To ask what your biggest regret in life is?

[SylviaPlath1984]

Or even what you feel you might regret in the future if you don't do it soon?

I regret not taking school more seriously or trying harder, not making more of myself.

What about you?

I regret going home to bed the night my mum died when I could have so easily stayed with her and I think of that decision everyday and I wish I wish I could just go back in time and change that.

@popsy321 they are all completely different jobs! I am a nurse and have had a fantastic and varied career, as well as traveling and working abroad. I have no desire to be a surgeon (or any kind of Dr), it's a completely different profession and I'd hate it. Teach our daughters to follow their own hearts/find their own niche, not do something they don't like because it's more money.

I regret my subservience. My parents always told me that, "no means no" and I can't get past that. I never ever question a decision or ask why. I just accept.

For example. Not fighting to have more children. I was in my 30's and going through early menopause and I didn't think to ask the consultant what my options were. I thought that was it

Leaving the best job in the world when redundancy was offered. I really didn't have to go, I could have tried to keep my job. The company I worked for wanted 3 out of our office of 6 to go and I think in hindsight I was probably the very last person they wanted to go.

Not working for my A levels
Beleving that the only important thing was having a boyfriend/fiance, and that I was worthless without one
Not using my brains to the full and settling for a less lucrative career than I was capable of
And, the big one, not seeking help sooner. I knew it was cancer, but I hoped it would go away. Stupid.

Being scared to do things. Anxious about making friends, being independent and doing things for myself rather than following others. Taking risks and enjoying life to the full. Worrying what people think about me. I still haven't overcome my fears yet I think I come across as someone whose just a bit quiet.

Not having counselling when my husband suggested it. It took another 6 years

Getting married twice, both huge mistakes,

Getting married
Not having enough confidence to ltb sooner

@Cowbells

Not writing a book. I've thought for decades that I'd like to write one. Don't care if no one likes or reads it, or if it gets published. Just to complete one would be an achievement.

And not losing weight. I have lost some but not enough. I know life is easier and people are nicer to you when you are slim. I was slim for most of my adult life and had no idea how much meaner and more dismissive people are when you are fat until I gained weight.

Both of these things are very much doable!

Not doing more with my education. Losing my virginity to someone who didn’t deserve it. Cheating on DH before we married (this is my biggest regret). Having a child late in life, was going to try earlier but bottled out ended up having DS at 42 which threw me straight into menopause and unable to have anymore. He is my world and I would of loved to have given him a brother or sister. This was brought into focus during lockdown when he didn’t see another child from March to September when he went back to school.

@Nhsisfucked
Your dad won’t have been disappointed in you - one incident could not possibly take away all of the love and pride I am certain he had in you. As a mother of teens, I can tell you that whatever they do you always love them and you know they’ll make mistakes as part of their journey to growing up - that’s part of being a parent and doesn’t mean you ever love them any less. I hope you find peace with this.

@TedMullins

Everyone I’ve dated. They’ve all been completely wrong and unhealthy relationships because I had an undiagnosed personality disorder and didn’t know how to form healthy attachments. I’d erase my entire dating history if I could, or at least have dumped the lot of them much sooner than I did.

Hear Hear! me too.

Should have saved from start of working life! Couple of others but that's the one I'm kicking myself for at the moment.

To have not told my df that my uncle
had started to sexually abuse me right at rhe start ( due to shock and fear ) . The damage , some of it , could have been spared a little

Was too young and scared.

I always regret not having the guts to stand up to my dad and say, "Don't talk to mum like that" when he has belittled and bullied her over the many decades they've been together. He still does it now. I live abroad and have a weekly Skype call with them both. Mum and I seem to have developed a lifetime's habit of just looking the other way/changing the subject, and the consequences of actually calling him out on his behaviour are oddly terrifying even now. Plus there seems no point inflaming the situation when he is never going to change, and I worry about making things worse for her living with him. But every time I see him treat her like that, I shrivel up inside and feel like an utter coward.

Not having a second child.

Not working harder at my first marriage. My exh was an arsehole and I love my second husband to bits but the pain of only seeing my ds half the time never lessens

Having kids. Not making a career that's high paying.

Not taking a year out to go travelling.

Not shagging more blokes when I was younger (I was a bit of a religious prude)

This thread is heartbreaking.

@Saggingninja

This thread is heartbreaking.

It is. I hadn't expected that.

I think I am quite fond of my regrets. And all the mistakes and bad experiences.

All part of life's rich tapestry, as they say.

Hope expressing regrets is helping people maybe come to terms with it.

I suppose giving up work when I had my first child I loved being at home with my children but there were times I would have left my husband if I had the income to get up and go.

Finishing with DH when I was 18. Admittedly we got back together 14 years later but by then we’d both had crappy marriages, he’d had a vasectomy and my medication for epilepsy means we can’t have a baby together. We have 3 between us from our relationships but We have cried together over not having a child of our own.

My greatest regret is also my greatest joy. Having children. I was bullied into it, never had a single maternal instinct. TOLD their father way ahead of time that I did not want children. It isn't as if he didn't know. I regret having them because I think I could have been a much, much better mom than I was. I struggled with a lot of things. I think they would have done better with a more "Mom" mom. But they are delightful, intelligent, successful adults whom I love to the bottom of my very being.

Not going to uni when young
Marrying either of my Hs
Giving up my job(s) now stuck supporting his career living somewhere deathly dull with no escape in sight