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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to ask your regrets

118 replies

cjt110 · 27/10/2016 16:54

I turn 30 in December and I'm not sure why but it has made me start thinking about my life and what it has turned out like.

We moved around a lot when I was a kid - not just locally but from one end of the country to another, to a completely different town. I studied at a uni in the next city.

My regret is I have no really close friends. The ones you've known all your life. I guess this is partly because we moved around and also, because as my Mum says, you have life stage friends.

I also regret being the follower in most friendships, rather than the equal/leader. I always feel on the outside.

OP posts:
Neaders · 28/10/2016 00:24

newday what happened IS NOT your fault! If someone wants to leave this earth, they will. Last year, no less than 3 of my younger cousins committed suicide. All in their 20's... eldest 28, youngest 22. A devastating time all round... so many what if's. Nothing you could have said or done would have made a difference. She had cancer of the mind... a heart attack in her brain.. use whatever analogy you want. Some people die of cancer, you wouldn't blame yourself for that... she died of the mental health version! God rest her she is happy now x

PutDownThatLaptop · 28/10/2016 00:27

I regret that I didn't hug or kiss my sweet Dad until he was dying.

meatloaf · 28/10/2016 00:28

I regret not pushing my career more when younger.

I have a great job which is super flexible, but it is a a job and not a career.

But very grateful I have a job and stuck with it .... Xp left me 5 years ago and glad I had a fab careerless but well paid flex job.

mowglik · 28/10/2016 00:35

I regret not spending more of the last month of my best friends life with her. She had terminal cancer and I knew she was getting worse but never believed that she would actually die.

I was too busy with my new relationship with DH to realise that she didn't have long left

Ohdearducks · 28/10/2016 00:36

I regret not finishing university, I started as a mature student, struggled with DC1 fell pregnant, developed HG so had to quit, tried again and discovered I had SPLds, developed severe depression and quit again. Now I have about £30000 of student debt and no degree. Collosall fuck up. Fuck!Sad

NewDay10 · 28/10/2016 08:44

Thanks for the kind words. It's just so hard for us all. the children are doing well they have a strong father. It's just so sad to see someone who was once so happy, someone I loved so much to do this to themselves. Also just so awful to think she planned to kill herself in the way she did by hanging and in her own home.

IHopeYouStepOnALegoPiece · 28/10/2016 08:55

Letting myself get so overweight, I'm now morbidly obese, verging on super morbidly. It will kill me the way I'm going and yet I don't know what to do anymore.

Original poster
cjt110 · 28/10/2016 09:55

These are all very sad, and reading makes you appreciate what you DO have rather than didnt do or dont have.

OP posts:
flirtygirl · 28/10/2016 12:00

I regret marrying dh, i feel very stuck.

I also regret not travelling more with and without kids but i will try more now and not moving to brighton and buying a house in my 20s, i chickened out, bought a house in my hometown but would have made 200k more and been able to move back mortgage free in my 30s.

I regret moving abroad and hating it but i came back, just felt foolish when less than a year later id see people and explain id moved back.

I regret not completing the masters i started at 23 but i was lazy, okay i wasnt i was a working single mum who felt burnt out. Really didnt appreciate how id feel at 38 (now) knowing im probably no longer capable. Im doubly burnt out now.

yorkshapudding · 28/10/2016 12:22

Becoming a Nurse.

I wanted to help people and thought I could make a difference. I knew it would be stressful, poorly paid and antisocial hours but I didn't realise the toll it would take on every other aspect of my life.

Unachievable targets, unsafe working conditions, blame culture, ever dwindling staff and resources and constant pressure from management to do more with less...and it's gotten worse and worse as the years have gone by. I started to realise that the system I was working in was so broken that I couldn't possibly give my patients the care they deserved and I hated myself for failing them.

I eventually accepted that my mental health had deteriorated to the point that I needed to leave the profession altogether and I found that, despite being a Specialist Nurse with an MSc, my job prospects outside of nursing were really quite poor. So I now have a job that I like but I have to work more hours than I did as a nurse for less money. I no longer think about driving my car into a wall or wake up at 2am hyperventilating but we are worse off financially and I have less time with my DC, which makes me feel guilty.

If I'd never gone into nursing in the first place I could have worked my way up the ladder in another career, been financially much better off than I am now and saved myself a huge amount of stress.

flirtygirl · 28/10/2016 12:29

Flowers for you all.

Thingmcthingyface · 28/10/2016 13:09

Flowers from me also.

CatsTats · 28/10/2016 13:27

Settling down so young
Moving into my current house
Bleaching my hair when I was 16 it ruined it and I didn't suit blonde.

SinisterBumFacedCat · 28/10/2016 13:37

I regret not having my teeth flouride treated as a kid, although it was never offered.

I regret living with mum for so long and staying with commitment phobic ex for 8 years who kept saying we'd move in together "maybe next year". This arrangement worked so well for both of them looking back, I should have left them both years ago.

I really regret not going back to Brett's room to "look at his CDs" that night in a Sydney hostel years ago Blush

Ketsby · 28/10/2016 13:39

Giving up my career to become a SAHM and wasting my 20s and early thirties sitting indoors or walking round parks wishing I was back at work.

malloo · 28/10/2016 13:49

I wish I'd gone and lived abroad when I was younger and properly learned how to speak another language. Can't see it happening now with DC, work etc.

mirime · 29/10/2016 16:53

I wish I'd gone to university. In fact I wish I'd been more of a 'normal' young person rather than being stuck at home with ME.

Also wish I'd travelled more. I'm terrified of flying and we can't afford it anyway, but do many places I'd like to see.

Sort of wish I'd had my ds a bit younger, but then it wouldn't have been my ds and I wouldn't change him for the world - although I might have said differently this morning when he kept jabbing me with his elbow.

More serious things, I really upset a friend once at a difficult time in her life, another friend died a couple of years ago and I wish I'd visited her more and lastly someone at work killed himself, I replayed the last conversation I'd had with him so many times. I don't think anything I could have said would have changed anything, but you can't help thinking what if....

frankie001 · 29/10/2016 17:03

I regret not wearing my retainer properly so even after treatment my teeth are crooked.

Getting fat, I'm loosing weight now but am worried about getting loose skin. Will be my own fault.

I haven't had a date in years I sex. I'm worried I will never have children.

I regret my mental health issues hold me back so much.

19Hannah · 29/10/2016 17:05

Not using condoms. Joking, although I wish I would have had a career first.

Jellybean83 · 29/10/2016 17:10

Not having another child. It's too late now as I'm unlikely to ever fall pregnant again ( have had a few abdominal surgeries due to a health condition and I've been told it's unlikely) my DS is 7 now anyway so the age gap would be too big, it literally breaks my heart when he asks for a brother and tells me he's lonely without a sibling.

Mombino · 29/10/2016 18:08

I regret promising my DD's father that I wouldn't tell her (or anyone) who he is. It was an accidental pregnancy and he didn't want to be involved, or be contacted in the future by adult DD, so I haven't told anyone his name; but I think she has a right to know the other half of her genetic identity so I regret making that promise. She's only 6 months at the moment (and SO SO PERFECT! I will never regret having her) but I'll probably end up asking advice on here when she's older for what to do.

PhoenixMama · 29/10/2016 19:26

I never used to have any - lived boldly and owned my decisions. The last two years are so full of regret. I wish I had NEVER gone out with the asshat that was my ex-bf. Every fibre of my being told me to be careful but I listened to everyone who told me I needed someone -boring- normal and steady. He ended up being EA, made us homeless, reported me (falsely) for benefit fraud and now, due to the legal fees to stop him, having to borrow to pay him to go away I'm about to have to declare bankruptcy.

I wish I had never gone for that "Christmas party snog" which turned into a violent sexual assault last year.

I regret my life has crumbled to such a state that a once vibrant, outgoing, creative person is barely treading water.

mollyblack · 29/10/2016 19:29

Wish I'd gone to uni
Wish I'd lived abroad
Wish I'd had a proper career
Wish I'd done something about building my confidence at a younger age
Wish I'd bought a flat as soon as I was working at 18
Wish I had never got a credit card

ImTakingTheEssence · 29/10/2016 19:38

I regret not making more of an effort with people but I always felt isolated and that I didn't belong. I still push people away now and turn down invites I think there's something wrong with me.

I regret the partners I've had and not going out with the right ones when theve asked. I always seem to go for the wrong men.

I regret not going to uni or taking so long to find out what I want from my life at 28. I've finally found the job I love.

I regret moving in with my brother at 16 and the bad years to come after.

Kingsizecrochetblanket · 29/10/2016 19:55

I regret not saying "I love you" before I hung up the phone to rush to the hospital to meet my boyfriend there.
He died in the lounge, he never made it to the hospital. I ALWAYS ended my phone calls to him with "I love you" he knew I loved him with every fibre of my being, but I wish they had been my last words to him.
Fuck I miss him so much. He's been gone nearly 10 years and I would give absolutely anything to hold him one more time.

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