Dakota Fanning on life after child-stardom: 'I know who I am'

NEW YORK, April 17 (UPI) -- Actress and student Dakota Fanning has accepted the fact she might always be seen as 9 years old.

"I've made my peace with [that fact]," she says in Nylon magazine's May issue, "I have this joke that I'm literally going to be 35, married, and pregnant and people are still going to say, 'Oh my god, you grew up so fast! I can't believe it!'"

She admits she still gets frustrated when her coming of age still surprises people—almost two decades since her 2002 role in I am Sam. "But I'm OK with it. I know who I am, " she says.

When it comes to life after child-stardom, Fanning, 21, holds herself together well. She tells Nylon, "I might not be running around being insane, but I'm also a 21-year-old who likes to be silly. Just because I don't flaunt those parts of my life doesn't mean I don't do some of that privately."

Although the star partakes in the fruit of college life, she admits not to dabble with social media.

"I feel like if I did it, I'd start to measure my experiences by how good of an Instagram it's going to turn into," she says. "And I don't want to be living my life trying to see it all in a square, trying to get a photo."

The Franny actress studies Women in Film at New York University, and talked to ABC News last year about her pursuits. "It's very hard to find a movie about a strong woman—one that doesn't have anything to do with a guy or the love of a guy or the heartbreak of a guy," she said.

"Is that the only crisis that women deal with: love and loss of love and sadness? There's more to life than that."