Sonia Kruger: ‘I blew up my life in my 40s and started again’

Not all of us achieve life’s milestone moments right on cue, writes Sonia Kruger, who says she’s never been happier since kicking convention to the curb and embracing life at her own pace.

In my early 20s, I would tell myself: by the time I’m 30, I will have my life sorted – career, marriage, house, baby – and specifically in that order. Well, we all know what they say about the best laid plans...

“I blew up my life and started again… and I’ve never been happier” (Picture: Daniel Nadel)

Actually, to tell you the truth, I’m not entirely sure what they say, so let me just google it. OK, not what I expected. “The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”

Good thing I’m neither mouse nor man then, right? Unfortunately, the premise still stands, which is to say that no matter how prepared we think we are, and no matter how much forward planning we do, life has an uncanny way of throwing curve balls at us.

By the time I was 30 what I had actually achieved was debt, divorce and a complete lack of direction. So I embarked on phase two of my adolescence. I went out – a lot!

I racked up more debt and was getting further from reaching the societal milestones that fully functioning members of the community, and even some of my friends, were hitting.

While people around me were starting families and sensibly investing in real estate, I was… searching for a hair brush and a Berocca to make myself feel slightly better about what had allegedly happened the night before.

Then, just a couple of years shy of turning 40, panic set in. There could be no more procrastination. My life assignment was overdue and I was definitely not getting a high distinction. So I hastily remarried, got on the property ladder and put my heart into work.

Unfortunately, my heart was not in my marriage and even though everything looked fine from the outside, inside I was miserable. So in my early 40s, I completely blew up my life and started again.

Sonia Kruger features in this Sunday’s Stellar.

And I’ve never been happier. It was scary to begin again in a decade where most people have consolidated and are comfortable, but it’s also liberating and exhilarating. I went on to have a great relationship, a beautiful daughter and a career where I completely lucked out. So who gives a rat’s about age?

From the day we’re born, we are judged by our milestones – from the first time a baby rolls over, then crawls and eventually walks, to 21st birthdays and golden wedding anniversaries. Some of us achieve those moments right on cue.

Others, like me, may take a bit longer. Let’s just say we’re late bloomers.

So convention be damned. Run your own race. Do life at your own pace. And you know what? Maybe the best is still to come. They don’t call it the prime of life for nothing.

Sonia Kruger hosts Big Brother VIP, 7.30pm Monday-Wednesday on the Seven Network.

Originally published as Sonia Kruger: ‘I blew up my life in my 40s and started again’