On my 29th birthday, I felt older than my friends who were already 30

“I felt way younger at 30 than I did at 29. At 29, you’re the oldest of the pack. When you turn 30, you get a clean slate.”

It’s Sunday morning, and a friend’s pep talk is ringing in my ears. I’ve woken up in a hotel bed in Melbourne: disorientated, hungover and half-dressed – yesterday’s salon-fresh hair now a matted mess. My eyes are puffy, and mascara clings to my skin in cheap, coagulated streaks.

I have always been a birthday person, especially during my 20s. But today, my 29th birthday, feels different – like there’s a creeping alarm, and it’s honking as loudly as the street traffic several storeys below.

“Twenty-nine is old, 30 is young,” she said. “I just can’t explain it.”

I think what my friend means by that is that 29 feels a bit like the final year of school – there’s suddenly more at stake. Thirty, by contrast, oddly resembles our first year of university, or whatever comes next: a chance to try on different versions of ourselves, wipe the slate clean and embrace a little whimsy.

We put so much pressure on getting everything ticked off by 30, from getting a promotion to Botox, that we focus on the countdown more than the moment. And it doesn’t help that our sense of ageing and reaching milestones is often mediated through our phone screens.

We’re grieving the easy confidence and endless possibilities of our 20s, while recoiling at the prospect of a new decade. If 30 is the marker, 29 feels like limbo — a waiting room surrounded by other 20-somethings, all waiting to be called. Which is when comparison culture creeps in.

I’m not sure what the “life doctor” would have to say about my 20s once I get in the room.

It’s OK, sweetie, you’ve got time to sort things out. Speaking of time, don’t panic about your eggs – yet – you’ve got a few years to find a man. Just think! You’ve done so much already.

Which is more or less the same smug reassurance I received after explaining “I’m still figuring it out” to those who seemingly have things figured out – and simply can’t place me.

That, or I’m firmly in the “other” box when it comes to the generic markers of success: Relationship. Job title. House.

“It seems to me that the years between 18 and 28 are the hardest, psychologically,” actor Helen Mirren once wrote. “It’s then you realise this is make or break, you no longer have the excuse of youth, and it is time to become an adult – but you are not ready.”

That tension – expectation without readiness – is what makes the transition so taxing and bruising. We’re asked to decide, commit and deliver while still working out who we are, and what we want, beneath the noise.

Which is why the idea of a single, universal standard for success feels so misplaced. Goalposts move. Directions re-route, sometimes beyond our control. Definitions of happiness, ambition and fulfilled lives are completely individual. Anyone who insists otherwise is likely living by someone else’s definition of success. To me, that’s the only real failure.

I’ve done some cool stuff in my 20s. I’ve been to international fashion weeks, seen Melbourne from a hot-air balloon, interviewed model Naomi Campbell, and moved from Melbourne to Sydney, then London. I lived in country Victoria for my first job and tamed my fringe next to model Lila Moss in a bathroom for another, and dated someone so far from my own world it felt almost fictional.

And yet, I haven’t been in a relationship in eight years. I suffer financial hangovers more so than real ones. I lost my job during COVID, then my career confidence. And I’ve lost myself, too, by accepting every request, invitation, or argument. I’ve people-pleased and confused career with identity.

While it can feel like I’m running barefoot through a forest, it’s also strangely exciting to think all roads lead to anywhere. If anything, I’m more afraid of certainty than missing expectations, and more afraid of disappointing myself than anyone else.

And the ones who matter? Well, they don’t care what I do or don’t bring to the table – as long as I show up (preferably with a bottle). For my 29th, a so-called “non-event” birthday, they made a joyous fuss. We sang and danced our way through Beyoncé’s Renaissance well into the early hours, and complained about work, boys and laughed. And when they left, I was full.

Reclaiming 29 doesn’t mean pretending the pressure isn’t there, or rushing to outrun it. It means choosing presence over panic, and loose plans over prescribed roles. It’s letting your life remain editable – relationships, cities, hobbies, professions. And certainly not photocopying someone else’s milestones.

Twenty-nine isn’t a deadline, it’s a doorway. It’s a year of goodbyes and firsts, of missteps and rewrites, of not giving up on the dance floor just yet. If turning 30 offers a clean slate, then 29 is the year you decide what you actually want to carry forward. And that, I think, is worth celebrating.

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