When and how did you find out that your childhood was over?

[Acoustic Cloud 2,202]

I honestly did have much of a childhood.
Around 3rd I pretty much grew up. I had a distaste for immaturity, and I definitely sometimes regret growing up so fast.  But it's alright, it put me ahead, and that's all I ask in life.

[Rough Pathway 157]

It ended for me when I was about 11 or 12ish (I'm 14 now). When I was 11 there was this flood that happened one night. The water went up to the top of our cars. Nobody died, but I did lose alot of childhood toys and things and I was kinda forced to grow up. A few months after the flood, my dad got really sick because of an infection and he also had a heart attack in the hospital. He survived, but it was hard for me while he was in the hospital. Then a month later, I entered middle school. I had to leave my old school and the middle school was horrible. Kids cussed, broke out into actual physical fights (I got to witness one of them up close too -_- ) and I heard them talk about not so innocent things. After all of that I got depressed (not anymore though). Even though my childhood ended, I'm still innocent (other than knowing about those not innocent things..) and I love 'kid' stuff. I'm much more mature now, too. Everything that happened has helped make me a better person.

[Girls Dead Monster 5]

I was 12. Fanfiction.net taught me what lesbians were. I blame Fanfiction.net for a lot of things. Then again, it spared me a lot of awkward conversations with my mother.

[Lunas Husband 2,777]

Ah when I turned 10 years old.. that's when everything just went down hill for me, and I had to grow up and deal with everything all on my own.. because who was going to help me anyway?

[Hyper Tumble 1,483]

When you look back on something only from your generation and put it on a pedestal is when your childhood is over; you no longer love something, you loved it.

[HeroBrony 36]

My Childhood has never really ended, sure I have a job now and have other responsibilities  but I will always be a kid at heart.

[Arretez 225]

The best word to describe me is "fanciful." This word basically means that I live in my imagination, which is very true. Because I live in my imagination, my childhood has yet to, and never will, end.

[Pomfritter 165]

I went to a "rehabilitation center" for reasons that I don't really feel are necessary to bring up here. Being away from home for 9 months ensured that I would never be the same person. And I also went through the final bit of growth during that time, so I looked different as well. My outlook on life and things was different, so I chose to act more accordingly to my new set of beliefs. Believe it or not, that place made me a much more mature person (although it did make me much more anxious).

[Celtore 2,770]

Hmm... I can't pinpoint one exact moment. I suppose I knew for sure it was over when I reached college and had to change my mindset and deal with new responsibilities. It especially hit the following year when I was taking a math and physics program to get into software engineering. It was then that I realized I had some direction, finally some idea of where I wanted to take my life.

 

Working at McDonalds could be where my "inner child" was destroyed. Getting yelled at for trivial errors 4:00 every Saturday morning by my boss was really demoralizing and even crushing. I always tried my best, I have a strong work ethic, but all she could see was my errors. I finally broke down after 2 years of that and I thankfully found work outside the fast food industry where my effort is respected.

 

The moment I joined the MLP fandom could be where I first consciously considered myself an adult. When I was conflicted on whether to continue watching MLP or not past the second episode, I acknowledged that fact to rationalize becoming a brony.

 

So take your pick, there are three possible contextual moments.

[Strong Copper 126]

Considering that all of us are loud and proud fans of a show about cartoon, brightly colored ponies I would like to make it clear  that 'adulthood' doesn't exist. In the slightest.

 

But to answer the question... My childhood ended when I finally left school. I hated it there, and life has improved for me since.

[Misty Shadow 7,867]

Huh? My childhood is over? I know we're all at the youngest teenagers here, but wow. Anyways, even though I'm 17 and I'm technically classified as a young adult now, I still consider myself to be a child at heart.

[Lucky Bolt 35,063]

The day I got my.....uh, the thing us girls gotta deal with every month. 

[Splashee 28,564]

It never was, and never will be. By accepting your childhood is over, you are taking away 36% so of your life, like watching cartoons, or playing with dolls (um, I am collecting pony toys!)

[TBD 17,254]

A friendlier translation for “when did I become dead inside?”

“I was told when I get older all my fears would shrink
But now I'm insecure and I care what people think "Wake up, you need to make money"

[Rainbow Cloud 17,970]

When I turned 18 and legally became an adult, mentally however I'm still not quite their yet  

[HereComesTom 2,267]

In some ways, I feel like I never grew up---probably partly because I'm not 100% sure of myself, don't really like being independent, never forgot how to have fun, and because I'm still into animation and video games.

All that being said, when I graduated from college, two truths hit me like a ton of bricks:

1) Everything changes, even things you wish wouldn't; nothing lasts forever, even things you wish would.

2) Just being a functional adult in society takes a HUGE amount of money, which is why having a job is so important.

When those two truths hit me, I felt like I'd hit a major transition-point, and had become an adult.

[Dreambiscuit 9,691]

When I was in fifth or sixth grade I was exposed to a lot of worldly kids, but I filtered most of it through a more innocent perspective and kept most of the bad stuff at bay. I don’t consider myself as having ever lost my childhood. I’ll hold onto it with both hands till I’m six feet under.  

[DubWolf 17,263]

Probably high school when pretty much everything you did from then on mattered for the future. Colleges don't look (as far as I'm aware of) any earlier than high school grades. Things mattered. A middle school student could've been a D student and it wouldn't have mattered much after. Never really watched cartoons very much anymore like I used to since I was now in the marching band (takes up all your time), so that part of me sort of died (big part of my childhood was going home and watching the toons on Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network endlessly... which wasn't good or productive! But they were fun, and memorable).

[碇 シンジン 27,431]

Realized while ago that there is no childhood there is just life that continues until we die