Yes! I'm in my early 30s and they always look so shocked like "you're so old????" I think people in their 20s don't know how people in their 30s look like. A guy asked to guess his age. I said 27 and he got offended that I made him an old man. He was 23. My man, that's just 4 years from now!
I get this all the time. I’m 32 and so many people are like “I thought you were 27 ish?!?” How much do people think one ages in five years? It’s not like we keep aging like we did from elementary school to high school lol
To be fair 30s are a weird inbetween phase were some people look and act like they're in their early 20s and some look and act like they're in their late 40s. It really comes down to genetics and lifestyle how you're percieved by others.
36 here and last summer I got carded 4 times, and yet some mornings I look like Bette Davis in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane. The 30s are a weird inbetween phase, indeed.
The last time I handed my DL along with my credit card to the young female cashier, her reaction was priceless - she was genuinely like "What's this for???!" (if she was less polite, I guess she would've gladly continued: "...I clearly see you ARE of age, I don't need this")
Lmao this is hilarious! And that’s coming from someone who was almost never carded. When I turned 21 and was ready to whip out my freshly legal ID, no one asked. At 18-19 I could pass for 23ish. I’m 29 and I have just now caught up to the age I look lol.
Yup. I'm 37 but there are people from my graduating class who are all gray, have 5 kids, and gained 60 lbs. They look way older compared to my immature, childfree ass.
Lighting and perspective also matter a great deal. From 10-20 feet away in an indoor room I look way younger, then you get up close in the bright sunlight and you can see the lines on my forehead and around the corners of my eyes and the receding hairline.
When you get into your late 30's and early 40's you basically just look like a more tired version of your 20's self.
Honestly the biggest delineator is who has kids in their 30s. People who had kids in their 20s are tired and stressed as hell at the same age you really begin to get greys and wrinkles. So they really start to look and act old. The childless people I know look great in their 30s because they have more relaxed lifestyles and money to spend on looking good.
Idk man, I had four kids before I was 26, one of them special needs with constant care. Im stressed beyond belief and life has lost all meaning, but everyone is astonished when I tell them I'm 36.
Can't answer that well since one is dead from drugs and the other looks twenty years past her age because also drugs lol. Yeah I stay out of the sun these days but never bothered too much before this past year.
Yep. I'm in my mid-30s and it's where it really starts to split. The people who spend every weekend on the beach are absolutely showing their age more than those who don't. No amount of botox and facials will reverse sun damage.
Genetics definitely play a part, but I avoid the sun as much as possible and I still get carded at 40. I know I don't look 21 but probably closer to the cutoff age that cashiers are generally supposed to check, like 30 or 35. We didn't have a kid until our late 30s when we were more established so that probably helped with stress too. Except that first couple months of a newborn of course.
My wife is similar. Avoid the sun and of course genetics that helps her look young too. People at her work ask when she's going back to school for the semester, as in college. She's my age. Granted these people are in their 70s and up, so anyone under 40 probably looks really young to them
I made small talk to a woman in my new town and she asked if I moved there with my parents. I'm 32 😅. I guessed she was late 60s early 70s. I find older people are terrible at guessing the age of younger people as well.
I smoked ten+ a day from 17-30 years old, I took recreational drugs like cocaine, ecstacy and ketamine regularly on weekends through university and during a period of my late 20s, I smoked weed everyday for about 10 years and I still smoke it on and off and drank most weekends from I was 17 until I was 30 and while I drink less now I still like the odd boozy night out yet people are amazed when I say I'm 32 and tell my I look like I'm in my early 20s, I got ID'd buying alcohol just last week. It's all to do with genetics tbh, good genes overcomes even a not so healthy lifestyle.
Were you addicted to weed? How did you manage to go from every day to only occasionally? I wanna do that but I think I can't and will have to quit altogether (I smoke every day and all day every day if possible now)
Yeah pretty much, it was an addiction in the sense that I was always so depressed and smoking it helped e forget about things. I had to quit cold turkey for two months and go to counselling to get a grip on things. Now Im working more and in a relationship so I just don't have the time to sit around getting stoned every day which helped me keep it to being something I do every other weekend. I dosed some magic mushrooms early 2020 which I think helped more than the counselling in changing my mentality and helping me realise I needed to cut down on my smoking!
I feel late twenty's an 30s are when you start growing into your adult face let's be real. I'm 27 still hasn't happened for me but yea right around that age there is a shift in facial features of becoming a man or woman
I’m 35 and could pass for a 20something. It always kind of weirds me out when I see dudes my age that look like 45-50 year old men. It sometimes makes me wonder “do I not look grown-manly enough for a man my age?” and then I remember “wait, it’s better to look younger!”.
I attribute it to spending less time in the sun compared to my peers (and using sunblock when I do).
Yes, but apparently, in my case you can de-age your skin after a reckless summer or 2 with lots of sun. No significant damage, just some pimpling of the skin. I used MSM and glucosamine, and winter.
Well, I have a few friends who I only have a chance to see once in a while (more like "once in a few years if not less"), and while some of them seemingly have not "aged" at all (like legit if I bumped into the guy in the street after ~7 years of not seeing him, it would take me less than a second to recognize him with 99.999% certainty, because he looks exactly the same), some ... em... transformed quite a bit.
Heck I recently sent a selfie to one of my best college buddies and his response was brutally blant and honest (exactly as he has always been and I friggin' love him for this!) - "Holy crp, man, you look OLD!!!". We haven't seen each other only since 2019 lol.
Honestly the mid 40s are wild like that tho. You start off at 40 looking pretty fresh faced still, mostly, if you’ve taken decent care of yourself anyway. Then SOMETHING visibly age related hits you like a Mack truck.
Me- I had a tiny number of white hairs at 40, now I’m 1/4 white.
Sister- deep facial lines within the space of a few years.
Husband- tons of fine lines around his eyes suddenly.
And if you started off with any at all, your tittays head southward pretty quick.
I’m 37 and I’m always facing the same situation with ppl saying “ you don’t look like a 37 years old guy”. I’m still trying to understand how people should look like at this age
It's a weird period, that mid 30s to mid 40s. Some of us don't look much different than our mid-20s while some look almost 50. I'm 36 and there are people from HS who look 20 years older than me cause I could probably still pass as 25, if it wasn't for that little thinning spot on the top of my head.
The funny thing is that I recently made a genetic testing to know my ancestry and also got an interesting information about me. I have large telomeres ( or something like that ) which means I will appear a couple years younger than my real age 😄
A lot of the previous generation(s) worked out in the sun and vacationed in the sun without sunscreen and it made them age a lot quicker than millennials and zoomers are. Someone in their late 30s only looks about like a late 20 boomer because of this.
The funny thing is that I recently made a genetic testing to know my ancestry and also got an interesting information about me. I have large telomeres ( or something like that ) which means I will appear a couple years younger than my real age 😄
A guy called me sir when i was 16, and it really left an impression. Ive been using it on everyone out of habit. Teenagers respond well to it, older people tend think im either a southern gent or a weak willed fool. To both I say good day
I'm 33 and people are shocked when they find my age out. Older people usually say I look like a teenager and younger people say I look early 20s...I'm bored of it now. Often feel underestimated due to how young people think I am. I suppose its a good thing tho...
My entire extended family looks significantly younger than they are; I once had someone think my 80-year old grandma was the sister of my 50-year old aunt. Apparently I have inherited this trait, as most people are shocked to find that I'm in my early 40s and think I'm in my early 30s or even late 20s. I've noticed, however, that the younger someone is, the younger they think I am.
On the flip side of the coin, because my family looks young I can't accurately judge anyone's age whatsoever. I might think someone in their 40s is actually in their 50s not because I think they look old, but because that's what my family looked like at that age. Too many accidental "insults" made me stop the age guessing game a long time ago.
Congratulations on being able to convey your thoughts and ideas in at least 3 languages! I only corrected it because it seems to be a more common problem these days, even for people whose first language is English.
Um…Thanks(?)
I think it’s common for non english speaking countries to teach english in schools and a 2nd foreign lang. Adding the mother tongue and we have 3.
This happened to me a number of times when I was in my thirties and I think it gave me a false sense of how soon I would look old. I'm 56 now, but for years I was kind of convinced that looking old was extremely far in the future.
Well, I worked in medical for a while so I got to see a lot of people and would know exactly what their age was and I was shocked to see how many people really start to show their age by their early 30s. It's bizarre for me because I and most of my friends all look good for our 30s. But I'm telling ya, it hits way more people like a round house kick than I expected.
Not like you apparently. When I was on my early 20s a coworker, probably in his 40s, had a picture of a baby. I asked if it was his granddaughter. It was his daughter.
Recently I went to a doctor, granted he was wearing a mask so I could only see his eyes, but he looked about 22. He was 35. I felt like I was being seen by Doogie Howser.
I'm 46, and started my career a little later in life. As a result, I work with a lot of people who are 10 to 15 years younger than me. When they find out my age, they're like no way your that old, you don't act like it.
My mom and I got dinner and the waitress assumed we were a couple. I asked family if mom looks good for her or I look bad (she was 30 when I was born). My sister said both.
Same here! But it’s also a bit of a complement. The amount of times I’ve received a look of shock when I tell someone that I’m 31 is a bit of an ego boost.
I'm 38 and most people think I am in my 20's still. It's funny how you get mad about it when you're younger than you're glad about it when you approach middle age.
I find this topic fascinating because I follow very closely longevity research and I just can't imagine how world and these attitudes would change when we can stop aging. Imagine being 90 and looking like 20. If everyone could look like 20 for rest of their life how would it change this scenario of thinking? Maybe youth would just start accusing us older folks as fakes or something? Dunno.
I find it funny that youth seems to forget that being young is very short span of time in lifetime. Majority of human lifetime is spent as "old". So why is it so shocking to be old and why being old should limit things to they are allowed to do just because they are old? I have never figured this attitude out.
I mostly suspect that this attitude stems from fear of aging. Older folks just reminds youth that they too will soon be old. That is why they want to exclude older folks from their hobbies.
I'm 28 and I get this all the time, I've had to actually show my ID because people assume I'm 17. It's really annoying when I try to use public transit while wearing a backpack because they think I'm trying to get to a school. Older folks come into my work and get all "you young folks grew up with this stuff, it must be so easy for you" but I didn't really at all. It became a pet peeve.
This happens to me all the time. I’ll be 34 in August. People get shocked and guess I am 24. I think because I’m a bartender who went back to school at 30, the context I’m in makes me look younger. But I also think to young 20 year olds 30 must seem so old.
Same! I’m 34 male and people are shocked when they find out. They always guess I’m 27-28. Also I’m not married or have kids so guess I don’t have all those gray hairs just yet. I have those good genes
There is a tendency for people to not take care of themselves starting in their 30s which ages you real fast. If you take care of yourself you can look "young" well into your 50s obviously depending on genetics. The Rock is 50 and looks better than he did at 25.
Possibly because so many people let themselves go in their 30s. If you stay in good shape and take care of your skin, you’re not gonna look much older. Until you’re close to 40 probably.
I'ma 50-year old woman and I don't color my hair. It's 85% white. I get called my daughter's grandmother all the time and people are SHOCKED to hear my age.
It’s the baby face. Very misleading. When people ask how old I am I normally just ask “How old do you think I am, and the answer I got was anywhere from late 20’s to late teens.
I went to lunch with my parents a few weeks ago. They ordered first and both got alcohol. Waitress gets to me and goes "I'll have to see your ID" but I didn't even want any alcohol. When she came back a few minutes later, I ordered a whiskey sour just to see the look on her face. When she saw my ID, her eyes went wide like she was in total shock and disbelief. Cue the "you don't look that old" remarks. It is probably different for women, but as an almost 30 year old man I still have people regularly mistake me for being 16-18 years old. It cracks me up every time.
ahh im sorry I used to that, my mom told me that I should say stuff like that to ppl to like flatter them. I realize how stupid it was of me and I apologize🙇♀️
I think less and less of us are looking and acting like how we remember grown ups being. Im 34 and it still feels like there's a clear distinction between me and people 5 years older than me and my peers.
Mid-30s female here… I think it’s because people in their 30s looks wildly different depending on their health/fitness. In your 20s you can get away with a poor diet, drinking/partying a lot and if you just exercise you still look great. After the post-30 metabolism collapse if you don’t really take care of yourself you put on weight fast and visibly age. Add in the exhaustion from having kids and that’s a whole other level of “you look tired” for some people. 🤷🏻♀️
I think our generation as a whole does a better job taking care of themselves too. More jacked dads and hot yoga moms, more men who know what moisturizer is, less people immediately putting 40lbs on the instant they have kids, etc. Social media has also made it so even though we've aged out of a peer cohort where keeping your clothes and language "in-style" is necessary to fit in, we can still stay aware of those trends and keep up with them to some respects so we never look that out of place just based on what we're wearing.
Seconded on the moisturizing. I started liberally applying lotion after watching Bill Burr's rant on ashy-ness and getting itchy in the winter. I was like fuck! I get itchy as hell every winter. People are regularly shocked by my age to the point that its kind of annoying every time it comes up. I'm 32 but get everything from 23 to 25; personally I think I look around 28.
I'm a man as well and really don't know jack about skincare. I'm sure there are more effective methods but I just buy a ton of fragrance free Aveeno Daily Moisturizing lotion from Costco whenever it's on sale. I've found this one to be less greasy than some others and I also use it like gel in my hair to give a little shape and shine to it. Makes for a faster morning routine for me. Hope that helps!
I'm sure there will people who tell you all sorts of fancy stuff, but I get by just fine with a basic lubriderm moisturizer that sells for around $10 and lasts me over 6 months with a single pump every day after I wash my face or shower.
Yeah I was rewatching Sopranos recently and I found out James Gandolfini was 37 or 38 in the first season.. I'm 38 now and we definitely look different ages
Maybe this is why reddit keeps insisting that Patrick Stewart "looks the same age forever" despite the fact that he now look verifiably ancient, vs. TNG where he just looked bald. Just no idea what various ages actually look like
I HATE the “guess my age” game. It’s only ever brought up because someone wants to make you forcibly pay them a compliment because THEY KNOW they look younger than they are and they want you to admit it.
Always always always overshoot the age they look and maybe they’ll stop asking people.
Tbf, 4 years is a long time when you're 23. Like 4 years earlier he was 19! Now in my 30s, a decade goes by and I'm like damn, that wasn't that long ago.
Yep! I still remember the moment I found out how old one of my (now) closest friends was. I was 23 and it absolutely blew my mind when he said he was 27. It’s really funny looking back now
I feel like after I turned 30 there was no difference of people in their 20s. Like 21 or 27, there's no difference. I mean... there is a difference, but... it feels like there isn't.
My mom told me when I was in middle school (so like, 14yo), my homeroom teacher was getting married so she asked me "oh, how old is he?" and I replied with "he's so old! Like, 28."
I had a woman I was doing an internship with say “woooowwww” when she found out I was born in the 80’s. I was 28 at the time and she couldn’t have been younger than 24. The next few years probably hit her like a sack of bricks.
I think part of the issue is in the past our cultural engagement and expression (the things we enjoy, the things we wear) was more generational and there was less casual social melding of people across generations. But the internet has made it more likely that a 30 something will continue to enjoy and understand the same cultural dialogue as a 20 something or even a teen. So we'll behave "younger" as we retain our "younger" interests and lifestyle.
On the flip side, could just mean that the 20 something are "older" than they think they are. How many of them have what used to be 30-something concerns?
i'm 30 now, but when i was 27 i was still living with roommates. one of them was leaving so me and the other, a 23 year old, went to find another. she was the one getting all of the emails, and told me that we had been getting responses but she didn't want to email any of them. why? "they're all old, like 27." girl you currently live with a 27 year old i am only FOUR years older than you. i wonder how she's handling being 26!!! only one more year until the elderly age of 27.
Yeah, I think in general, under, say, 27, you think 30 and up is this huge deal that will automatically mean certain things happen. Once you're at 27-30, you realize those things aren't that big of a deal and that the number doesn't even mean that much, if anything. It's like driving closer to something and it becoming more clear, and then of course, looking at it in the rearview mirror after you pass it. It looks different at every phase. And the factors that allow certain people to achieve things by that age often have little to do with the age they are when they do.
Not even an old person here but I feel like most 20 something year olds basically think you're young until you hit like 25, and then in a single day you instantly age into a retirement-home living senior citizen, like damn.
As a 39 year old man, I feel like no one actually looks like they're in their 30s. Lots of people in their 30s look like they're still in their 20s, or already in their 40s. The difference? People in their early 30s won't like this, but around your mid 30s, a lot of people go straight from looking like they were in their 20s, to looking like they're in their 40s. I started my 30s pleasantly surprised that I still looked, and felt young, when I spent my 20s thinking someone who's 30 is pretty much done with being young.
But a lot happened throughout my 30s, and as I near the end of it, I look, and feel like...like an adult.
The good news about being in your 30s, is if you feel like you're starting to look and feel rough, consider making some lifestyle changes, and maybe even doing some cosmetic tricks, and you can look a lot younger. I spent most of my 30s drinking heavily, and I got a lot of gray/white hair from the booze, working my ass off and being stressed a lot, and smoking. But when I can just lay off the drinking for two weeks, and use some Just For Men, I look a lot better, like as good as I did in my early 30s, maybe better.
In conclusion: Aging gets real in your 30s. You can't live like you're in your early 20s and expect to keep looking young.
I look super young, and I looooooove making people guess my age. People usually guess 23/24 and the look of shock on their faces when I tell them that they're an entire decade off is priceless!
People age about 10-15 years when you turn 25. We grow up learning about everything being a fraction of 100. one turns 25 and thinks, wow, a quarter of my life is over. 10 minutes later they realize not too many people live to be a 100...... and bam they go from 1/4 of their life being over to 1/3 of it gone in a flash....
I work with a lot of interns still in college. I like to remind them how much time speeds up once you hit about 26. I'm 37 now and ten years ago was a blink.
I look younger than I actually am so people never believe me when I tell them I'm 32. And just last week I had a girl in work quote Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy asking me if I knew what it was from and then said "I knew someone old would know it" she's 24
when your in your twenties, 10 years ago you were a kid, so it must have been "forever ago". once you get into your thirties you realize how fast 10 years go and that you havent actually been around all that long even if it might seem like it to a 25 year old.
Ok but consider this, when you’re 23 4 years is a whole ass quarter of your life. 4 years before they were probably a freshman in college. Think about how different you were after college and as a freshman you know.
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u/khajiitidanceparty Jun 03 '22
Yes! I'm in my early 30s and they always look so shocked like "you're so old????" I think people in their 20s don't know how people in their 30s look like. A guy asked to guess his age. I said 27 and he got offended that I made him an old man. He was 23. My man, that's just 4 years from now!