Living With Peter Pan Syndrome

“But, Mother, I don’t want to grow up!” - Wendy Darling

by SOPHIE SCHLOSSER ★ JULY 15, 2020

I don’t understand people who claim to hate their birthday. Whenever I am faced with the words, “I hate my birthday,” I must refrain from losing complete corporeal control behind my insensitive trail of laughter. If all truth be told, my annual birthday wish is usually for every day to be my birthday. I never understood how anyone in their right mind could possibly dislike a day of external love and incessant attention. Birthdays are awesome, or so I thought, until July 5, when the treacherous wave of my nineteenth birthday crashed upon my shoulders. 

In the last eighteen years leading up to this day, my birthday was my true best friend. I awaited my birthday a concerning amount, religiously using my countdown app to track the exact number of milliseconds until the clock struck twelve on July 5. It wasn’t until my first year of college that I began to realize that my teenage years are fleeting, all thanks to my notorious day of birth. 

Perhaps quarantine is to blame for leaving me alone with my wandering thoughts, but this notion—growing up, that is—brought me crippling anxiety in the weeks preceding my special day. My mom disclosed the news to me that I had been plagued with a severe case of Peter Pan Syndrome. According to ScienceDaily.com, Peter Pan Syndrome “affects people who do not want or feel unable to grow up, people with the body of an adult but the mind of a child.” Damn straight. 

If you happen to be cursed with a brain remotely similar to mine, you’ll agree with the fact that adulthood is terrifying. I deeply miss my youngest days where crustless PB&Js and nap time were the ritual, and my biggest concern was forgetting to bring my snow pants outside for recess. Fast-forward thirteen years and I’ve somehow ended up in an alternate universe where nervous breakdowns are now routine, and my biggest concern is forgetting to bring my face mask indoors that will shield me from the deathly COVID-19 pandemic that is swarming every corner of our globe. Wow. What a turn of events. 

Unlike Peter, I refuse to accept the fact that all I need is nothing more than a pinch of pixie dust; to grow up. Personally, I believe my fear of aging is derived from the fact that I know nothing about the real world. This cluelessness manifests itself in several ways ranging from incessantly googling, “Real-World Advice Columns,” all the way to hysterically crying at the dinner table in front of my immediate and extended family simply because I don’t understand how the bank works. Or the stock market… please don’t get me started. 

Although there is no definite obligation for me to learn these concepts prior to X date, there is a gaping hole inside of me that silently begs for answers. I’d like to share some questions I wrote in a notes page on my phone titled “Help.” Try not to laugh too hard.

1. How do taxes work? 

2. When do I need to start paying taxes?

3. What are taxes?

4. Am I the only one who doesn’t know what taxes are?

5. How does the bank work?

6. How should I tell the bank to contact me instead of my dad when I go over my credit card limit?

7. What the hell was The Wolf of Wall Street about?

8. Will the guy at the bank be familiar with the plot of that movie?

9. Why is there a stock market?

10. What is the stock market?

11. Does anyone actually know what the stock market is?

12. What if someone else has the same social security number as me?

13. How does the bank have enough storage space for all the money that people deposit into it?

The list goes on. 

I will be the first to admit that I am painfully clueless. In fact, I am blatantly ashamed of my renowned dependency on others to seamlessly guide me through life. In all honesty, I blame my Peter Pan Syndrome for blinding me from the fact that I’m getting older and these questions are beginning to take on a new, essential meaning in my life. 

As much as I wish time travel were real, I have no choice but to accept that my teenage years will soon be a glimpse of the past. So rather than dwelling on the departure of my youth, I am embracing the arrival of my new age. I believe the remedy for my Peter Pan Syndrome will only be found by letting go of the past and enticing the future. By doing so, I am taking the reins and accepting the memories. I hope you follow in my path.  

So as I embark on this final twelve-month period of my teenage experience, I trust that answers to these questions and many more will come in due time. Although my heart and my head are aging at different speeds, I must accept both in order to reach beyond.

Cheers to the final 364 days, 3 hours, 22 minutes, and 14 seconds of my teenage years… but who’s counting?

Sources: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/05/070501112023.htm#:~:text=The%20'Peter%20Pan%20Syndrome'%20affects,immature%20behaviors%20in%20Western%20society.

Cover photo credit: Pintrest (Vanity Fair)