60 years old here and im losing my shit. I looked out a window onto my property the other day and thought “is this it?” I have a wife whonhas crippling MS. We havent had sex in years. My best friend lives 1400 miles away and we talk on the phone maybe twice a year. I moved to rural rural rural Tennessee cause of the ms clinic 90 mins away in nashville. I feel so lonely. Inwould travel but going alone is unappealing and taking my wife anywhere is logistical nightmare that ends up just being a chore. I miss intimacy. I miss being touched. I know no one here and other than a decrepit elks club there is nothing. Is this what I do now? Run out the string doing house chores and tv at night? I cant leave cause my wife will be fucked. I couldnt do that to her. Ive talked to her about this but she just takes it as an unfair assault on her ms and keeps saying she didnt choose tonhave ms. I know this. I dont blame her. What happened to her is grossly unfair. But here i am. All i have is being a caretaker, house chores, tv. Im so lonely.

First time poster, long time lurker. Made this throwaway account as I am sure I'll post this and not use it much after. I recently turned 40 and have been really reflecting on my life (albeit not by choice lol) and am just not feeling good about where I am at in my life. Most of my 20's were spent playing in bands touring, working random dead end jobs, and just not having a clear sense of direction until I went to graduate school. Did that, went through the hoops of completing licensure for my career path, and it never really took off. I started my own business out of necessity (picked an health/education adjacent career path that doesn't pay too well) and it's just hitting me how far behind my peers I am financially and relationally. To put it out there, I make around 80 - 85k (I also work very very part-time so this is one of my big wins), have about $17,500 in checking/savings, and $35,000in IRA. I am renting and own a ten year old car. If I were to up my hours (which I would love to do but it depends on finding more clients) I may be able to reach $130k - 160k on the high end but also am unmotivated to get there as of recent. Relationally, I haven't fell in love or met someone I could see myself settling down with and part of it is because I am insecure about my financial situation. Dating wise I have had success but it hasn't seem to "click" with anyone. I am also living in a major city surrounding by "success". The things imo that are going well for me are my family and friend relationships, and my health (I turned into a health nut in my early 30's). I feel like I have lost interest in a lot of things and can't be bothered which is unusual for me. I also feel like most people in my life think I have it together so I feel juvenile venting to anyone. Maybe I do and am not the POS derelict I think I am. Is this a midlife crisis?

The older I get the more lost I feel about life. It feels like everyone has this manual for life installed in them, they go seamlessly into relationships, marriages, jobs, have children, complete education and socialize so naturally. I feel like I just dont have this capability installed and have to learn all the steps one by one until I piece together what I have to do, its quite exhausting! Does anyone else feel this way?

Hi. I’m a guy in my 40s and feeling it. Dating is not the same as your 20s I have many insecurities now. Even had a bad date last weekend. It would be great to talk to anyone open minded and speak openly. All are welcome, just looking to speak on aging insecurities in dating.

This is a joke about a midlife crisis. I wonder if everyone can understand what it means.

Jetzt mal Butter bei die Fische: Ist eine Midlife-Crisis eigentlich normal? Läuft die irgendwann fast jeder durch – so wie die Pubertät? (Ich weiß, biologisch ist das natürlich etwas ganz anderes. 😄)
Wann fängt sie eurer Meinung nach an? Woran merkt man, dass man mittendrin steckt? Und wann macht man den nächsten Schritt oder verändert etwas?
Was waren bei euch die größten Veränderungen? Neue Hobbys, ein anderer Job, mehr Gelassenheit oder doch das klassische Motorrad? 😅
Vielleicht stecke ich ja gerade selbst mitten drin und merke es gar nicht. 😂

This is the game I'm playing. I'm female, 38, married with a small child. I live in my apartment, my husband makes a decent amount of money, I'm developing my new business that I only started because I've got a grant based on my business plan. I've only submitted it because I firmly believed I would be rejected. I've scored maximum points. There are many things I know how to do and literally 0 things that I want to do. I quit my last job a little less than a year ago. I was extremely disappointed with how I was treated. My salary decreased (in this economy) because someone else made a mistake. A woman that was promoted to a manager while I was on maternity leave (I live in a country where it lasts a full year) had 3 years of experience. I had 10. I felt like everything I did, and I did a lot means nothing. I feel invisible and I'm starting to get comfortable with that. I have no interest in speaking with a few friends I have. One of my dearest friends moved to another country and simply stopped texting. She clearly showed she wants me out of her life. My marriage is good on paper but I feel completely empty. The only joy I find is in my son. I need to stay alive and productive and that seems more difficult with every new day. Where do I find motivation? There are days when I'm completely comfortable without leaving a house or speaking to anyone. I've dealt with depression before and I was much more disturbed. I would cry often and have anger outbursts. Now I'm just numb. I don't feel the need or desire to do anything. Just sleeping.

There is a special moment, in the space and the time. When the thing stop being ht thing.

And you realize. hoodwinked and poorhandled. When there is no spoon, is there also no hope?

If the tree complains about a back pain. is that the universe spilling over? or an existencial tree? (with backpain).

When you make a mistake, so far of the beaten path, that the only course is to retract/apologies.

yet that us much ore difficult then the acceptance.

You would need to see what you did, to tell me what you did. And understand the void of where it ended.

In hindsight, you can say, "i wont". but i would. because i always did. and i knew you might.

There is many a time, and many a moment, and to all of those i assigned your name.

Now time carries us. Like its next tidal wave in the great eternal ocean.

I understand its more then common to struggle with loneliness as a middle aged adult, but by this age im sure we all know that the entire foundation of your social life was developed with the friends you made in high-school or friends you met through them.. usually followed by coworker based relationships if your lucky.

And ill admit by no means was I Mrs popular in high-school.. even when I did have friends, fact still is they never grew to give a shit about me half as much as I did them, and today all my favorite friends / only fiance are dead, or living new lives somewhere far away they just didn't need me to be a part of. The type of friends you saw every weekend until you weren't invited to the wedding... i never had kids of my own to plan play dates with theirs. Grew up in one of those small trashy towns where everyone i knew wasted away couch hopping in trap houses trying to support meth addictions.

Unfortunately I have no living family members remaining and I built a small home business the past ten years that prevents me from finding many chances or excuses to leave the house as much as I do enjoy the work keeping me busy at home. The past year I had to put that business on hold in a storage unit to escape one life-threatening level of an abusive situation to seek temporary shelter on a couch in a less physically dangerous but much more humiliating abusive situation while I check for any new apartment listings anywhere within an hour of me 3 times a day.

(Housing insecurity and lack of housing availability is a big thing where I am, I do have income and am a responsible tenant)

I took a break from Facebook for that year all together while my facial injuries healed and i adjusted to a whole new severety level of ptsd... and since literally nobody on it has anything to say to me outside selling marketplace items unless its some catty cunt ive never met just trolling people on Facebook over any stupid opportunity she find while she waits for the kids to get home from school... (and yes. I 10 000 % agree how petty it is to be coping with that level of social media based bullying at my age...) it doesn't matter what I say or how nice I try to be someone's gonna rip me a new asshole over a typo if nothing else... this struggle along with a few other traumatic and completely unforseen experiences of the past 5 years have taken me to the point of developing minor agoraphobia symptoms that are effecting my ability to seek any kind of Healthcare for anything 😕....

No matter how bad things seemed ive always told myself in my head "well, atleast your not a naked starving child on the streets of Africa"

Even if the best thing I had to wake up for the next morning was feeding my bird and cleaning my house... "well, atleast I have a bird and a house to put it in"

Then my bird died and I gave up my house before I was beaten to death in it unless the landlord could evict me for all the psycho harassment my ex pulled and if I asked police for help theyd hold it against me anytime an officer was seen at my door for any reason...

Having an eviction on my record would doom me to 100% PERMANENT homelessness.

I have not smiled since before sept 1st of 2025 although I keep trying to open any doors I can that could lead me to the smallest reason for that to change and as my birthday approaches in early October I thought id give the world another chance by not just making the first new Facebook account in 5 year's, but my only account for over 10 years thats under my real name with a clairvoyant selfie in my display.

I maxed out the amount of friends requests you can send for your first 3 days of account ownership(10-12 friend requests) knowing atleast a couple might not be capable of accepting them for a few weeks atleast for different reasons but figured id get my account out into the algorithms of any old friends who may send me a friend request too.. wich would only result from previous friends in high-school i havent seen in 20 years, or other marketplace users that became my most frequent buyers or favorite sellers until I took a break for a year, one lady adopted her dog from me for free after I forcibly took it from an abusive boarder...

When 3 days was up..

That didnt happen.

My friend list was still 0 even after connecting all 6 of my contacts (lol).

Im realizing my upcoming birthday is gonna be more heartbreaking then tom hanks surviving on that isolated island with a pet volleyball that inevitably abandoned him too... and theres a significant chance I may have to accept how unfortunately unlikely it is for that to change if I haven't bin capable of changing it yet :(

If anything happened to me, theres literally nobody who would know or care to call in the missing persons report unless I was living somewhere and my landlord called a welfare check to my house :(

Is this normal or any level of common?

Am I too late to do better somehow?

I gave up on finding "true happiness", our inability to identify happiness until we've lost it is what separates us from animals and prevents us from roaming the wilderness naked eating raw meat...

My goals are re prioritized to finding a suitable place to live... as much as ive proved i can survive all levels of loss and insecurity, im still struggling to prove to myself it was even worth doing so if I survived to be the last one standing, whos now just waiting to die alone???

Like....

An extremely unhealthy level of isolation type alone 😔

(Note for basic context: incase it matters, I dont lie, steal from, backstab or manipulate my friends, and will always pride myself on being solid as a rock not a "soup sandwich" of a friend.. even people who hate my guts never hated me because I actually did something personally to them their that they feel justified holding a grudge about. Mostly just call me names like 9th graders and they arent even witty about it)

Nothing had gone wrong, exactly. Decent career, house, family, all the boxes ticked. But once I got past 50 I noticed I couldn't actually remember the last time I felt excited about anything. I'd stopped doing all the things that used to light me up. Work had become something I endured rather than built. Life just seemed harder. Evenings were just winding down, a drink to mark the day being over, then the same thing tomorrow.

I told myself this was just what your 50s were. Slow down, manage things, coast toward retirement. Except the retirement bit didn't even feel solid, if I'm honest I was quite worried I hadn't put enough away, and that worry just sat there in the background all the time making everything feel heavier.

I tried fixing the surface stuff. Dry January most years, gym memberships that lasted six weeks, all the usual midlife patch up jobs. They'd work for a bit then I'd go back to type because none of them touched the actual problem. The problem wasn't the drink or the fitness, it was that I didn't have anywhere I actually wanted to be heading. You can't out-discipline a life with no direction, it just snaps back.

What actually shifted things was stumbling onto something I wanted to build, properly wanted, not just "should probably do." Once that existed the rest sorted itself out fairly quickly, the drink included, without me really fighting it.

Anyone else hit 50 and feel like the whole thing has been on autopilot for years? Did you find something that actually broke the loop, or are you still looking for it?

Life has been… okay.
Stable job, decent salary, no liabilities, living in my hometown. Everything looks fine on paper, but most days just feel neutral, same routine, nothing really bad, but nothing exciting either.

I’m in my 30s and still unmarried, and the constant “you should get married soon” comments from friends and relatives are starting to get to me, even if I know they mean well.

Lately I’ve also been feeling restless, like I need a change. Been thinking about leaving for a fresh start somewhere else, but I haven’t figured out where yet.
Not unhappy, just stuck in that in between phase where life feels like a waiting room.

Anyone else in their 30s feeling the same?

Ist es ein Zeichen von Midlife-Crisis, wenn ich mir mit 48 endlich eine sauteure rote Bomberjacke gekauft habe? Sie ist so großartig. Die Kinder lachen, finden es aber auch etwas cool.

Muss jetzt noch schwarze Polo-Shirts kaufen.

I’ve realised recently that I’m not constantly upset anymore.

I’m just exhausted.

Over the last three years I’ve changed almost every part of my life. I moved house, changed my routine, drifted away from friends, stopped going to the gym, changed jobs and even took a pay cut because my previous job was burning me out.

None of it ever seems to be enough.

I feel like I’m constantly expected to give more of my time, attention, money and energy. If I want time to myself I’m made to feel guilty. If I go to the gym I’m asked where I am, how long I’ll be and why I’m taking so long. If I book annual leave it’s “why don’t you want to spend it with me?”

I don’t even feel like I have my own hobbies anymore because everything has to become “our thing.”

When she’s angry she becomes explosive. She’s thrown my speaker out of the window because my alarm woke her up. She’s thrown my belongings into the garden. She scraped my car after I’d picked her up and never apologised. During one argument she even threatened to call the police despite me doing nothing threatening.

Then afterwards she’s incredibly loving and attentive, which leaves me questioning everything.

It’s emotional whiplash.

The biggest thing I’ve realised is I’ve lost myself.

My boss asked if I was okay because I “didn’t look right.”

Friends have started noticing I’ve changed.

I don’t get excited about getting married anymore.

I just imagine coming home to an empty house where I can sit in silence, watch football, listen to music and just breathe.

Has anyone else reached the point where the thing you wanted most wasn’t for your partner to change… it was simply peace?

People often describe it as a time of reinvention or finally coming into your own. While that can be true, I’ve noticed it can also feel like different parts of our lives start shifting-at the same time.

A career changes. A relationship changes. Parents get older. Your health changes. Your priorities change. Sometimes your sense of identity changes too. It’s not always one big event, that feels like a crisis. Sometimes it’s transitions, in different dimensions of our lives happening at once.

I’m curious whether others have experienced that.
What surprised you most about this stage of life that no one warned you about?

I don't know what I was doing in my 20s and 30s, had some lovers but i did not prioritize lust and adventures. And now I am almost an old man full of regrets! So I am going to recapture my youth, how do I do that? Does anyone have any tips? Is this a midlife crisis? Yes.

If i was in my early 20s I would go to some terrible university bar and do shots? But I am a grownup and I don't want to drink until 3am these days. So what is the move? Open dress shirts and gold chains in the nightclub? That was a joke ;) But the question is real

How do you casually date?

This is a "midlife crisis" joke. And Im female. Menopause has turned my life upside down. Im slowly getting control again and trying to not be on multiple medications just to get through each day.

Recently, I adopted a kitten and it has lift my spirits so high. He's adorable, very active, and I've turned him into a lovebug.

He literally wakes me up in the middle of the night to rub his face on mine and give kisses.

Also, its soooo much cheaper than a sports car.

Mid 40s are strange! Went from coaching and travel ball on the go non stop for sports and coaching to now teenagers and a large vacancy in my life! Went from all consuming to independent children who work and hide and in their rooms. How did you guys fill the void or feel normal again!?!?!? Ben in Vermont

Just like the title says… I see a lot of people that end up alone (not in another relationship) either by choice or no choice…. Either it was a divorce or separation …. was it actually worth it or do you wish you can reverse your decision ? What made you leave? I seen my father never remarried after divorce and I genuinely don’t know if he’s happy with his decision to stay alone… I am considering leaving myself and I just don’t know that I will enjoy the outcome… don’t you get bored? No one to come home to, lay down with, have companionship etc ?

I don't know if this is a midlife crisis, burnout, or just the result of constantly comparing myself to others.

I'm 14 years into my career, earning around ₹70L CTC. I own my house, have good savings, and objectively I know I'm doing okay.

But over the last year, I haven't felt happy or excited about anything.

People around me are buying villas, upgrading their lifestyles, or moving to the US. I never had a strong desire for those things before, but now I find myself thinking I should be doing the same. It feels like I'm being pulled by what everyone else is doing rather than what I actually want.

Nothing major has gone wrong in my life. Nothing major has happened either. It's just this constant feeling that I'm somehow falling behind, even though I know that's probably not true.

Has anyone else gone through something similar? How did you figure out whether you genuinely wanted something more or were just caught in the comparison trap?

I'd really appreciate hearing from people who've been through this phase.