do the ERP thing of “just accept that the thoughts are there but don’t engage.” Like what? How can I just think a thought that might be so integral to my identity and just ignore it? If it’s all true and I don’t like people my age anymore then I have to know and plan around that, that could change my entire life. I’m rambling, my b.

Clara_and_ellie

Date posted: 11w

crying about the most stupid thing ever

Tw for people with pocd maybe I'm so tired of eighteen years old being consider adults or whatever i don't want to be an adult I'm fifteen I don't want to be fifteen leave me alone I want to be fourteen forever fifteen is too much I want to be fourteen I don't want to be fifteen,I never want to be an adult I want to be a child why can't I stay 13/14 forever I turned 15 19 days ago and I can't get over it leave me alone I don't want to be an adult,why do people consider 18 years olds adults when they're still in highschool and if 17 years olds are consider teens then why 18 years olds aren't when it's eightTEEN and neunTEEN,i literally saw a video of an 19 year old with an 33 year old man like it's a teen stop,and I saw a girl who's 2010 just like me say "stop treating us like kids we will be adults in 3 years" like eighteen is still so young please stop,i feel like a child,I don't feel like I will be an adult in 3 years why is 18 even consider an adult when you're still in highschool and brain develops to 25 just leave me alone please Can any adult 20+ tell me how it's like being an adult like the way you think and the way you see things? sorry for any grammar mistakes I was frustrated and English isn't mine first language

unicornwithocd

Date posted: 6w

Perfectionism OCD

I’m about to turn 18 and I’ve graduated high school a year early and I deal with intense feelings of imposter syndrome. I have no clue where my life is headed and not really even sure what college I wanna go to. I know I want to go to college but I just don’t know what I should do. I have a good job that I’ve been at for over a year and thats great, but I look at people my age and feel like I’m not where I’m supposed to be. I’m an overachiever and someone that deals with OCD and the mix of those two is not fun. I think that when I was a child I had a lot of pressure placed onto me to do so well that I’m constantly looking for ways to improve in many aspects of my life. This leaves an unrealistic outline of where I should be and makes me feel so shitty that I can’t even see the good I’m doing. I can’t remember many positive things that people say to me about myself because I don’t think my brain believes it. I often worry if I’m not as smart as other people and overthink mistakes I make so many times a day. Excepting constructive feedback from people is extremely hard for me because I feel like I’ve failed. I feel sad about all of my past relationships with people. I feel scared nobody will ever love me.

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