When did you grow up?

Topic is the question, When did you grow up? When that cynical bottle of the world felt like forcing itself over your perfect bright childhood innocence. Whether it was one or a few catalysts that started it, or just steadily over time. If it was one moment, What was that moment? What lesson did you learn from it? If it was steadily over time, What was the moment you realized you were an entirely different person, That "Huh" moment when you know your childhood is over. Personally mine was when I was seventeen due to the death of a family member, well one I was there to watch happen. Taught me that no matter how young you are, Life ends ect, Made me far more somber, and focus more on the important aspects of life instead of just having fun or goofing off. How about you all?

Well I would laugh if I said that my childhood was innocent because when I was younger I felt like everything was just a game just made for all of us to play and even now I still feel that way because the fact that one day a race of people will literally try to wipe us out and we'll have nothing to do but run with our tail between our legs and take whatever they're going to give us. Seriously look at what we are doing to our race right now. But anyway what really woke me up was when I watched Foamy the Squirrel and his wisdom about the world as I literally had to watch those videos to realize what my worlds was consisted of.

Ouch, becoming an adult because of death must be hard. I grew up by observing my father and my stepfather. As I got older, I realized that my step father was a child. Always whining and not trying anything to make things better. My father is much more adult and mature. He teached me philosophy, comprehension of others and autonomy. Where my step father made me insecure, my father told me to be confident. I just decided to do everything I could to become like my father and not like my step father.

I don't know if I ever have. Like to me, life has always been both something to be taken seriously, and when opportunities are given, you could take it with a grain of salt. My first experience with death was a girl in my class named Brittney. Third grade, she got brain cancer. She didn't make it. So every death since then, while it was a transformational experience for me, has never really compromised me. College? The main thing I picked up there was not to get too stressed out for situations that are beyond my control. If I can't fix it, I work around it, or I wait until it can be fixed. I've experienced the loss of my grandmother (Who basically raised me, so it was like loosing a mom), I experienced the loss one of my friends about a year ago, and I almost lost my brother to the same kind of tumor which killed that girl in my class all those years ago. But the loss of my grandfather is looming, we could all tell in the look in his eyes that he's just waiting for his time. Of course he's still walking, like the stoic badass he is. But I still feel like I haven't been compromised by the world yet. So if paying bills, working, and voting qualify as adulthood, then yeah. I have experience. If there's some other fundamental shift waiting to happen, then I don't know if I've attained that yet. ...Maybe Alcohol is the missing ingredient.

I grew up around age 17 knew the world wasnt a fair place and you pretty much are gonna be the only one who has your back

For me, it was more of a positive thing. When I went to Vo-tech(sort of like college). I finally had the chance to live away from my parents, and it helped me learn a lot about myself and become a much better person.