When we grow up, we look up to adults with a sense of awe, appreciation and trust. We often wonder at how adults know exactly what they are doing, how they have got it all under control and how they always make sure that things ultimately work out just as they we were supposed to.

Basically we wonder how great it must be to be an adult. But as it turns out, there are a lot of unexpected and sometimes unpleasant discoveries that come with adulthood and most of the time adults are just as clueless as kids and teenagers are.

While schools and colleges prepare us for a lot of stuff, there are aspects of adulthood that we are never prepared for until we get there. And when we do get there, sometimes we are able to handle them while sometimes it is too late.

Preparing for an adult life can be tough, as the gap between childhood and adulthood is often bridged without us even realizing it. There are certain grim realities of adult life and certain problems that we are never ready for. This series of posts is about such adult problems that nobody prepares us for.

Not Seeing Our Parents Often

One of the saddest things about adult life in this modern age is having to live away from our parents because of working/professional life. Not everyone comes from big cities that provide most of the jobs and therefore many have to migrate from villages and towns to these cities.

Over time we settle down in our new lives, get married and start our own families in the place of our livelihoods and we kind of get permanently physically detached from our parents because of having to live away from them.

Our only physical attachment with them then becomes the visits we pay to them or the visits they pay to us. And during each of these visits, we face an aspect of adult life that nobody prepares us for - noticing and realizing that our parents have gotten older.

No matter how busy and involved we get in our working lives, our parents always mean the world to us but, sadly, time passes as though it is a blur.

Realizing That Keeping Friends And Making New Ones Is Hard

When we step into adulthood, no one warns us about how quickly we and our school & college friends drift apart and move on with our individual lives. And when we realize it happening, it makes us feel awful.

As kids and teenagers growing up, we spend most of our time in the company of our friends whether in classes or outside, doing all sorts of activities like playing sports and games, shopping, eating out, going to the movies, exercising, travelling etc.

Our circle of friends basically become our second family and we can barely think of a life without them. But then adulthood arrives and gives us a hard awakening and our circle of friends slowly shrinks over time like how winds erode sand castles.

And before we realize it, we barely see each other anymore. Though everyone misses each other, nobody has the time. And even when we see our friends, what we usually talk about is the 'good old days' and that nostalgia just makes us all sad and helpless.

Having To Figure Out Things To Do And Then Bringing Ourselves To Do It

Growing up, we get tired of getting told what to do and we long for autonomy and can't wait to grow up and become an adult. We are often told that when we become adults, we can do whatever we want to and that always sounds very exciting.

But only when we actually step into adulthood, we realize that the autonomy that we had always dreamt of having, comes with a price. While most adults generally figure out what to do in their lives and that includes almost everything, not just figuring out one's livelihood, sometimes it becomes too overwhelming.

Then we begin to wish that there was someone who would tell us what to do and guide us and maybe take some responsibility off of us - basically the exact same thing we hated growing up is what we begin wishing for irrespective of how embarrassing it may sound and feel.

And even if we figure out things to do, sometimes it become too difficult a task to bring ourselves to actually do it because an aspect of adulthood is dearth of time.