I turned 30 yesterday. Nobody besides my family believe me when I tell them how old I am. Everyone else consistently says I look 18 or 19. I do not use make up or any skincare products. I've always eaten a diet of junk food so it makes no sense. I've always looked considerably younger than my actual age throughout my life, consistently freaking people out when I tell them how old I am. When I was 16, people told me that I looked 9. One of my friends messaged me about this study which said that some people actually do age a lot slower compared to other people, and looking considerably younger is often a sign of that. My appearance got the attention of doctors who were convinced that I had some kind of hormonal disorder, but when those tests came back normal, they were stumped. Whatever it is, it's not genetic because my sibling looks their age, so do all my other family members on both sides. I used this app called FaceAge (after one of my friends told me about it, curious what the results would be) and it estimated my age to be 18. When I uploaded a photo of myself from 2020, it said I was 16.
I got really sick a little over a decade ago which caused me to be semi-bedbound from when I was 19 all the way up until I was nearing 30. I had heart and neurological problems caused by Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, which have since been treated, but because of that illness affecting the blood supply to my brain, I hardly remember anything from my 20's. My 20's seemed more like a weird fever dream than anything very tangible (I mostly just remember hospital appointments) and suddenly I'm 30 but I don't feel 30, physically or mentally. Anyway, I recently thought about the people I knew in school who I forgot the names of. Some of them were a couple of years older than me, and I'm just imagining how old they must all look now even though they aren't that much older than me, and how they're probably experiencing slow downs. I look like how they did when they left school now. That just makes me feel really upset for some reason. The best way I can describe it is similar to how you feel about a cat or dog ageing a lot faster than you.
Another issue is with dating. If I put my age on my profile, with my photos, I'm going to look like I'm catfishing or something, even though I'm not. And even then, it's going to look weird for a 35 year old man to go out on a date with someone who looks like she's barely old enough to gamble.