i had this misconception as a kid that when you get older, there's some unseen force of nature that forces you to stop being interested in what you care about (as a kid).

i guess it makes sense? like i knew people tend to "grow out" of interests, but i couldn't fathom NOT being interested in certain things, so the only thing that made sense to me was that it was involuntary.. a force of nature.
fiction didn't help. like jessie toy story 2's backstory comes to mind lol. like "wdym she just falls behind a dresser and now you only care about nail polish and boys or whatever???" OBVIOUSLY it was the puberty hormones reconstructing the way her brain processes serotonin.

if i could go back in time to tell my kid self anything, kid me would be relieved to know that it doesn't work like that - that i'm allowed to retain interests and beliefs into adulthood - that the things/interests that fall to the wayside happen out of a voluntary choice.

in a way tho i feel like some part of me still believes this was meant to happen to me, and it didn't. like i was meant to go under the "puberty hormones reconstructing the way your brain processes serotonin" beam and it just missed me through some accident. lol.