Minä olen noudattanut tätä rutiinia lapsuudesta pitäen.
I have followed this routine since childhood.
Breakdown of Minä olen noudattanut tätä rutiinia lapsuudesta pitäen.
tämä
this
olla
to be
minä
I
lapsuus
childhood
Questions & Answers about Minä olen noudattanut tätä rutiinia lapsuudesta pitäen.
How does the word pitäen work in this sentence?
Pitäen is a postposition meaning "since" or "from [a point in time] onward". It requires the word it governs to be in the elative case, which usually expresses "out of" or "from". Here, the base word lapsuus takes the elative ending to become lapsuudesta, giving us lapsuudesta pitäen (since childhood).
Could I use lähtien instead of pitäen here?
Yes, lapsuudesta lähtien means the exact same thing and is fully interchangeable here. Both require the preceding word to be in the elative case. Lähtien is generally more common in everyday speech, while pitäen often appears in established expressions or slightly more formal contexts.
Why is the object tätä rutiinia in the partitive case?
The verb noudattaa (to follow, observe, or adhere to) is a partitive verb. It always forces its object into the partitive case, regardless of whether the action is ongoing or spans a specific timeframe.
What is the base form of lapsuudesta and why does its stem change so much?
The dictionary form is lapsuus (childhood). In Finnish, abstract nouns ending in -uus or -yys change their stem to end in -uud- or -yyd- when you add a case ending. Therefore, lapsuus changes to the stem lapsuude- before taking the elative ending -sta.