When did you first realise you were an adult?

When my parents died. They always treated me as if I was 8; 12 on a really good day... [BTW I was in my 60s when my mama died... ]

I'm still waiting! I think we all carry so much baggage from our childhoods that never really resolves and I will consider myself an adult when that happens - I'm not holding my breath!

76 and still working towards..

. My son realised when he put a National Trust sticker in his car

Never !

Pregnant at 17, married within 3 weeks and grew up overnight. (We are still together after nearly 58 years)

It was me that was 19 - not all the patients!

Being left in charge of a ward full of patients aged only 19 suddenly made me realise I was supposed to be an adult.
I didn’t like it, tho!

When I asked my mother a question and she didn’t have the answer.....?

Erm, i don't think i have yet. I will keep you posted ?

At my first job interview. I made my own way there without my Dad acting as a taxi driver and felt very grown up in my cream suit! (Got the job as well! )

I thought I was at 18 when I got a live-in job at a large London Hotel.

I was 25 when my in-laws' house burnt down. I dealt with insurance, house clearance, councillors and MPs to get them rehoused and settled. They all treated me like an adult, & I thought 'At last, I'm grown-up'

When my dad died, I came to the realisation that I was no longer anyone's child and was finally an adult!

The first night when I left home to go to uni. My Father had dropped me and my stuff off and I joined others in the Pub.....in the pub, YEA! I knew that I could drink myself silly and go back to my bed and no one would say........' and what time do you think this is'
Of course there were other life changing situations but I remember the excitement of that night so vividly.

I became an adult when I stopped blaming my parents for my problems.

I didn’t know anyone who went or had gone to university...everyone I knew left school at 15 unless they ‘stayed on’ til 16. It was most unusual to go to university even into the mid/late 80’s only 6% of population had a degree.

Apprenticeships were highly regarded, teachers, nurses and physios/occupational therapists all went to college and learned on the job.

Think I may have gone slightly off subject.

Being told by a work colleague, at 17, that I was far too old to sing along with the Sound of Music number: "I am 16, going on 17. I know that I'm naive..."

It was OK to sing along with any of the other songs, apparently, so it wasn't my voice quality.

Seriously, though, leaving home and finding I had to do two jobs (£8pw ft and £4pw pt) just to pay rent, food, clothes, bus fares etc. Also at a still-fairly-naive 17.

When I left school, and went away to university and for the first time I was away on my own and nobody knew what I was doing. I was in charge of my life for good or for ill.

When I had to give my mother half of my first pay packet. I was left with £2/10!

When I was 16 and I had to get up at silly o'clock to catch a bus across town to work in the hospital.

On my 17th birthday a visitor who didn't know me asked what I wanted to be when I grew up. I replied, 'I am grown-up'. I think my mother was a bit sceptical about that. There are several experiences that reinforce adult-hood: first full time job; first baby; death of a parent.

tanith and yes, my mum like yours, too took me along for the interview.

A couple of weeks after my 15 th birthday I was working in London as a trainee typist. There were 17 year olds in the office and i remember thinking that when I am 17 i would be grown up. When 2 years later that didn’t happen I had to think it out again.

Possibly when DD1 was born and I really understood that her survival depended on me.

When I first heard someone (in a reported conversation) refer to me as a woman, not a girl. I was about 26 at the time!