Adulthood: The grey twilight between hope and suicidal despair

Whenever it is mentioned that someone is 'coming of age', it is usually portrayed as something positive. To grow up, to gain new rights and responsibilities. To have the world open up to them. That's the romantic version at least.

For too many of us it never manages to reach that 90s sitcom levels of endearingness, however. The main feelings that I find myself struggling with at having accomplished reaching adulthood by staying alive, are those of disgust with humanity in general, and a mix of despair and terror as I contemplate my own safety and future.


It should be obvious to anyone who is even mildly sane that humanity as a whole is far from sane. With the widespread beliefs in religions, cults and things like hoarding property, with wanton violence and destruction by the biggest bullies in the playground, all that the adult world is, is a daycare centre's playground without the requisite adult supervision.

Those who rule the playground through might and usually a clout of lackeys are the ones who set the rules, who determine who lives and who dies. Because this isn't just your local daycare centre's playground, no. On this playground the children kill and are killed. Even as no one seems to be able to truly explain why any of it is happening, the playground is a near-constant warzone when it isn't filled with the sound of bickering and suffering.


Normally a child can grow up in relative safety and oblivion from this adult playground. Others are not so lucky. I still cannot remember exactly what was done to me or by who back when I was five years old, but that first introduction to the world of adults has left a lasting impression. I never want to be an adult. Not if it means becoming like those people.

Never truly having been granted the right to exist, with psychologists, doctors and others having made it abundantly clear that I'm also insane and also an abomination with this body of mine and also am imagining everything, it feels like being that kid in PE class who didn't get picked by either team and has to sit it out at the sides. Before getting beaten up after said PE class. For being weird. And wearing glasses. And reading books.


I don't like the world which these so-called 'adults' have made. I note the violence, lack of tolerance and respect, the enforcing of baseless views upon others and so on. It shouldn't feel so dystopian, but at the same time one can only admit that the care-free life with the happy ending is reserved for films and sitcoms. And yet this is the only world that is offered to one.


To me the main question I guess is then whether after more than a decade of surviving the medical system and related, how much do I want to struggle through this adult playground? Carve out my spot and somehow stay safe from the bullies. None of that sounds like particularly fun to me. I can feel my mood swinging between careful optimism and despair. Nothing about it seems particularly easy or fun, yet it's hard for me to tell when something is truly that bad, or when it's my PTSD blending in with reality.

As a veteran of the War of Dehumanisation, I have become maybe allergic to any system that does not acknowledge people as such. Call it bureaucracy, regulations, the law, etc. All of it is an easy shortcut to not have to think about people as living beings with their own feelings and dreams. It were humans who made up rules, nations and bureaucracies. We humans get it wrong more often than that we get it right. That's why it's essential that we are always ready to revisit any rules and systems we created to improve them.

This is sadly also exactly the part where humans fail so badly. Call it cognitive bias or any of those other cute psychological excuses for humans refusing to use this supposed 'human intelligence' for intellectual purposes. In the end the result is that tragically, the average child is more perceptive and fair than the average adult human.


Maya