Thirty
I’ve reached thirty. A number that people often celebrate, a so-called milestone of adulthood, of stability, of finally knowing who you are and where you belong. But for me, thirty feels like a cruel reminder. I am still here, but I don’t know why.
There is no victory in this age for me. No grand achievements, no great loves, no wealth of memories to lean on. Just survival, day after day, year after year. My life has been a series of almosts and not-enoughs, of watching others move forward while I stay stuck in place. I had imagined that by thirty, I would have figured something out — love, career, purpose. Instead, all I have is the gnawing emptiness inside me and the same question that keeps haunting me: why am I still here?
Get lucrecia nadyne’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
I am not someone who shines. I am not the favorite, not the one chosen, not the person remembered first. I am the extra, the afterthought, the background noise in other people’s stories. Love has never come my way, or if it did, it never stayed. Success has never sat on my shoulders, only struggle. Peace has never been my companion, only the endless weight of existing.
And so I ask myself every day: why does life keep me here when I don’t want to be? I have long since grown tired of carrying this body, this mind, this heart that feels too heavy, too fragile, too broken. I have long since wished for an end — quiet, final, absolute. I am not afraid of dying. What terrifies me is living without reason, living without worth, living without being seen.
They say thirty is still young, that there is so much more life ahead. But to me, it feels like a punishment. Another decade of being unwanted. Another decade of being invisible. Another decade of waiting for something that will never come.
So here I stand at thirty, not celebrating, not looking forward, just whispering into the void: Why am I still here? Because in truth, I have been ready to go for a long time.
I already want to die. And all I am doing now is waiting.
