Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

What's The One Thing You Wish You Had Done ...

67 replies

Rudimental · 16/07/2023 13:42

What's the one thing you wished you had done in your youth/younger days?

Mine is I'd wish I'd have gone travelling although it wasn't really a thing 20 years ago, like it is now.

Also, I'd wish I'd have slept with a women ( I'm female ) always been a tad curious, I'm married now and have a couple of kids so missed the boat there!

OP posts:
Work2live · 16/07/2023 15:30

I wasted a lot of my younger years (from 15-20) in a string of long(ish) term relationships.

I wish I’d stayed single, made more friends and had more fun and nights out! Pretty much my entire uni experience was spent in a very boring relationship with someone who was perfectly nice but completely unsuitable for me.

calimali · 16/07/2023 15:37

Not cancelled my place on Camp America because I was besotted with my new boyfriend.

birdiejane · 16/07/2023 15:44

Twice I wished I'd made different decisions. The most important, and pivotal, would have been when I was very young. It would have set me on a different career path, and life entirely. I would also need some of the knowledge I have now to be imparted, obviously.

Another would be meeting my ex husband. I wish I had not and I'd have recoiled in horror and gone the other way. That reincarnation book (what is it called?) always resonates with me where the woman is able to do just that on seeing her future husband in the street.

PerspiringElizabeth · 16/07/2023 15:47

Appreciated my thin face

Travelled more - although then I wouldn’t have met my DH and have my exact life now, which would be sad. I LOVE my life now. Will hopefully travel in the future but early 20s travelling is setting you up for life, finding yourself, making lifelong friends etc so very different to travelling in your 40s/50s obviously.

PerspiringElizabeth · 16/07/2023 15:48

calimali · 16/07/2023 15:37

Not cancelled my place on Camp America because I was besotted with my new boyfriend.

I did exactly that too 😄

I have travelled alone here and there but not massively. The people I know who did camp America still meet up with their camp mates 20 years later!!

CallMeDiaz · 16/07/2023 15:48

Lived alone.

Gone to Spain for a year when I had the chance.

onefinemess · 16/07/2023 15:48

I wish I had partied more, slept around more and generally been just a bit more care free.

I met a guy in on a weekend trip to Ireland back in 2003, I was in a relationship at the time. He was interested in me, he was gorgeous, way out of my league, like male model type. My friend and I went out drinking in a pub in Killarney and we met this guy and a few of his friends. We got talking and things turned very flirty.

But because I was in a relationship I did the "honorable" thing and ultimately turned him down.

We even spent the next two days in each others company because my friend had hit it off with one of his friends. To put it bluntly, I could have sex with the most gorgeous man I ever saw in my life, and I turned him down because of a dickhead boyfriend who I broke up with a few months later.

MotherOfCatBoy · 16/07/2023 15:50

@birdiejane Life After Life. Great book!

UsingChangeofName · 16/07/2023 15:53

I'm not sure why you think it wasn't a thing 20 years ago. It was big back then, I knew loads of people who had buggered off to Australia and Asia etc in the early 00's

....and long before that.

Lada214 · 16/07/2023 15:54

Study harder, go to Uni.
Ignore idiot ex boyfriend who kept telling me I was so fat ( size 12/14) and started stupid diets when I was 20 and this made me put more on weight.
Choose a better boyfriends, always was the one who run after them and they all cheated on me as I was always pleaser..
be better with money, always spent my wages the very first day and rest of the month lived pasta with ketchup.

eiderdownlily · 16/07/2023 15:54

My friend (is that you!) cancelled coming to Camp America with me as she decided she'd miss 'Stephen' too much. She also split up with the him not long after. He was an awful boyfriend to her.

birdiejane · 16/07/2023 15:55

MotherOfCatBoy · 16/07/2023 15:50

@birdiejane Life After Life. Great book!

Yes, that's it. Thank you

Original poster
Rudimental · 16/07/2023 15:59

onefinemess · 16/07/2023 15:48

I wish I had partied more, slept around more and generally been just a bit more care free.

I met a guy in on a weekend trip to Ireland back in 2003, I was in a relationship at the time. He was interested in me, he was gorgeous, way out of my league, like male model type. My friend and I went out drinking in a pub in Killarney and we met this guy and a few of his friends. We got talking and things turned very flirty.

But because I was in a relationship I did the "honorable" thing and ultimately turned him down.

We even spent the next two days in each others company because my friend had hit it off with one of his friends. To put it bluntly, I could have sex with the most gorgeous man I ever saw in my life, and I turned him down because of a dickhead boyfriend who I broke up with a few months later.

Please tell me you've stalked / looked him up on Facebook? Is he still gorgeous?

OP posts:
LMNT · 16/07/2023 16:00

I wish I’d known it wasn’t me, it’s was my narcissistic mother and her gaslighting. It would have changed everything.

ManchesterLu · 16/07/2023 16:13

I wish I'd been thin. I overate (well, was overfed) as a child and as I got to my teens I knew how to make it better, but didn't. Eventually lost 12st in my early 20s. But I have such deep regret that my whole high school experience was being bullied for being fat, dreading PE, and not going to prom because I didn't want to have to wear a dress.

It might seem ridiculously shallow, but I would have loved to have been thinner.

DrCoconut · 16/07/2023 16:15

Gone abroad for a volunteering project after my first year of uni. My family were dead set against it and basically talked me out of it. They said I'd never raise enough money, I wouldn't like it, nice young ladies don't go gallivanting off instead of spending time with family etc. Everyone else who went loved it. They got tons of support to raise money. Now I'm older I have children with additional needs and my own health issues so its unlikely I'll get to do anything like that in later life.

toochesterdraws · 16/07/2023 16:16

I wish I had put my foot down and insisted that my DM used my dad's life insurance payout to buy her council house outright, instead of putting the money in a building society like the financial adviser told her to.

onefinemess · 16/07/2023 16:56

Rudimental · 16/07/2023 15:59

Please tell me you've stalked / looked him up on Facebook? Is he still gorgeous?

Show quote history

It's even worse than that 😪

My friend didn't just hook up with the guy, they swapped emails (it was 20 years ago) and then had the audacity to get into a long distance relationship with him. Then she fucking married him and moved to Killarney.

They are still together, and he is still friends with the "model". So not only do I not have to stalk him on Facebook, everytime I visit my friend, I get to meet the "model" and his oh so fucking gorgeous wife, and their oh so fucking perfect kids.

That could have been me!

onefinemess · 16/07/2023 17:01

And he's gotten even better looking with age!

He looks like Morten Harket, the singer from AH-HA. But with muscles.

I could fucking cry sometimes!

Original poster
Rudimental · 16/07/2023 17:06

onefinemess · 16/07/2023 17:01

And he's gotten even better looking with age!

He looks like Morten Harket, the singer from AH-HA. But with muscles.

I could fucking cry sometimes!

Oh. My. Word! This is sickening! I want to cry!

Morten Harkett is one of my all time crushes! 😭

I want to see him!!

OP posts:
cassiatwenty · 16/07/2023 17:08

I've never been kissed a really really fit guy (yet) Shallow I know, but reading MN Relationships section isn't really helping 😅

Notveryanything · 16/07/2023 17:11

stbrandonsboat · 16/07/2023 15:25

Joined an overseas aid organisation as a nurse when I was first qualified. My mother was a controlling bully and wouldn't allow it because she needed me to make money so she could take it off me.

☹️

Notveryanything · 16/07/2023 17:19

Like some PPs I really wish I had travelled more. I had my DD very young and went to university and started working during her childhood so there was never the money or opportunity- or at least that's how I saw it.
I could have been braver and maybe we could have had some adventures but I wasn't confident enough.

I don't really have the time or the cash to do it now either.

I'm really glad my DD is managing to see a bit more of the world.

My second one is that I wish I had tackled my T2 diabetes when I was diagnosed. Instead I have been coasting along for years and now...surprise surprise...I am starting to suffer with some nasty complications.
I don't understand why I let things get like this.

GeraltsBathtub · 16/07/2023 17:35

I wish I had tried being with a woman too. I also wish I had tried Ritalin while I was at uni.

Original poster
Rudimental · 16/07/2023 17:42

GeraltsBathtub · 16/07/2023 17:35

I wish I had tried being with a woman too. I also wish I had tried Ritalin while I was at uni.

I don't think I would have wanted to have been in a relationship/settle down with a women but I definitely would have liked to have tried a sexual experience with one.

OP posts: