Hi, when I was a teenager

1. I went to a "special" school

2. My mom was very controlling

This had an effect of isolation and on top of that made me very shy. So I don't really have a whole lotta memories from back when I was a teenager (no friends or girlfriends to share my life with for instance) and this is why this website (particularly the 2000s section) interests me a lot.

I am trying to remember details, even stuff like the design of a new kitchen appliance back in the 2000s and how it would differ to one designed today. A lot of stuff seems to have stayed the same since the innovations of the 2000s, more evolving than revolutionising like things seemed to back in the 2000s.

I was wondering if anyone was in the same boat.

Oh no.... I don't think so when I just exited my rough teen years four months ago.

I'm going to have to wait and see how my life goes over the next several years for me to think about that, but for now, hell no I wouldn't want to go back to my teen years.

Blessed to be a young adult now.

If I looked back at my preteen/teen years in the future, it wouldn't be pleasant. Even if I'm still a teen, I regret everything from them. The only pleasant memories from my teen years that I know is when I became nostalgic for my childhood. That's about it. When I turn 18, I would hope that being a young adult would be better than being a teen. Even though you don't get out of your teens until you turn 20.

I feel like my teenage years were wasted rather than in any way unpleasant. It is the desire to go back to them that drives a lot of my nostalgia. I wish I had more memories from them which is what spurs me on to look up stuff about the 2000s. It looks like I might be in a fairly unique situation in that respect :-\\

Not really... because my ''teenage years'' were during the early years of this decade, which still kinda feel recent.
As a matter of fact,I don't think I'll EVER try to reconnect with those years! ;D ;D ;D ;)

I feel like my teenage years were wasted rather than in any way unpleasant. It is the desire to go back to them that drives a lot of my nostalgia. I wish I had more memories from them which is what spurs me on to look up stuff about the 2000s. It looks like I might be in a fairly unique situation in that respect :-\\


I feel like I'm in a somewhat similar situation. While I don't worry about reconnecting with the 2000s as a decade, I always wonder how my teenage years would've been like if I heard some 2000s music earlier, got into certain sub-cultures, or dressed differently, or made different friends etc. Hearing of things that I hadn't heard of from the 2005-2008 period gives that piece of media a "what-if" aura to me.

I feel like I'm in a somewhat similar situation. While I don't worry about reconnecting with the 2000s as a decade, I always wonder how my teenage years would've been like if I heard some 2000s music earlier, got into certain sub-cultures, or dressed differently, or made different friends etc. Hearing of things that I hadn't heard of from the 2005-2008 period gives that piece of media a "what-if" aura to me.


This for me. I look back to my teen years for my miss opportunities. I feel they would have made the experience greater compared to missing each one in rows.

I've been feeling increasingly more nostalgia for my teenage years recently. At one point this would've seemed impossible. In 2005, I wouldn't have ever believed that I could conceivably feel nostalgia for the 2000's, and even in the early '10s it still all just seemed too recent.

But, the passage of time changes everything. This fall it'll be 15 years since my freshman year in high school. Times have changed, and much of what was en vogue during my teen years has completely faded from mainstream pop culture. Everything before 2007 feels pretty dated to me these days, so that certainly makes the idea of '00s nostalgia a bit easier to swallow.

Not "reconnect" necessarily but I'm always nostalgic for the time period from 1994-2003. I miss the days of Alien Workshop, Pop Punk and Warped Tour. Skateboarders ruled the world back then with the popular music and fashions and oh man was it great!

I think I can definitely relate to you in some ways... My situation is different, but I'm still left feeling a sense of uneasiness about the fact that the 2000's are over and I only have a few more months left of being a teen.

I was born in 1996, so while growing up in the mid 2000's, my generation was exposed to a lot of media from the late 90's and early 2000's. With these influences, I grew up idealizing the idea of being a teen. However, by the time I started high school, it was already the 2010’s… things just didn’t seem right… social media was dictating how people communicate, mainstream music was becoming increasingly more electronic, and fashion became gaudier and more ridiculous. It seemed like the simplicity of being a kid/teen in the 2000’s was long gone. I acknowledge that teen culture of the 2000’s has many parallels to teen culture of the 2010’s, but a lot has still changed.

I'm not sure what you meant when you said a "special" school, but I personally went to an alternative high school, which ultimately gave me a pretty unconventional high school experience. I had a lot of anxiety and it stopped me from going out and taking advantage of being a teen.

I also found it funny when you mentioned how you notice things like the difference between the design of kitchen appliances then versus now… I thought I was the only one who noticed these kinds of things lol.


I agree. My high school is batsh*t insane with social media. You couldn't go anywhere without people going apesh*t about the newest Vines, or taking a picture on Snapchat to show cool you are. But it's just terrible for my generation, because I don't think it's a good idea to be cool with that much social media. They're just fame wannabes, who are naive as hell. What's worse is that my teachers think every student is tech-savvy as hell, so they believe everyone is crazy over their smartphones. I hate that logic, because I'm not obsessed over my iPhone. I don't obsess over modern social media, nor any of that bullsh*t that keeps teen crazy as hell. If I was, then I wouldn't have an account here on InThe00s.

I've been feeling increasingly more nostalgia for my teenage years recently. At one point this would've seemed impossible. In 2005, I wouldn't have ever believed that I could conceivably feel nostalgia for the 2000's, and even in the early '10s it still all just seemed too recent.

But, the passage of time changes everything. This fall it'll be 15 years since my freshman year in high school. Times have changed, and much of what was en vogue during my teen years has completely faded from mainstream pop culture. Everything before 2007 feels pretty dated to me these days, so that certainly makes the idea of '00s nostalgia a bit easier to swallow.


Totally! In the 2000s it felt like everything was so up to date and cutting edge and in some ways it feels ahead of how things are now. It just felt so modern back then!

In the 2000s I was reminiscing about the 90s a lot, even though I couldn't remember much of them. I never thought I would be nostalgic for the 2000s either.


I agree. My high school is batsh*t insane with social media. You couldn't go anywhere without people going apesh*t about the newest Vines, or taking a picture on Snapchat to show cool you are. But it's just terrible for my generation, because I don't think it's a good idea to be cool with that much social media. They're just fame wannabes, who are naive as hell. What's worse is that my teachers think every student is tech-savvy as hell, so they believe everyone is crazy over their smartphones. I hate that logic, because I'm not obsessed over my iPhone. I don't obsess over modern social media, nor any of that bullsh*t that keeps teen crazy as hell. If I was, then I wouldn't have an account here on InThe00s.


As far as I can tell the social media and selfie craze has been going since I was a teenager. I remember camera phones and even rudimentary video capable phones as early as 2003.

One of the things I find annoying about people of my generation, further generations are experiencing an evolution of that.

Glad to find a couple of people that can relate to my point of view!

More like my preteen years, because I was so smart then until people taught me to pretend to be stupid as a teen.

I'm more nostalgic about my teenage years than any other period in my life. The late 2000s and early 2010s were a really enjoyable period for me as far as what technology and general trends were popular, with there being a solid balance between social progressiveness and openness of thought. The Angry Video Game Nerd and the Nostalgia Critic were both in their golden eras, Wikipedia and YouTube were fresh and exciting, and social media existed as just a possible option of communication rather than the launching pad for all online activity. While music and film were a bit hit or miss, especially prior to 2009 in particular, there was definitely a lot of room to deviate from the mainstream and still flourish, as I did as a hardcore fan of eurobeat and Dance Dance Revolution simulation. I also started to become extremely interested in 80s music around 12th grade, and while most of my peers wouldn't be chatting about music from 20-30 years ago, I could still easily find and purchase songs I liked using iTunes.

I also absolutely adored my high school and so wish I had gotten to know other students sooner and closer, especially my 12th grade crush. Luckily, I'm still able to reconnect with most of my old classmates, and I will be attending my 5-year reunion this year, but the magic I felt while actually attending the school is something that can never be recaptured.

The only downside to my teenage years is that I was hardly able to talk about being queer to anybody except for my close online friend at the time. However, if I could be transported back to August 2007 as a girl, I would embrace it fully.

Yeah I miss being a teen in the early-mid '00s. It's starting to seem like a long time ago in some ways and that scares me.

Yeah I miss being a teen in the early-mid '00s. It's starting to seem like a long time ago in some ways and that scares me.


Yep, it sucks getting old, doesn't it?

Sometimes I get nostalgic for some of the things that happened/were around during my teenage years.  I wouldn't say I miss being a teen, but I miss the way some things were in general back then.

If I could relive it I'd make a big do over of them! Maybe getting involved in more things, less goofing off, finding better things to do than to let getting carried away get the best of me.

I've been trying to do that for years. Impossible though, that was a once in a lifetime thing.

If I could relive, I would tell my 16 year old self to stop being a little brat!  ::)

Its like now I'm trying to create a parallel with them. I didn't care for going about then and seeing people. Now I do.