To ask if you had your time again would you make the same family decisions

I would have found someone else to have children with.

I’d do everything differently but I’m not unhappy now.

Happy with my decisions on marriage (not married, been happy with DP for over 20 years), kids (didn’t have any, massively glad I didn’t) and parental/sibling relationships. Not perfect, but certainly not bad and there’s nothing different I could have/would have done.

I would want exactly the same child but with a totally different and better man but I realise that's impossible!

I'm going to say this too. She has been really over bearing at times and it's really impacted my decisions and how I've felt about things.

I have a very toxic mother and I wish I hadn't wasted so much time trying to get her to like me or to change. When my Grandmother was alive she'd always make excuses for her and make me promise I'd always be there for my mother but I should have just said no and walked away. Other than that I wouldn't change anything.

I often wonder if I could have hung on in there and made a better job of my first marriage. However, that would mean I wouldn't have the lovely second husband and daughter I subsequently had.

The problem with this question is that NOW we know what to avoid, how having kids can turn out, what jobs we were best suited to. But back THEN we didn't, we just did the best we could with the information available. Nobody sets out to fuck up their life, sometimes it just happens. So if we had the same time again, we'd likely just do the same again - unless we already knew what we know now. If I knew what I know now I'd have done a lot differently, but at the time I just made the best decisions I could then with what I knew then.

I would have had more children I had my children in my 30s, I wish I'd had additional children in my 20s too

I’d do everything differently. I wouldn’t have been a sahm. I would have had a career.

I would have spent more time with my parents when they were healthy, and been more accepting of the people they were (not abusive, just old-fashioned and didn’t talk about emotions).

I would have married DH earlier (we got together quite young but didn’t get married until several years later).

I would have tried for a second child - was 38 when I had DD and initially I wasn’t sure if I wanted another. Now I’m older, I wish I had tried for another even if it was unlikely due to my age. Not a huge regret, but I do think ‘what if…?’ sometimes.

Nothing im happy with who i am and how life is.
I have no regrets.
No kids no man no pets no debt.
Anyone that hurt me in the past or even now i let them know in a nice friendly calm way what they did was wrong wish them well and block move on without drama or making a fuss.

This is going to sound mercenary but it really isn’t. I’m not money driven. DH was excluded from school several times (both DS’s diagnosed with ADHD…). Left school with no qualifications and still at 61 is working a minimum wage job. I hate that the burden of earning falls to me. I hate being skint. I hate worrying about money all the time. But I do love him dearly. I just wish life were easier.

If i were to have the same dc I would have had them in my early 30s and closer together, 2 or 3 years not 5. But no real regrets, that's just in an ideal world, with the knowledge I now have. Who knows in the future I may consider it all to have been timed perfectly.

Yes, generally very happy with all the choices I made. I have a lovely Dh and I wouldn’t want to be with anyone but him. I have lovely dc and I had exactly the number of children I wanted and at the age I wanted to have them.

I have no relationships with my parents (dad died when I was a teenager and I have been NC with my mum for several years). In a perfect world, I do wish I had my mum, as the person she was when I was growing up, in my life. But her life took a turn and it’s quite dysfunctional now and I’m glad she isn’t in my life anymore. Yes, I do wish I had my old happy healthy well mum, but there were no choices I could have made differently for that to be the case. If anything, I wish I hadn’t let the years drag on so much and I would have more divisively gone NC with her sooner. But outcome is all the same.

I also have a half brother who I haven’t seen or spoken to in 25 years. But I’m quite happy with that choice and I wouldn’t have chosen to have him around in my adult life anyway.

So yes, pretty happy with all the choices I’ve made and I can’t think of anything I would have wanted do differently.

No. I never would have/should have married my ex husband. I wish I never met him, never mind married him (and put up with his shit for 25 years..)

I would have never married my abusive ex. We got married when we discovered I was pregnant. If I had my time again I would not tell him and flee. I couldn’t wish never to have met him because I couldn’t loose my dd.

I would be more aware of sexism and feminism and cock lodgers. I was raised and told we had won equality and being feminist is terrible, while also taught to accept housework and childcare as woman’s role along side bringing in a wage equal to the man. Made some terrible decisions in my life because I was so nieve (how do you spell that??!). And suffered because I trusted too easily.

No.

I would've put up more boundaries with my DM and not let her have so much influence over my life choices.

I'm not sure if I would have children again, maybe I would if I had them with someone else.

Yes I’d do things differently. I love my DH but would never marry someone with children already if I had my time again. I’d also either have my two children closer together (6 year Gap).

Yes, I would have married my husband again even though he brings me a lot of unhappiness at times, he gave me my kids.

The change would be handling relationships with my parents and in-laws. I worked too hard for too long to consider others people’s feelings before realising much later that no one ever considered mine. So I’d be much more selfish if I was to relive my life again. I think that is the secret to happiness - being true to oneself most of the time.

💯 everything connected to DH and the girls. I think I might have done a bit more skills training when I was younger and braver.

I would have stopped trying to be siblings with my half siblings many years earlier than when I finally pulled the plug. They were never interested. I would never have married my ex husband. He was abusive and really screwed me up.

I would have valued my mum even more than I did and spent lots more time with her.

That’s a hard question!

if I hadn’t got with fuckwit was going to be be a DH XDP I would t have had ds. So I can’t regret that.

But being a LP to a disabled child has meant I haven’t met anyone else and had no more children and I always wanted lots.

However it’s possible that DS disability is genetic from me so again I don’t know if I would have had more anyway and I can’t know if I hadn’t met XDP or hadn’t had ds with him if I’d have met someone else and been blessed with children.

But that’s the thing with “what ifs”. They are an unknown. And I couldn’t know to do things differently because at the time things were right iyswim?

No. I made a very bad choice of husband and though I absolutely adore my kids, if I hadn't chosen him I would still have kids I adore but with a reasonable and kind father for them instead of being a single mum. Or maybe not because I could choose badly again! Or a million other things could go wrong too I guess. But I do regret my choice of husband so so much, the pain he has caused us.

Yes. There's nothing that would make me want to change my children.