16 Signs You Haven’t Quite Nailed The Whole Being-A-Grownup Thing Yet

You have googled “which number on the check is my routing number” at some point in the last month.

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Twenty20 / kevism
Twenty20 / kevism
Twenty20 / kevism

I’m a grownup. I think. Sort of. I live by myself, I pay my bills, and I have successfully raised three gerbils, though two have since passed away (RIP Maximus and Leonidas). But there are times, man, when I just don’t think I’ve got the whole being-a-grownup thing down. Maybe that’s okay. Maybe I’ll never feel that way.

You’d might as well admit it: If you relate to these struggles, you probably have not yet entered that mythical period in your life known as adulthood. But maybe, that’s overrated anyway.

1. You have googled “which number on the check is my routing number” at some point in the last month.

2. Actually, I’ve just reminded you that you need to order checks. (Why oh why can’t we just pay our rent with Venmo?)

3. The bottoms of your shoes looked like this before you finally caved and bought new ones.

Suzannah Weiss
Suzannah Weiss

4. The Ikea bag you used to transport your home décor to your apartment now doubles as a laundry basket.

5. You feel really healthy when you add vegetables to your ramen noodles.

6. You’ve sprayed perfume on your socks because you didn’t have time to wash them at some point in the past year.

7. You’ve been late for work due to the after-effects of playing video games or watching Netflix into the wee hours of the morning.

8. Even a few seconds of being alone in public without checking your phone floods you with anxiety.

9. You’re pretty sure you applied to the health insurance plan with the coolest-sounding name because all the different payment options were too overwhelming to consider.

10. But you can’t remember said name because healthcare registration was a dark, scary period of your life that you’re just hoping to forget.

11. You’re thinking about going to grad school some day for journalism or maybe archaeology or maybe astrophysics. Or something.

12. You might get a cat once you’re not living with someone who is allergic or squished into a 300-square-foot apartment or thinking about moving to France at some point.

13. You don’t have a library membership because you don’t know how that works and you’re too embarrassed to ask anyone or even look it up.

14. You don’t really buy into the whole concept of meals; you just kind of eat when you feel like it.

15. Last Father’s Day, you gave your dad a card you found in your childhood bedroom and scribbled a heartfelt message in five minutes earlier.

16. You relate to characters in shows catering to teenagers. (Yes, Pretty Little Liars counts.)

Is it just me, or do these really just sound like signs of being a millennial? I can’t guarantee we’ll ever reach adulthood. Thought Catalog Logo Mark


About the author

Suzannah Weiss

Suzannah Weiss is a writer whose work has also been published in The Washington Post, Salon, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Marie Claire, Seventeen, Paper Magazine, Yahoo, and more. She holds degrees in Gender & Sexuality Studies, Modern Culture & Media, and Cognitive Neuroscience, which she uses mainly to over-analyze trashy television and argue over semantics. She never outgrew 90s rock music and hopes she never will. You can follow her on Twitter at @suzannahweiss.