Okay, before you start chuckling, hear me out. This is very serious business.

This year, I hit the ripe old age of 25. I am officially in my mid-twenties. Which is a little bit of a scary prospect when I cast my mind back to the eve of my 20th birthday when I was full on freaking out at the thought of not being a teenager any more. The fact that I am now mid-way through a decade which I was dreading, and 30 is equidistant to 20... yikes.

I'm now at that funny time of life where an engagement ring is gracing my Facebook feed pretty much once every couple of weeks, and if it isn't engagement rings, it's baby photos or pregnancy announcements. If it isn't that, it's someone who is going off on their travels or someone who has just had an offer accepted on their first house. That age where everyone seems to be hitting milestones of one form or another, sometimes going in wildly varying directions and here I am in the middle somewhere, in the midst of the 'I SAID YES TO THE DRESS' posts & time-lapses of far off countries and hearing my mother comment 'you know that girl you went to school with...?', slogging away at my 9-5, getting excited about my Saturday night takeaway and living a thoroughly unextraordinary life, wondering if I'm getting it all wrong.

Welcome, my friends, to the quarter-life crisis.

Don't get me wrong, in a lot of ways I'm very lucky. I'm just the right side of having my shit sort-of together. I have a good job, I'm living independently, I'm in a long-term relationship, I earn enough money to pay my bills and have my nails done and go on days out. I'm not quite a hot mess (although there is still time.) But, all of a sudden, I seem to have realised that life is in fact short, and my biggest fear is looking back and regretting choices I've made or at what time of life I hit these milestones. And while in reality, I know it's probably a result of comparing myself to what I see on social media but bloody hell it's knocked me for six.

Let's take a classic example. I know that I am in no way ready for children. Not a chance. The thought of getting no sleep, having to change nappies and bodily fluids become a normal part of my day-to-day routine, it just does not appeal to me right now. And don't even get me started on pregnancy. I know I want to be a mum one day, but one day is very far into the future, potentially even past 30. Plus the fact that I'm a little bit old fashioned and want to get married before I have kids, and am I ready to get engaged? No sir.

But the issue of having a lot of friends and colleagues who are 5-10 years older than you, is that they all start weighing in on the issue. That's without factoring in family members who are just dying to know your entire life plan...

'No, you're young, you have plenty of time for marriage and babies. 25 is no age'

'Why bother getting married first? It doesn't change anything. Wasted money to be honest'

'Well, having kids younger is better. Then you aren't old when they're 18 and you get your life back. Really, you need to be thinking about having them now'

'You're 25 now Sian, your biological clock will be starting to tick'

Yep, I have genuinely been told every single one of these. Biological clock is ticking! The problem is, when you hear this stuff, you internalise it and it makes you question yourself. Everyone loves to tell you the 'perfect age' to do x,y and z, and it just makes you want to ask for the link to this rulebook on Amazon because maybe you missed it?!

I've made it no secret on my blog that my career pathway hasn't exactly gone to plan over recent years. And while I try not to let that bother me, especially now that I'm almost a year into a job which I love (for the most part) and could really see myself carving a career out of, but there's always this little niggling voice in the back of my brain saying Yeah but it isn't journalism though is it, hun? And sometimes, it's a voice that's actually being spoken out loud by a no-holds-barred family member. And no, it isn't journalism and whilst I do sometimes feel guilty that those I went to uni or school with are already being promoted with salaries that would make my eyes water, I'm doing okay right? Right?

The best way I can describe it is thinking back to my 19 year old self. The girl with big dreams, full of confidence. If that girl saw me now, what would she think?

I'll be honest, I think her first thought would be What the f**k happened? 19 year old me wanted me to have gone on adventures, moved to London and be working on a magazine by now. Hah.

Instead, I'm living just a stone's throw away from my home town, working as an estate agent, in my pyjamas by 8pm, living away from most of my friends and nights out tend to be the last thing on my mind.

I wonder if I've let my 19 year old self down by the life that I'm living now. And then I remember how naive 19 year old me was. She didn't understand the responsibilities of having to pay bills. She didn't know how difficult it would be to save money for a big city move. She didn't count on one of the worst periods of her life making it almost unbearable to be too far away from her family. The thing is, life gets in the way. And I'd hope that 19 year old me will understand that 25 year old me is just trying to muddle through as best she can.

And muddling through is exactly how I'm planning on getting through this quarter-life crisis, and hope it all falls into place. And it will. Right?

I can't promise I won't keep feeling half-jealous and mildly irritated with the engagement posts though. I'm only human!

Love,
Sian xo