The Curse of Getting Older

When you are young, age is insignificant to you. Unless you are barred from participating in sport teams, you are hardly aware of how old you are: all that matters is having a great time. Although the latter remains a popular ethos once you hit the teenage years, suddenly you are submerged into a world where age means everything to you - which can hold the key to unlocking various privileges that you yearn to regard as your own.

From being allowed to attend thrilling parties to learning how to drive a car (hopefully without your parents preying on your every move), age is a key which grants us many wonderful things that our younger selves would never have had access to. As brilliant as these advantages may be, even the most delusional can have the heart to deny the negatives that are attached to growing older, clinging to dear life like an X Factor reject.

For one thing, your childhood innocence is lost in a pile of dirty clothing that your mum constantly nags at you to put in the washing machine: as your cheeky smile fades into a horrific grimace, very little will sooth the blow of getting into trouble. Responsibilities begin to be thrown at you in literally every single direction which, if not sorted out appropriately, will quickly evolve into a spectacular mess that puts your life on a par with a foul-smelling dump.

As your brain is undergoing a series of life-defining changes (according to an article I once read in a science magazine. which changed my world forever), is it truly realistic to expect you to live up the image of a responsible, hard-working and good-natured young adult? Personally, I think that the transition from child to teenager happens far too quickly for anybody - especially your poor acne-suffering self - to get their head around. Maybe that it forms part of the curse that links itself with adolescence: nobody honestly understands how daunting it feels to be thrust into the deep end, after spending years of your life caged in an secure, airtight bubble.

Though my memory has since become pretty hazy regarding that period in my life, the 12 to 14 age group tested me at the best of times because I was adjusting to a maturer status, whilst still escaping my now-invalid one as a child. Hot bursts of anger would sometimes grab hold of me and control my every emotion until I was a fireball burning with rage - a thousand miles away from the sweet-hearted, cute little girl that I was several years before! Yet, for a reason that probably not even the greatest scientists could ever answer, I never uncovered why I got angry: it was simply an emotion that I would experience for a while, neither pre-warning me of its appearance nor indicating when it would flush out of my system. That alone is plenty to make a jacuzzi bubble with an even greater intensity, let alone stimulate yet more tension in a teenager!

My overall conclusion is that these things just happen, though it doesn't answer my - nor the world's entire teenage population - question at all. I wasted too much time on figuring out why I would lose my temper, which never made me feel better whenever it did happen.

Nowadays, I'm starting to overcome the curse of adolescence which, rather scarily, won't be lasting too much longer. There are only two-and-a-month-and-a-half left until I reach the starting line for adulthood, which will then last my entire life - hopefully without irritating my hormones quite as easily as before. In fact, I've gotten so used to being a teenager that the thought of hitting a milestone birthday - my 16th - next February quite terrifies me: I'll be moving further away from my early teens to the latter part! Still, I guess that is the way it goes, along with the many curses that I've encountered over the years...

1. You can no longer play in fun centres

Unless you are a really big kid and don't exceed 5ft. Sigh. Who would have believed that the day would have come when I would regret my petite height? All for the sake of climbing up slides, leaping into pools of brightly coloured balls and burning off all the chips that I'd eat.

2. The Tooth Fairy is not required to give you any money

Translation: an imaginary fairy is now forcing you to slave away doing chores that you hate, which you receive even less money for than you did as a toothless six year old. How is THAT fair?! HOW??? If I'd been given a few more one pound coins during my toothless years, I'd have the money to issue a lawsuit against a fictional winged creature!

3. Your life is not defined by toys

Ever devastated that The Teletubbies finished before you were born? Playing with your toys would be the ultimate pick-me-up! From teddy bears to scantily-clad Bratz dolls, I would lose myself in hours of fun with my toys, which used to send my imagination into overdrive. However, my life was forever changed once I hit the age of eleven, seemingly developing a new attitude overnight - toys were no longer 'cool'. Despite initially being a good idea at the time, I grew to regret it when I needed distractions more than ever - surely creating a Desperate Housewives-inspired storyline with my Bratz dolls would take my mind off the hormones that I struggled to control? And, before you know it, a period in your life specifically reserved for toys is over. Quel moment triste!

4. Chocolate is not a vegetable.

And, um, contains more calories than your Key Stage 1 knowledge of maths can comprehend. There goes the mornings of sneakily eating tubs of Smarties before breakfast which, despite my brother's pleas, I would always 'fess up to - ah, the sweet pleasure of delving into one's naughtiness!

5. The sky is not made up of whipped cream as clouds and strawberry ice cream as a pink sunset

Even though my fifteen year old self believes otherwise...

6. You can't buy Garfield in Pets at Home

Instead, you have to make do with a chunky ginger tom whose life has never been defined by a bite of lasagne - what a tragedy indeed!

7. Money doesn't grow on trees 

Those words still didn't stop me from searching through the forest near my village for any such trees. Who knows what you'll discover in the unexplored, Wifi-less countryside?

8. Your Barbie dolls don't come to life à la Toy Story while you're at school

In other words: don't believe what your parents say, as much as you want to believe that your toys were having a bonfire party in your bedroom!