Turning 40 marks a major milestone for many people. It can be an exciting time when your family, career, hobbies, and sense of self are finally falling into place. Unfortunately, it can also be the decade when your joints start hurting and your hair goes gray.
In other words, your 40s can be a mixed bag. What’s especially fascinating is that everyone’s experience in their early 40s will be different. Some people say that’s exactly what makes it such an interesting season of life.
Guy on X notices a few strange things about being in his 40s
Ben Eisenhart, a self-described dad and husband who turned 42 earlier this year, recently took stock of his peers and found that there was a wild amount of variety.
He realized that he’d reached a point in time when minor differences in life choices, luck, and genetics that were barely noticeable in his 20s were becoming massively evident.
The post was a hit, racking up nearly two million views and hundreds of comments from people eager to share their own experiences and observations. Here are five things people say make your 40s the weirdest and most interesting decade of your life.
1. Kids
In your early 20s, the vast majority of your peers don’t have kids yet. In your mid-to-late 20s, the process begins, and newborns start crashing group hangouts. Late nights at the bar become lazy afternoons at the brewery as parent friends try to survive the early stages of parenthood. Others either aren’t ready for kids yet or have decided not to have them.
In your 40s, it’s not nearly as simple.
Some folks are still child-free. Others might have grown children who are out of the house. Some are even grandparents by this point. Others are just getting started in parenthood with their first newborn. In fact, the latter is becoming increasingly common, with over 20% of women now having their first child after the age of 35.
2. Looks
Some people look older, and some look younger. That’s just the genetic lottery, and it’s true at almost any age.
But by your 40s, life choices and health issues have piled up and widened this gap. Some 40-year-olds could pass for being in their 20s, while others look 20 years older.
Genetics alone can account for huge differences in how we age, and it’s a topic of great interest to scientists. But a few decades of staying fit, or smoking, or using or not using sunscreen really start to show up around your early 40s.
3. Couples
Similar diversity shows up not just in whether people are partnered up, but in the many different shapes and timelines of romance that appear.
As Eisenhart notes, many people marry relatively young and remain together well into their 40s and beyond. Others are divorced, on their second or third marriage, or have been single the entire time. Even among those who are single, they may be dipping their toe in the dating pool of folks their own age…or, in some cases, much younger.
It can make for some very interesting get-togethers.
4. Career
There’s a great camaraderie in your 20s when everyone you know is just getting started in their careers. Some are struggling through menial jobs, while others are in more prestigious fields but are grinding their way up from the bottom of the totem pole.
You’re all in it together, in a sense.
In your 40s, those career paths have diverged a great deal over the years. Some folks are executive-level leaders at big companies. Others have been doctors and scientific researchers for over a decade. Some have suffered setbacks or are in the midst of a career change, piecing together work the best they can. More and more people in their 40s are even going back to school.
It can, and should, be a time of deep empathy and leaning on one another.
5. Hope for all
Ultimately, most people in their 40s who commented on the post agreed on one thing: it’s a pretty cool season of life.
“All these are just lessons that we ain’t competing with anyone, at every age in our life just live your best and do things that makes you happy and always love yourself even more,” one X user wrote.
Another said, “Life really doesn’t follow one timeline. People the same age can be in completely different seasons, and that’s normal.”
“I turn 48 in July, and what ive gathered is wherever you find yourself during these years, as long as you find the joy, its all good,” another user added. “Out of all my decades, 40s have been surprisingly my favorite, mainly because ive learned to only worry about what i can control.”
One person noted that your 40s offer an amazing opportunity for transformation: “Early 40s is the last time of a big ‘potential’ horizon. Where you could totally reinvent yourself and make it if you wanted to.”
And finally, many wisely advised that your 40s are nothing to fear:
It wasn’t just 40-year-olds who were drawn to the viral post, however. More than a handful of people in their 50s and 60s stopped by with just a few choice words: “Just you wait.”
