Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask what was your 'sliding doors' moment?

455 replies

Fairyicecream · 16/11/2020 19:41

For those that haven't seen the film Sliding Doors, it basically showed how different her life turned out if she caught the train/didn't catch the train.

What was one decision, one moment that could have changed your whole life?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. A few years ago my marriage went through a bad patch (understatement to say the least). DH talked about leaving. It was the worst time of my life and I honestly don't know how I got through it.

Anyway, i often wonder, what if I had just told him to go? We would now all be living separately and we and our beautiful DC would have a completely different life.

Instead, we are all now happier than we have ever been. But it could have all been so different with that one decision...

OP posts:
PearlclutchersInc · 16/11/2020 19:46

If I hadn't fallen off the pavement (sober) If I hadnt gone for a walk down that street that day would I have still broken my ankle ....

Might have been happier that year (first year at secondary school) and it might have all been so much easier.

Oodlesofnoodles20 · 16/11/2020 19:54

If I hadn’t have seen the job advert in the paper that matched that days horoscope, I wouldn’t have got the job where I met my husband and father to my children. If Id just skipped past it.... that was my sliding door.

I’m not at all wooo about horoscopes either but the job advert was, say, about a chocolate factory (for example) and my horoscope said “if you are looking for a new path, get your teeth into something sweet”. Here I am 20 years later, my life set by that newspaper.

LittleTruffle · 16/11/2020 20:00

I am very private with my social media. No colleagues, no old school friends who I haven't seen for donkeys years. Only close friends and family.

A few years back, someone sent me a friends request. He was someone I very vaguely knew growing up. I hadn't seen him in around 20 years. I wouldn't even say he was a friend back then. He was a friend's friend. I don't think we had more than maybe one or two brief conversations back then. At most, we would just say "Hello" in passing.

As per my own rules, I should have declined his request... but for some reason, I accepted it. I really don't know why. Totally out of character for me as I am usually extremely picky about who I accept.

Anyway, we got chatting.. a lot.. and he asked me out...
3 years later, we have a DS and we couldn't be happier!

I do sometimes look at my little family and wonder where my life would be right now had I declined his friends request.

Original poster
Fairyicecream · 16/11/2020 20:00

@Oodlesofnoodles20 What a lovely story! I really believe in fate Smile

OP posts:
Original poster
Fairyicecream · 16/11/2020 20:02

@LittleTruffle Oh, how lovely Smile It really does make you wonder, doesn't it.

OP posts:
BetteTwoShoes · 16/11/2020 20:05

If I hadn’t have suggested to my ex that he apply for that job, I wouldn’t have moved with him across the country when he got it

Then, I wouldn’t have met DH...

ImNotMeImSomeoneElse · 16/11/2020 20:06

I went on a £50 course many years ago, probably close to twenty. It was a one-off thing, did nothing more with it.

Two years ago I met the trainer that took the course. They remembered what I'd done on the course, and now, as a direct result, I'm involved in a project that I'm really excited about with the possibility it might lead on to other things.

HeyAllYouCoolCatsAndKittenz · 16/11/2020 20:06

i was about to pull a sickie in the pub i worked in. ended up going to work anyway that was the night i met my dh 12 years on and we have a house and a son. i wonder sometimes what would have happened if i didnt go into work that night

CCC1 · 16/11/2020 20:07

Ooh I have a good one. I had a boyfriend who I met in Australia when I was 16. His family was British and moved back and forth before finally settling in Oz. By the age of 20 I was engaged and starting the application process for a de facto visa to move to Australia. Then the relationship went to pot. I found out I was pregnant, then miscarried and I was pretty heartbroken. A proper mess really.

I went on to meet my lovely husband, moved somewhere lovely, had our child, enjoyable career path etc and have a pretty, really lovely life. I’m friends with my ex on Facebook these days. He has two kids by two different people one of whom was a de facto Brit sponsorship and he seems to have led quite a haphazard life.

I’m not gloating as he’s turned out to be an Ok person, but I am really, really glad that I didn’t end up treading that path - most particularly being a single Brit mum in Oz with no support network.

AnotherEmma · 16/11/2020 20:10

This is a bit outing but here goes...
I studied languages at uni and had planned to split my year abroad between two countries, but changed my mind quite late, and ended up making rather last minute plans - I got an exchange placement completely by chance, in a city I knew nothing about. And that's where I met the man who is now DH and the father of my children. I also loved the city and had a great time there in general, not just because of meeting DH.
There were so many other possibilities for my year abroad and it wasn't even something I'd researched and applied for, it just kind of landed in my lap - and thank goodness it did!

SnugglySnerd · 16/11/2020 20:10

As a trainee teacher applying for jobs I was offered two different interviews on the same day. I had to decide which one to turn down to attend the other one. Luckily I got the job. This changed the whole of my life as I ended up moving to the area and meeting my husband as well as several good friends, particularly those I met locally at baby groups.
I often wonder if I had gone to the other interview and got it if I would have the same life but in a different town. I doubt I would have met my husband if I'd lived there. I wonder if I would have met someone else or still be single. If I did have a different dh would I still have had the same number of dcs? It's quite strange to think about.

Elbels · 16/11/2020 20:11

Won tickets to a competition and very nearly didn't go to very small event that the ticket was for. Decided to drag myself 1.5 hours to it solo on a freezing cold January night.

Met my boyfriend there on that night. He also very very nearly didn't go!

AnotherEmma · 16/11/2020 20:12

Great thread topic btw, some fascinating stories so far!

sherryperry · 16/11/2020 20:13

When I was younger I was contacted by an ex about getting back together on the same day a prospective new boyfriend showed an interest. After lots of thoughts I chose the new boyfriend. We have been together ever since, happily married and three kids. I often wonder what would have happened if I'd made the other choice.

PumpkinCheater · 16/11/2020 20:14

I accepted one university offer and not another.

Basically my entire life would be different. Career, friends, DH, kids, town/country of residence.

At the time I made the decision, I remember knowing that all of this stuff might be hanging on it... and also realising that I had no way of telling what either choice would bring.

KitKat1985 · 16/11/2020 20:16

At college I managed to leave a class 10 mins early one day and was able to catch the slightly earlier train to the train I normally get.

The people who were on the train that I would have normally been on were involved in quite a bad accident and 3 people died, and several others were injured.

I do sometimes wonder if I would have been here if that class hadn't finished early that day.

PatchworkElmer · 16/11/2020 20:16

One of mine is someone else’s really- DH’s friend and my friend were sent on the same course (neither meant to be there originally, they were filling spaces). They met and fell in love. DH and I met at their housewarming BBQ. Which I nearly didn’t go to.

So, if I hadn’t gone to that BBQ... and if both our friends hadn’t gone on a course they shouldn’t have been on... It makes me feel a bit sick to think about it, tbh!

Natsku · 16/11/2020 20:17

If I hadn't gone into that particular pub one day I wouldn't have met my ex, I wouldn't have dropped out of uni and left the UK and I wouldn't have my children.

MsAwesomeDragon · 16/11/2020 20:18

Mines quite similar to snuggly. I was applying for teaching jobs and had applied far and wide. I was offered 2 interviews on the same day (and another 3 in the week following those first 2). I couldn't decide which to go for, so I flipped a coin. I got the job at the interview I went to.

That meant moving about 2 hours away from where I'd been living. I love my school, and met now-dh while I was scouting the new area. I've been here 15 years, we got married, have a 10yo together, and I'm a properly permanent fixture at my lovely school.

I'm sure I would have been happy if I'd gone to the other interview that day, or even if I'd got one of the other jobs I'd applied for. But my life would have looked different to how it looks now. So that flip of a coin decided the course of my life.

switswoo81 · 16/11/2020 20:18

I'm in Ireland where you add up the points in your final exams to decide entry to college , I missed the course I wanted by 5 points ( it's out of 600 so a very small amount) and didn't go that year with some school friends who were all living together there. I was devastated.
Instead I repeated my exams and went the following year met the most amazing bunch of friends we travelled the world together for years, had fab adventure s moved to a different city and lived with them. met dh on a night out with them.
I'm still great friends with my school friends they all ended up moving home buying houses very young so I am very glad the way life took me.

BellatrixLestat · 16/11/2020 20:20

First time I dabbled in online dating. This was years ago so way before tinder and it was still a bit 'taboo' ("you met him on the internet, what if he's an axe murderer?" Type thing). Anyway, I was meeting him after work and was so nervous I was about to text him and cancel when my colleague (and friend) took my phone so I couldn't, so I did meet him.

We've been married for 8.5 years and have 3 DC Smile

IntrinsicFieldSubtractor · 16/11/2020 20:24

Ooh good thread! I have several, but one that had a huge effect on my life was my choice of university. I was stuck between two options - I really wanted to go to Liverpool, but was terrified of moving to a big city that was completely different to the place where I grew up. The other option was Oxford, which was nearer my parents, had much more in common with my hometown and was, well, Oxford. I agonised over the decision for weeks until just hours before the final deadline, when I got home from an afternoon eating Nutella ice cream and chocolate cake with my teenage crush (I swear this is true!), and in the ensuing giddiness of hormones and sugar high decided I was going to stop overthinking and just fucking do it.

I picked Liverpool, met my best friend of ten years and counting, got into a terrible relationship that lasted five, learned to fly a plane, made lots more friends, recovered from a psychiatric condition I'd been told would be lifelong, still live here, have a career I love, and have never once used my degree in my entire life. I'm sure things would have worked out fine if I'd gone to Oxford too, but I would be a completely different person now with a completely different life.

SymphonyofShadows · 16/11/2020 20:28

My first proper boyfriend moved away with his family, and it just fizzled out through distance and being young and skint. A few years later he reappeared and asked me to go and live with him in a house he’d just bought. I was seeing someone bad and exciting at the time, so I politely declined. I’d always wondered what if, especially during the godawful times. He contacted me via Facebook out of the blue some time ago, I accepted because I was curious about what sort of person he grew to be. He was an opinionated, boorish ‘man’s man’, to put it nicely. Now I know that I made the right choice, not because of the bad boy, but because of everything that came much later.

AnotherEmma · 16/11/2020 20:28

@PumpkinCheater

I accepted one university offer and not another.

Basically my entire life would be different. Career, friends, DH, kids, town/country of residence.

At the time I made the decision, I remember knowing that all of this stuff might be hanging on it... and also realising that I had no way of telling what either choice would bring.

Good point, same for me.
TheDowagerDuchess · 16/11/2020 20:29

Ah I really had that film!

But mine is a mixed bag one. If I hadn’t accepted to go out for a friend’s birthday I wouldn’t have met exh and might have got the job I had an interview for the next day (stupid, I know!). It would have set me on a totally different path. But I wouldn’t have my lovely dc if I hadn’t met exh, and have to be grateful for that.