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
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

What is your biggest regret in life?

856 replies

Teadrinker11 · 12/02/2022 21:19

At 26, I know I'm still at an age where I'm somewhat young enough to make good decisions to prevent more regret in the future, but I still do regret a lot. I've wasted so much money on things I didn't need, I neglected my health for so long, it's taken me to 26 to somewhat have my life together. I'm studying law and love it, but hate how I spent so much time after school messing around wasting my life. I didn't go to college straight after school like so many of my classmates did and I still pine over the years I lost, when people in their early 20s are having the time of their lives. What is your biggest regret?

OP posts:
Thewindwhispers · 12/02/2022 22:36

Sex with idiots

Flutterby8 · 12/02/2022 22:36

Not being there when my father passed away. Care staff were utterly useless and failed to tell us that he wasnt just a bit unwell but that paramedicas were trying to resuscitate him.
Luckily I did see him the day before and he was happy.

Not having my first baby earlier as she will never know her grandad.

Puppyseahorse · 12/02/2022 22:38

Not enjoying my 20s more. Feeling insecure, panicking about being ‘on track’, worrying what other people thought… I should have just relaxed.

I’d say 26 is pretty young to have things figured out, OP. Sounds like you’re doing well.

BeanAnTae · 12/02/2022 22:38

Blossontoes - I'm so sorry you lost your beautiful son. If you were whisked away to ITU then you were probably very ill. Hugs (I know it's unMumsnetty but your post moved me)

Bumpy23 · 12/02/2022 22:39

None.
It happened the way happened, it couldn't of happened any other way because it didn't.
Some things are hard, but it makes us who we are.

WTF475878237NC · 12/02/2022 22:39

To the lady who didn't get to say goodbye to her mum after the phone call I'm so sorry.

Blossomtoes so sorry for your loss. I wish the team had been able to give you a chance to see him.

I wish I'd have stopped my first husband getting on the plane. I waved him off happily without a clue my whole world was about to change. If we hadn't sold our house he wouldn't have been going anyway. It is a deep regret. There is nothing trivial I regret like purchases or too much chocolate!

tillylula · 12/02/2022 22:40

Not making an effort to make freinds, so before I met DH, I filled the gap with alcohol and sex with anyone. I was an idiot, and lonely.

Being with someone who prioritises games over me and the children.

NeverDropYourMooncup · 12/02/2022 22:41

Not telling somebody at school what was going on.

Had that happened, none of the other shit decisions would have been made.

LouLouLou37 · 12/02/2022 22:41

Sleeping around

CoastalWave · 12/02/2022 22:42

My pension.

Due to a whole host of job moves in the my 20's and then having a baby late 30's - I'm now late 40's, self employed, with nothing except the state (and 4 other pensions that despite paying shit loads into are worth pennies - literally. One will pay out £5 a month. Brilliant)

If I were 26 again, i would set up my own private pension in the first place and just whack in £250 a month.

It's actually criminal how much I've put into pensions for them to be worth fuck all.

darumafan · 12/02/2022 22:43

I wish that I had forced my son to move back home after his diagnosis instead of believing that he would be better in his flat.
He took his own life less than 6 months later.

Orangelover · 12/02/2022 22:44

Choosing nursing as a career Confused

Cherryblossoms85 · 12/02/2022 22:45

Not writing back to my father's wonderful last email before he died. Too wrapped up in my pointless work.

Original poster
Teadrinker11 · 12/02/2022 22:45

@darumafan

I wish that I had forced my son to move back home after his diagnosis instead of believing that he would be better in his flat. He took his own life less than 6 months later.
I am so so sorry. My heart broke reading your post.
OP posts:
AngelinaFibres · 12/02/2022 22:46

Well there is a quote that's quite useful here
"Only a fool is tripped up by something behind them".
However we all have things we wish we had done differently
I am content with how things have turned out. I have a very nice life but if I had my time again I would.......

Leave my teacher training course at the end of the first term. I hated it from day 1 but it was an acceptable career in my parents eyes so I carried on, qualified and did it for 20 feckin awful years.

I should have done something practical. If I had a second go I would go to the Royal School of needlework at Hampton Court get a BA in embroidery and go and work for a couture house.

I wish I had had lots of fun and sex with my first husband without marrying him. I wish that, once I wanted a mortgage and babies I had left him and found my second husband.
I wish I had let go of the anger I felt towards my ex husband years earlier. He just wasn't worth it.I realised in the end that I didn't want him, I just didn't want anyone else to have him.
I wish I had worked better in revising for exams. With maturity its easy to see how to compartmentalise things. At 16 I had no idea.

pastabest · 12/02/2022 22:46

@Goinghome20

I wish I had paid more attention generally when I was younger. Just so wrapped up in my feelings and sped through years like a tornado.

I think I suit middle age!

I think most people feel like that (I certainly do)

youth is wasted on the young, as they say.

Iamanicepersonreally · 12/02/2022 22:47

Not telling him that I love him. It's too late now

icannotbebothered · 12/02/2022 22:47

@ShavingTheBadger

Taking the wrong GCSE options at school and ending up as a PA, a job that comes with it’s own glass ceiling and absolutely no option to climb the ladder apart from moving across to be a PA for someone else.

Wasting a decade going out with an absolute arsehole and losing the chance to have kids with someone.

I'm a 27 year old PA and I'm now trying to get out! I hate it!
Pangolin44 · 12/02/2022 22:49

NRTFT but smoking. I've smoked for over 30 years and it's my greatest regret. It's the hardest thing to give up and it's utterly pointless.

So, OP, I'm sure you won't, buy don't ever get addicted to nicotine.

KatherineJaneway · 12/02/2022 22:49

Not believing in myself, allowing others to tell me who I was. I wish I knew then what I know now.

Fetchthevet · 12/02/2022 22:50

Being an idiot for most of my life. Saying and doing stupid things. Never seeming to get anything right. Feeling worthless and stupid for about 40 years. Making lots of bad choices because I was too afraid/ stupid to ask the right questions. Making a very big mistake 8 years ago, which I feel guilt for every day. If I'd had known the extent of the guilt and how much it would ruin my life I would never have done it.

BeanAnTae · 12/02/2022 22:52

I think we should all remember that we are only human...

pinkpapaya · 12/02/2022 22:53

Allowing myself to become overweight and spending too many years loathing myself for not losing it. I gained as I was in an emotionally and financially abusive relationship that left my self esteem in tatters. I did walk away but the damage had been done. Still trying to overcome the disordered eating now.

Also not being strong enough to walk away earlier.

MsAnnFrope · 12/02/2022 22:55

I don’t have regrets about choices I made to do/not do things but god I regret the hard time I gave myself over everything!
Yes I had an abortion, dropped out of Uni, chose relationships unwisely but honestly learning from the poor choices of my 20s has vastly improved who I became in subsequent years.
So don’t beat yourself up. Try and learn from things you regret then move on and let them go.

ClaudiusTheGod · 12/02/2022 22:58

Until recently, caring too much what others thought of me (you would never know this if you met me now). Making decisions about careers and degrees on the basis of what I thought other people would think. It’s meant that I have wasted my brain and my capacity for hard work.

Swipe left for the next trending thread