11 Things Millennial Girls Were Taught Growing Up That Turned Out To Be Completely Wrong
It wasn't until they reached adulthood that the truth came out.
Inside Creative House | Shutterstock Every generation faces their own version of hardship. As common as it is to compare generations, it's important to acknowledge that everyone's life is impacted by issues that are out of their control. For millennials, that essential truth manifested in the divide between the lives they were promised and the lives they actually had.
It's easy to look back and romanticize a 90s childhood, but there were so many things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong. These misguided life lessons shaped how millennial girls saw themselves, which means that millennial women are engaging in the hard work of redefining their self-worth.
Here are 11 things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong
1. If you go to college, you'll automatically get a great job
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Growing up, millennial girls were held to high expectations. They learned to equate their productivity with their value as people, which meant they pushed themselves academically, often to the point of extreme stress and anxiety.
One of the major things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong was that going to college would set them up for immediate success. They upheld the belief that earning a college degree meant they'd automatically find a job, which turned out to be completely wrong.
The Great Recession was a defining moment for millennials, only it was more than just a brief moment, it was something that influenced their whole financial future.
According to millennial researcher Jason Dorsey, "The Great Recession led to a very tough job market, wage stagnation for those that had jobs, student-loan debt that was increasingly hard to pay, and rising costs of living around the country," all of which hit millennials especially hard.
Dorsey described the Great Recession as an "extremely formidable and difficult event" that defined older millennials' life trajectory. In many ways, millennials are still playing catch-up. They're still trying to find a sense of stability in an increasingly volatile world.
2. You'll own a home by the time you turn 30
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Millennials' entry into adulthood was marked by the economic downturn and the housing crisis, which put them behind older generations in terms of major life milestones. The number of millennial homeowners is significantly lower than the number of boomer and Gen X homeowners at the same stage of life.
In 2022, 51% of millennials owned homes, compared to 56% of baby boomers in 1990 and 58% of Gen X in 2006. In 2022, the median price of new homes sold was $457,800, coupled with much higher mortgage interest rates.
"Now, a new house is a luxury product. It's not an entry-level starter home product, that doesn't exist anymore. Only high-income households now can afford to buy new homes and existing homes are barely attainable for somebody making the median income," residential real estate expert Domonic Purviance explained.
Even though millennials were raised with the expectation that they'd easily be able to buy a home by the time they turned 30, their reality is very different from what they were taught.
3. You can 'have it all'
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Millennial girls were raised by boomer moms who taught them they could have it all. Their moms broke the glass ceiling and still made it home in time for dinner. Millennial girls internalized the message that they could do everything, as long as they worked hard enough, but this turned out not to be true.
In 2012, Anne-Marie Slaughter, the former director of policy planning at the The U.S. State Department wrote a seminal article declaring that women can't actually have it all, despite being told that they can. In an interview with NPR, she explained why this was true.
"We say 'women can have it all,' and we don't acknowledge differences between men and women," she said. "So we don't talk about differential pressures in terms of having kids, much less different feelings about work and children... Without men present, then a very different conversation goes on."
Women, more so than men, are expected to balance their professional and personal lives in a way that's actually impossible. The truth is, no one can do it all. Being an adult means making choices and prioritizing some parts of life over others.
As much as they were told to "lean in," it's one of the many things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong, with millennial women beginning to accept that something's got to give if they actually want to live a balanced life.
4. Being a mom is the only way to have a meaningful life
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Millennial girls were taught that motherhood would give their lives more meaning than anything else. This mindset was directly connected to the idea that women could have it all, yet rejecting that idea meant there was something wrong with you, as opposed to something wrong with the mindset itself.
Millennial women faced extreme pressure, both external and internal, to be moms, because they were taught to believe that motherhood legitimized their womanhood. Yet as Slaughter explained, when it comes to having kids, "I don't think there's one path. I think every woman faces different choices... if that's what you want to do, then you are going to have to make some tradeoffs — either then or later."
Having kids is a deeply personal decision, and it's not right for every woman, no matter what they were taught growing up.
5. Guys won't like you if you're 'too needy'
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Of all the harmful lessons millennial girls were taught, the idea that being "too needy" would push guys away tops the list. Millennial girls were told to be the cool girl, the girl with no needs, so that they'd be likeable, but in doing so, they compromised an essential part of what makes them human.
As psychologist and relationship coach Dr. Kristin Davis revealed, emotional neediness is a normal part of being human. "We are hardwired to need people," she pointed out. "Emotional neediness isn't inherently a bad thing. We all long to be understood, supported, loved, and accepted, and it's OK to feel this way."
Yet she shared that "being too emotionally needy creates an unhealthy dynamic in even the best relationships," in part because of the imbalance it creates. "Being a healthy person means standing on your own," she continued. "You should have the ability to express your needs."
While those two things might seem opposed to each other, they're actually intrinsically connected. The more confident you are on your own, the more easily you can express your needs, with the understanding that not everyone can meet them. Even so, having needs, in itself, doesn't make people needy. It just makes them people.
6. Tanning beds are totally safe
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Millennial girls were brought up in an era of extremely rigid beauty standards, which were amplified and reflected back to them by the intense celebrity culture of the time. They were taught to believe that tanning beds were a safe alternative to the sun, yet according to the American Academy of Dermatology, tanning beds aren't any safer than being exposed to natural sunlight.
Indoor tanning can increase the risk of developing two common types of skin cancer. Using tanning beds before the age of 20 can increase the chance of developing melanoma by 47%, and that risk increases with each use.
In their quest to look like the "perfect" girl, millennials compromised their future health and well-being for a long list of beauty rules that turned out to be completely wrong.
7. High-fat foods are always bad for you
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Millennial girls came of age at the height of diet culture, which means they were taught that eating fat was always unhealthy, which turned out to be completely wrong. Even the classic food pyramid they learned to base their eating habits off of was wrong. In truth, not all fats are created equal, and some intake of high fat foods is good for your health.
Even though one of the things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong was choosing low-fat or fat-free options, certain full fat foods are actually less processed and lower in sugar and carbs.
In the past, people believed that eating high-fat foods led to imminent heart disease, but now, research has shown that not all fats are unhealthy. Incorporating full fat whole foods into your diet, like eggs, cheese, yogurt, dark chocolate and nuts, provides some serious health benefits.
8. Size 0 is the ideal body type
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Millennial girls weren't only taught that eating high-fat foods made them fat, they were also taught that being fat was a really bad thing. In the early 2000s, there was no such thing as body positivity or body neutrality, there was only the rule that being a size 0 was the ideal body type.
According to nutritionists Dana Monsees and Cristina Hoyt, who host the Millennial Body Image Project podcast, "It really does feel, as millennials, struggling with body image has been built into our DNA."
"We've grown up in the 80s and 90s, with almond moms, through the fads of low-rise jeans, wellness culture, and now, the age of Ozempic and influencers, and it's really hard to feel at home in your body, when we've always been told that it was a problem to be fixed," they concluded.
As hard as it was to grow up in that era, millennial women are redefining what beauty means. They're unlearning and relearning how to relate to their bodies. They reject the idea that having a bigger body means they're not beautiful. Undoing years of devastating social programming isn't easy, but for millennial women, it's the path to self-acceptance.
9. You should be ashamed of your body
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Within the idea that there was a "perfect" body type was the idea that millennial girls should be ashamed of the bodies they had. They faced serious stigma about the fact that they had bodies, at all. They were taught that getting a period was a shameful experience. They were taught that having body hair was disgusting, so they better start shaving as soon as possible.
Millennial girls were taught to contort themselves to fit into unbearably tiny boxes. If they had a body that defied the beauty standards of the era, they were considered defective. They were taught to commodify themselves, because being the object of a man's desire was the most important thing.
Rejecting the rules they were taught as teenagers lets millennial women live as their truest selves, because they have nothing to be ashamed of.
10. You have to push yourself to the limit to succeed
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Millennial girls were taught to prioritize academic success over everything else, which meant they grew into women who made professional success their top priority, even when it was harmful to their health and well-being. Every millennial woman who celebrated being a girl boss and leaned all the way into hustle culture, is now realizing that those sacrifices weren't actually worth it.
According to burnout recovery coach Bethany Sadler-Jasmin, "Millennials are burnt out, disengaged, stressed, and treading water daily, all for the sake of the dollar and someone else's dreams of increased profit."
"The idea that one must constantly work hard, sacrifice personal time, and prioritize the company's financial goals above all else doesn't bring humans true happiness, as we are now discovering," she shared. "This isn't how humans are supposed to live, and we know this because we are all showing the symptoms of our bodies rejecting it."
She pointed out that "It is crucial to recognize and accept that our true fulfillment and happiness as humans come from various things," not just work.
11. Once you get married, everything else falls into place
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Perhaps the most mind-boggling of the things millennial girls were taught growing up that turned out to be completely wrong was to place a premium on marriage. They were taught that becoming a wife would inevitably make them happy and fulfilled, and the rest of their lives would magically fall into place once they did.
As much as they may have wanted to believe that marriage solved everything, that mentality turned out to be false. Millennial women learned that marriage, like everything else, is a balancing act. It is, in fact, the opposite of a fairytale: It takes commitment and communication and serious work. Marriage isn't easy, and it's also not the answer to every single problem.
Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a staff writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.