Thinking about age never seems to go away

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Nearly always in my head I just have these feelings like I have been missing out on things in life and not conforming to what is expected by when you hit a certain age. At 30, I am still single, living with one parent while working, and no children. I never went to social events or drinking parties on a saturday night. My mum's partner is 40 now and he has never had children and I keep thinking what will it be like at his age and thinking I'll still be the way I am now today and I may feel much worse. I feel like I'm 28 in a 30 year old and doing things later than other people. Its like as though when I was 18 and still felt 16 when I left school because 16 is when most leave school at that age or when I got my first paid job at 26 when I should really have had one at 23 or 24. I have been told by people that age is just a number and to stop thinking about it. It does seem to feel as though it is a race to do things at certain ages before it is too late because otherwise it will pointless in doing because I have wasted time. I even have this irrational fear of being kicked out because I'll be too old to still stay at home at 31, 32, 33, 34, and 35 even though my parents are loving and caring people. I do remember my stepmum saying to me to stay until I'm ready but I do still think I'll be kicked out.

I'm 64, and only got my diagnosis last year. I've got very little time left to try to make up for some of the things I've missed out on, and it's far too late to ever experience some things. At 30, things weren't right, but I thought I still had plenty of time, and it would happen one day, but at the time I thought I was "normal" with a bit of a problem that would eventually go away.

I don't know the answer to this problem. I only received my written diagnosis report today, and have an appointment to discuss it in just over a week, so I'm hoping I may get some advice and support from the Autism Service, but I don't know if it will result in a satisfactory outcome.

Your mum’s partner isn’t doing too badly at age 40. He’s done enough to win the heart of your mum.

I think you have become rather obsessed with this.

I second that. I think you have exhausted all the relevant advice here quite thoroughly. Maybe you should hang from your toes and read it all again.

Some problems are not able to be solved in the safety of the mind.

I'm in a similar boat, in my teens I started this race against others, virginity, drinking, learning to drive (not at same time as drinking) were all these big issues, and I saw them all through a bit before most of my peer group. However it didn't help, i knew it would all come down around me, that I wasn't doing things for the right reasons. I'm in a similar position to you now and I'm kinda lost with it. You're not alone.