I’m honestly so tired of seeing women in their 20s treated like children. It’s frustrating to watch society infantilize grown women as if we’re incapable of making adult decisions. There’s this recent drama about a pop singer claiming she doesn’t know any parents her age who aren’t miserable. She’s 27! Somehow, this ignited a chorus of people agreeing that women her age are 'too young' for parenthood.
This isn’t new. There’s this persistent notion that women over 23 are still kids because 'your brain isn’t fully developed until 25,' so clearly we’re immature and incapable of functioning as adults. As a 28-year-old woman, let me be clear: I’m a young adult, but I’m still an adult. And we face enough challenges being taken seriously without adding this patronizing narrative to the mix.
I get that some people are still figuring their lives out well into their 20s and 30s—it’s tough out there, especially with financial struggles. And there’s no shame in that. But not everyone feels stuck or is unprepared. Just because some 27-year-olds don’t feel ready to have kids doesn’t mean the rest of us are too young to make that choice.
It’s exhausting. We should be able to embrace adulthood without constantly having to fight to be treated like the capable individuals we are.