Wednesday Debbie Downer: It's The Quarter-life Crisis!

Debbie Downer: Did you know that according to a recent poll conducted for the AP and MTVU, undergraduates in colleges across the nation are stressed out? (camera zooms into Debbie's face - soundfx tuba: wah waaah)


"Um, tell me something I don't know," says Captain Obvious.

Majorities cite classic stress symptoms including trouble concentrating, sleeping and finding motivation. Most say they have also been agitated, worried, too tired to work...Many cite eating problems and say they have felt lonely, depressed, like they are failures. Substantial numbers are even concerned about spring break, chiefly not having enough money or being in good physical shape. (CNN.com)

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A mid-life crisis occurs when a middle-aged adult goes through a sudden transition in their life that makes them realize that they are no longer as youthful as they'd like to be. So it would make sense to coin the term "quarter-life crisis" to define the college years in life; the transition from being a high school kid to becoming a young adult is a big leap...all in the matter of the few months between graduating high school and moving into freshmen dorms.

And what about after you graduate college? A quarter-life crisis, indeed (I mean, they even have a show about it).

Besides balancing her approaching graduation with the 20-hour-per-week job that helps finance school, Jeanette Devereaux-Weber said she has a new pressure: beginning her post-college life. The anthropology major at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, said she has not decided what to do..."It doesn't feel like looking for a summer job anymore, it's looking for a career, it's things that will shape everything to come," she said. "Sometimes it feels like you have to make the right choice right away or you will be behind everyone else." (CNN.com)

Wah waaaaaah.