TLDR how do I balance living the life I didn't get in my 20s with caring for parents/starting a family? Also I draw porn and that may have fucked me up.
Early 30s. My family used to be poor. Through a long-shot hail mary, with stars aligning in the weirdest ways and several very unlikely deus ex machinas from people who were way more charitable than anyone has a right to be, I got my degree in my late 20s (first in the family) and recently bought a house (never thought I'd say that, and also first in my family) in a low-COL rural area. I had one of my parents move in with me to save because even though it's a low-COL area, it's a high-COL state, and every dollar counts. This was it. I'd done it. I'd escaped poverty and was making enough money to keep me and the family comfortable.
Except. In the past 4 years, I've lost a sibling, a parent, and a pet. (Edit: now that I think about it, also a family friend, an Internet friend, and a few others. Damn. I have death PTSD. I was promised this only happened in my mid 40s.) These were my first big losses that weren't completely abstract and they're making me re-evaluate what to do with the time I have left in this world. I don't know how long that is. My sibling was only a few years older than me and he died from a health condition that may be inherited. There is a higher than average chance that I won't be here in a decade. I don't have much other family to speak of. I have friends but most of them are cities away. Most of the people in this rural community are in their 60s+ and so is my remaining parent, and health issues abound. There are very few people my age in this geographical area. Everyone I know is burned out and depressed. Life is great.
I'm doing my best to stay active, drink lots of water, avoiding drugs and alcohol and soda, I wear my sunscreen, I try my best to get enough sleep which is so painful as a hardwired night owl. Physically, I'm mostly fine. Mentally I'm doing OK.
Spiritually, I don't know what to do. For various reasons I'm not going to get into, my early life was sheltered and limited, and my 20s were laser-focused on getting a degree. No dating, no fun. I was driven and determined and had basically one shot to get it right. Somehow I made it. Now I actually have (some) money and time but what I don't have is a direction, because I have two polar opposites to choose from.
For some people my age, including many of my friends, I "should" have a spouse, maybe be looking to settle down and start a family. I want one, someday assuming I live that long, but not now. I never got to have freedom in my 20s. I want to explore and make new friends. But I also don't know how much longer my remaining parent is going to be around and I want to spend time with them because life is so fragile and short.
I should start dating too, I guess. But I also really like having free time and I hoard it jealously. I don't want to get locked into a relationship when I've never had time to myself before now. And I most definitely don't want any accidental families starting–my late sibling's life was shattered by an unplanned pregnancy before he passed.
I do have hobbies! Lots of hobbies that I don't want to get into detail about, but I will say that some of them involve making things and being outside, some of them skew towards older adults. But I think I messed up because (buried lede) one thing I do and enjoy doing is drawing kinky porn. I think consensual kink is cool and reflects a lot of trust and communication between participants. But I also worry that keeping that hobby is going to make it a lot harder to date. I don't know if it was the porn or just naturally the way my brain was wired, but I've never been particularly sexually attracted to any gender, even before I started watching porn, which is aggravating. I know asexuality is valid and all that but that doesn't change the fact that it makes relationships way harder than they are for most people. I dunno. It's been haunting me recently.
The isolation of this area isn't helping at all, but even with my income + retired parent's income, moving any closer to civilization is a highly questionable decision. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to figure out what state I'm in.
That's a lot of deep stuff and I don't know what my question is, so I'll sum up with: how do I balance living the life I didn't get with caring for/starting a family? How did you navigate these years? I'll take whatever discussion you're willing to share.
Peace and thank you!