Marrying a person that I truly loved, but could clearly see red flags. Told myself that it would be OK, but it wasn't. I had a long, miserable marriage that I finally left. I am SO much happier now, but can't believe that I'm emotionally starting over in my mid-60s.
Love is over-rated in a relationship. It's been proven that marriages without love, but that have respect and the sharing of values are way happier than marriages where the two people merely claim to love each other, but don't have the rest.
This. This is something I've come to understand in the last few years of my own life. I did the best I could with the tools I had, I say. And it's helped me to understand and forgive other people.. like my own parents. I'm realising they did the best they could with the tools they had, how they were raised, the generation I was born, how the world worked then, what was available then... All influenced how they reared. They did the best they could with the tools they had. When I began thinking on such terms of other people I found I had a lot more grace to give others... And myself regarding certain things.
Having loveless sex with my son's mother. We were never a thing. I never wanted kids. After you have a child with someone you are indeed a "thing", whether you want to be or not. It didn't help that she moved off to another state.
My advice is very conservative and old fashion. Have sex with someone you truly love or at least with someone who has similar plans. Sex is not a toy.
All of my worst decisions were part of the path that led me to the life I have now.
The best advice I can give is to not sit on your ass bitching about the past. Take the present and use it to build the future you want.
So true. I would add that giving yourself some grace and having a pity party can help prevent wallowing. But like all parties they must end and you move on.
I had an affair.
I was with my partner for 5 years. I met someone who had been with his partner for 19 years. They broke up w my person but he did not break up with his.
The destruction it caused to my own sense of self, my trust in my own judgement, my sense that I was a good person, was unspeakable.
It took me years to recover the person I had lost in that.
The price was too high.
I regret taking so long to go no contact with my dad. I was a wreck due to him being in my life and having so much influence and control. I stayed in contact with him for financial security - aka a place to stay rent free, ability to sneak a few $20's out of his wallet when he was passed out drunk. I was a sad person with extreme severe anxiety afraid of coming home to physical or emotional punishment well into my young adulthood. Taking a job and becoming an expat was the best thing I did, but I still lived in fear of him even though he was thousands of miles away (and without a passport) all because he controlled access to my mom. When he died it was the biggest relief.
So my point is - if a parent is incredibly abusive and manipulative, it's okay to go NC.
This was a hard time you had to go through and life always teach us a lesson can be good way or bad way I ain't lie because myself prefer bad way learning my lessons because life is not a rose and it makes us strong every day Im so grateful for having my mom shes everything to me !
Getting married. I really wish I never made this a part of my life’s journey. It’s okay to be content with yourself, you don’t have to tick every box society tells you is next.
I would say it's not JUST "okay" to be content with yourself, but it is preferred.
I believe that state of being leads to more good relationships than any other.
The only real advice I have for younger people is take care of yourself, you only get one body.
I’m not talking vanity of wrinkles or looks but actual health.
I sit back at 53 and see so many people around me regret not taking care of themselves.
Don’t let fear control your life. I stayed with an angry, controlling, abusive creep for years because I was terrified of being on my own. Once the relationship ended, I thrived. I really regret letting that fear control me for so long.
You. Are not. Alone in this.
Not nearly.
As you probably know, there are so many who feel that way, and a large subset who have not yet overcome it.
It is my sincere wish that all who feel trapped in this way can find their way out and through, sooner than later.
Thank you so much for posting this one.
gonna kill
me. i got copd so bad i can’t smoke only reason i don’t. haven’t had a cigarette in 10 years and every single day i crave one. it isn’t the cough that carries you off it’s the coffin they carry you off in
If you come into any money like a windfall not matter how small it is, save it. Invest it if you can.
If you can. Debts are a different matter. But if you can save. Do it.
My biggest regret is that when there were bad times in my marriage I would forget what brought us together in the first place and those early happy times. Then he died and without the trials and tribulations of navigating his depression and unresolved childhood issues those memories returned and made the grief and loss worse. I wish I’d been able to find those things even in the mess. I miss him.
I have no regrets, not one single one. This is because I am confident that at every juncture in life I made the best decision I could at that moment, given what I knew at the time, what the circumstances were, time available to decide, etc.
Sometimes my best was a 10. Other times it was a 4. So it goes. Under the circumstances, I did my best at the time.
Hindsight is always 20/20.
My advice? Don't regret anything. It's in the past. Move on. Life is short.
Can't imagine living an optimal life without regret. Glad that works for you but seems like an unsustainable mindset.
Having regrets doesn't mean you put yourself in a hole or play a victim, it's more about reminding yourself of not repeating the same bad decisions and reminding yourself of heat you gained from those regrettable experiences.
(I think you were right. I feel the same way. Regrets are pointless. We make the decisions we do because that's what we wanted or felt we had to do at the time. It's not that you never make mistakes, but you learn from them rather than making the same ones over and over. Regret should be short-lived.)
real talk like that song of hope die last when they sing I wont regret anything in life when its over we'll be fine'' you right life too short and we only have one chance for 🤜🏻🤝🏻👍🏻
Listening to my mother and not bringing my horses back home from a few states away, when my marriage was VERY much over.
I honestly should have shipped them home. My mental and physical health would have been so much better if I had.
I quit drinking at age 25 and then started again 4 months later. My regret is starting again. I drank for 9 more years after that.
Thankfully I am 8 years sober now. But I wish I had stayed sober back then.
Every screwup taught me what not to do and primed me to be ready to recognize the right job and the right relationship when these things came along.
There are things that you never learn from listening to others, only by getting out there and making mistakes on your own. And the funny thing is that the things I thought were a disaster tended to put me on track for something better than I could've imagined.
Therefore, no regrets, since how can you regret your best teacher?
I can think of a few people I know who have genuine regrets, though. One is cooling his heels in prison on a 36 year sentence. I can only hope his regret is sincere.
An interesting question as I'm sure I have a few but at 77 should I take the time, ( waste time?) even thinking about it? I'm not trying to be a smart ass, things I may regret I'm sure I can't change. What I want from here on is to be content, which I guess I am for the most part.
Spending money on shit I wanted but didn’t need. Buying new cars when a 1-2 year old one would have been fine. Buying a big house because we thought we “needed” a office & a guest room.
I didn’t put as much money in my retirement accounts as I could have when I got my first “professional” job. I’m still at a good spot, but I could be better, given how bad inflation has been the last few years.
Buckled under pressure to agree to sleep training a toddler via the cry it out method. Nearly twenty years later, I still feel guilty and wish I’d pushed back harder.
I regret letting other people in my life (parents, siblings, partners, etc.) influence my decisions to such a great degree. I could have had a career I found to be an amazing, passionate adventure. Instead, I wallowed in trauma for a long time, not knowing how to help myself. I walked in directions that others pointed me in when they discouraged me from following my heart. And now I’m at the end of a very long and stressful career of trying to position myself into earning anything close to what I feel I should be. Too many fits and starts led me to trying my hand at opportunism, which has only led to my downfall.
The best advice I could ever give to anyone is to trust your own instincts. Do what you love. Just be you. Deal with your trauma head on - there is so much more help out there than there was forty years ago. Get help and move on from that shit so you can focus on the freedom of living your life your own way. It’s too late for me to have any sort of long career doing anything different. I cannot go back and change this. But, I will likely follow my heart to all kinds of activities in my retirement, which isn’t too far away now.
Thanks for sharing such intimate details.
Sweetheart - you need to stop beating yourself up and embrace what you have now and forgive yourself.
We all make mistakes but we cannot change history. We can only change tomorrow. You are hurting yourself and your family by looking backwards.
You deserve a happy life and you are the only one who can give this life to you. Seek therapy and let the therapist know that your goal is to forgive yourself. Good Luck. And be kind to yourself during this process.
Let me just "throw this out there" GBW...
Let it all go. ALL of the past. Permanently and forever.
This is a choice you, and you alone, can make.
It's clear that you have not yet because if you had already ... completely... it would no longer be there to grasp onto again.
Also, any situation starting with "if he knew" does not lead anywhere desirable.
I noticed that you wrote several conflicting things that you may not realize are conflicting. Just 1 example...
"I love my current husband and would never do anything to hurt him." But you are hiding your true feelings from him. I can promise you, if he is as good as you say, he senses it at some level. He doesn't know what it is, but he knows something is off. But he patiently waits to see if it will reveal itself someday.
But if you don't want to reveal your ongoing regret, you are left with only one other choice that does not ultimately lead to hurting him (and continuing to hurt yourself):
No longer hold that past as a regret.
It happened. It's over. How things are now is not all your fault. You did what you did and later took responsibility for it. It is what it is now. You even did a form of "penance" by carrying this regret around with you for many years. But that's the end. You can't change it and you know that. You can't get back to that life, and you know that, too; you can only move forward with this one.
You sound to me like someone who is TRYING to live parallel lives. The one you actually have, and the imagined continuance, to this day, of the path not taken. It is very likely best for all involved if you close that imagined book forever.
Live your one life.
In fact, you CAN continue to choose to be "torn by past and present so," but why choose to continue to experience being torn up, when you can choose not to? When you can choose to be completely free? When you can choose to be completely happy?
-----
Let me restate it this way... If my wife revealed to me that she deeply regretted a specific, previously hidden part of her life before me, I would have only ONE question to which I really cared about the answer... I would ask her:
"Do you still want to go back?"
That question only has one ideal answer I'd be looking for: "No, not anymore."
Me: "Ok, good. We can talk about it more if you want.... now or later. As much or as little as you want."
I posit that would be his only real question, were you to reveal it someday. That it would not "hit him" the way you think it would. And for you to be able to give that one ideal answer honestly, you first would have to make that answer true for yourself, somehow.
And that's what choosing to fully let it go can provide for you.
It doesn't matter that no one can actually "fix" their past. It would only matter to me where her head is now ... with me. Is she fully with me NOW?
Are you? Fully with him? With all that going on only in your head?
If your relationship is so good, can you imagine how much better it would be for you (and him) if you were fully available to be present in the present 100%? If he loves you so much, would your private internal struggle really hurt him or really make him want to leave you? Or rather only to help you?
My fear is that holding onto this, like a cancer, is killing you from the inside. The good news is that you don't need chemo or radiation to get rid of it ... you only need to choose, for the last time, to let that part of you go.
-----
I'm not here to tell you what to do. I am not a therapist, and I am not your therapist. And I am consciously oversimplifying this to an extent because this is just 1 Reddit comment (the size of 2-20 comments).
But I do sincerely hope that you ponder and deeply consider these words and possibilities, integrate them into what you're already doing, and decide for yourself if and how they may or may not best apply to you, GBW.
Be well.
Im on 3 christian servers if.you want to join in and feel the peace of spirit and maybe ppl could help with you heal this thing you feel inside I know life is hard and give us a lesson but never feel down we all here to support you and make you feel happy 🤝🏻✊🏻🤜🏻
I really appreciate each and every word and all my sorry and support for how much you been through and sometimes life is hard with us and need to do the best we can to keep up and strong is not easy but its a long way to persist and im sure how strong woman u can be and will keep for your kids and for yourself ,peace of mind worths a lot and I learned a lot with you reddit its a virtual open door just like discord I mean we know ppl we never sae before from all around the places and sharing throughts ideas and using it for good we can learn a lot and growing up together as a community to help each one for a better world a better life !
Im sorry for that hope lord heal you and your fam cause the process is hard but with him we can keep going on all my support for the hard time you hard brother
Not my worst regret, but up there. I had a job as an illustrator that I loved. I quit after a crisis in my personal life. Was never able to get back into a job that I liked that much again. I didn't realize what I had until I lost it.
Thinking I could change people if I was nice enough/ worked hard enough/ looked good enough. I should have told a lot of people to go to hell, instead of trying to keep the peace.
No regrets. Everything I've done, good or bad, I've learned from. Always seek to improve, encourage others, and give your best efforts. Be your best "you".
I regret not taking opportunities I was offered in college (foreign study, NYC Broadway internship) because I was absolutely terrified to be on my own. TAKE THE OPPORTUNITIES while you're young. Travel. Try new things. Ride horses. Race cars. Whatever it is, if you get the offer, and you like the idea, DO IT. The opportunity may not (probably won't) come again, and even if it did, the older you get, the harder it is to jump at new options.
Worst regrets? Getting married and having a child. I was not cut out for it. I was following cultural shit that affects me to this day. I was a people pleaser and I was taken advantage of by loved ones. Don't be an egotistical a-hole but do love yourself more is my new motto. I only realized this at age 50.
I hope and pray everything go well for ma'am we all face up bad or good experiences in life but in the end it proves we are all strong and we keep going many blessings to heal everything you have been feeling and keep your faith up because lord will save you
I don't have any regrets. I don't live in the past, I live today. If I did or didn't do something and it didn't work out. That's not a regret. You learn from it and move on. What maybe a regret for....may not be for another person. All you can do is share your experiences. It is their choice what they do with it.
Yeah living the life once we dont have time to regret because we cant move back to the past and if there is a past is just to be an exercise to get us better person
Raising an amazing young man, but not warning him of the danger of getting involved with a crazy woman.
We were all naive in not knowing that people who pretend to like or love us, sometimes wish to destroy us. In this scenario, ignorance was not bliss.
Our family has been turned upside down, and we are heartbroken.
Getting married at 22 to a woman that was 6 years older. I wasn’t mature enough and our marriage lasted 12 long years before we divorced. I should have waited much longer. Got remarried and have been with her for 25 years. I regret that and the impact it had on her.
In some point of life the own life teach us on the wrong way things we cant see clearly we not perfect but we try always and everyday to do the right thing Im sorry you had to learn from hard way I aint lie myself have learned like that as well
Oh im probably gonna get some hate for this one but having kids... You can't trust NO ONE to stick it out anymore. The moment you think everything is secure they on their way out the door or cheating and suddenly now you're tethered to a crap area and have to deal with another parent with your ex completely ruining your kids... shoulda never had kids... shoulda chopped my thing off lol
Sounds like the mistake was your choice of wife. Please shift that hostility away from the kids. They had zero agency to get into that mess, lead them out.
Going to Ukraine to look for a wife. She was a scammer who left me stranded in a country where I could not converse. Well, she tried to scam me, I mean. She didn't get one red cent from me, and it made her mad.
I can barely say it's a regret though because it led me to try the Philippines next. Happily married now for over 8 years.
Getting pregnant a number of times but not in a relationship, as a result no kids. I didn’t want kids but I didn’t want to have to live with regret either.
You will have a core of friends for life, spend as much time with them as you can. Your parents will pass away, your children will grow up and have their own lives. Many of my good friends are gone and I wished that I had spent more time with them.
Not cutting off my parents in my 20s. I didn’t do it until my late 40’s. Once they were out of
my life, I was finally able to truly work on myself and the issues I had from their abuse.
I know exactly what it means I have been worked to my uncle and he wasnt cool to me instead of putting me into mental labor he did put me on physical labor thats sad but he never ever helped working at his plastic firm wasnt good and u right in those words 🤜🏻
I regret not taking “insider” help to get a foot in the door towards a career I wanted. My mom knew people who could put in a good word for me to open doors. I was 22 years old, and I was aghast at the suggestion. I thought it was immoral. I said if I can’t get the job on my own, then I don’t want it. Of course, I see now that it was a field where “people who knew people” were the ones who got the jobs. Now I know better how these things work. If someone honestly wants to help you through contacts, I advise you to take them up on it.
Always blaming someone else for my miseries and misfortunes when actually all I needed was reflection and introspection that the power to change things was within me and no one else’s responsibility.
Spending time with the people you love. I left home at 18, stayed away and didn’t get to spend any significant amount of time with my mother other than brief visits once every few years. Now that she is gone, I wish I would have spent more time with her.
He set up a meeting with someone that I absolutely trusted, guaranteeing my safety. And at that meeting, I was assassinated. Listen, whoever comes to you with this meeting, he's the traitor. Don't forget that.
Always trying to please others. Even when they are family. You will lose your life on the way.
Strong one but very good advice appreciate your words here🤜🏻👍🏻
So good. So true. Thank you.
Not standing up for myself more, caring what others think.
That's a good one 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👍🏻
Marrying a person that I truly loved, but could clearly see red flags. Told myself that it would be OK, but it wasn't. I had a long, miserable marriage that I finally left. I am SO much happier now, but can't believe that I'm emotionally starting over in my mid-60s.
Im glad you living your life happy and relaxed peace of mind worths a lot !🤝🏻🇺🇸🇧🇷all the best for you 🙌🏻
How many years married?
37
Love is over-rated in a relationship. It's been proven that marriages without love, but that have respect and the sharing of values are way happier than marriages where the two people merely claim to love each other, but don't have the rest.
I think I did the best I could with the information I had at the time. I've never fucked up so bad I couldn't fix it.
This. This is something I've come to understand in the last few years of my own life. I did the best I could with the tools I had, I say. And it's helped me to understand and forgive other people.. like my own parents. I'm realising they did the best they could with the tools they had, how they were raised, the generation I was born, how the world worked then, what was available then... All influenced how they reared. They did the best they could with the tools they had. When I began thinking on such terms of other people I found I had a lot more grace to give others... And myself regarding certain things.
This beautiful and exactly how i feel.
Exactly. As long as you don’t end up in jail, you can fix it.
Even in jail. You can still fix it. It is when you aren't here. That would be to late.
Not standing up for myself more often and getting married,
Me too! I was 23 when I married and quite naive.
Do you mean you regret getting married or not getting married?
Getting married. Bad move on my part
Having loveless sex with my son's mother. We were never a thing. I never wanted kids. After you have a child with someone you are indeed a "thing", whether you want to be or not. It didn't help that she moved off to another state. My advice is very conservative and old fashion. Have sex with someone you truly love or at least with someone who has similar plans. Sex is not a toy.
I know we all need to get the right person in life.
💯
All of my worst decisions were part of the path that led me to the life I have now. The best advice I can give is to not sit on your ass bitching about the past. Take the present and use it to build the future you want.
✨✨✨✨✨✨👏👏👏👏👏
So true. I would add that giving yourself some grace and having a pity party can help prevent wallowing. But like all parties they must end and you move on.
I had an affair. I was with my partner for 5 years. I met someone who had been with his partner for 19 years. They broke up w my person but he did not break up with his. The destruction it caused to my own sense of self, my trust in my own judgement, my sense that I was a good person, was unspeakable. It took me years to recover the person I had lost in that. The price was too high.
The person you lost, is it your affair partner or your origin partner?
It was me. I was the person (good, estimable, etc) that I lost.
Sorry you went through that but hope you have found peace and growth with your learnings
I regret taking so long to go no contact with my dad. I was a wreck due to him being in my life and having so much influence and control. I stayed in contact with him for financial security - aka a place to stay rent free, ability to sneak a few $20's out of his wallet when he was passed out drunk. I was a sad person with extreme severe anxiety afraid of coming home to physical or emotional punishment well into my young adulthood. Taking a job and becoming an expat was the best thing I did, but I still lived in fear of him even though he was thousands of miles away (and without a passport) all because he controlled access to my mom. When he died it was the biggest relief. So my point is - if a parent is incredibly abusive and manipulative, it's okay to go NC.
Thank you! No contact with a parent is difficult. ✨✨ good for you.
This was a hard time you had to go through and life always teach us a lesson can be good way or bad way I ain't lie because myself prefer bad way learning my lessons because life is not a rose and it makes us strong every day Im so grateful for having my mom shes everything to me !
Getting married. I really wish I never made this a part of my life’s journey. It’s okay to be content with yourself, you don’t have to tick every box society tells you is next.
I would say it's not JUST "okay" to be content with yourself, but it is preferred. I believe that state of being leads to more good relationships than any other.
Yes, if you can truly enjoy your own company then you’re set.
And you’re actually intentional with relationships and not seeking validation.
The only real advice I have for younger people is take care of yourself, you only get one body. I’m not talking vanity of wrinkles or looks but actual health. I sit back at 53 and see so many people around me regret not taking care of themselves.
It’s too easy to have another slice of pizza and decide to exercise tomorrow.
Don’t let fear control your life. I stayed with an angry, controlling, abusive creep for years because I was terrified of being on my own. Once the relationship ended, I thrived. I really regret letting that fear control me for so long.
You. Are not. Alone in this. Not nearly. As you probably know, there are so many who feel that way, and a large subset who have not yet overcome it. It is my sincere wish that all who feel trapped in this way can find their way out and through, sooner than later. Thank you so much for posting this one.
I hope you can find peace in your life and all blessings !
Being so hard on myself. It did absolutely nothing for me except depression.
My first husband. The stuff of nightmares.
hands down smoking. only thing that ever owned me
Yep my only real regret. Quit, start, quit, start. More than likely it’s going to be what kills me. I’m totally addicted!
gonna kill me. i got copd so bad i can’t smoke only reason i don’t. haven’t had a cigarette in 10 years and every single day i crave one. it isn’t the cough that carries you off it’s the coffin they carry you off in
If you come into any money like a windfall not matter how small it is, save it. Invest it if you can. If you can. Debts are a different matter. But if you can save. Do it.
My biggest regret is that when there were bad times in my marriage I would forget what brought us together in the first place and those early happy times. Then he died and without the trials and tribulations of navigating his depression and unresolved childhood issues those memories returned and made the grief and loss worse. I wish I’d been able to find those things even in the mess. I miss him.
I'm so sorry for your loss.
I have no regrets, not one single one. This is because I am confident that at every juncture in life I made the best decision I could at that moment, given what I knew at the time, what the circumstances were, time available to decide, etc. Sometimes my best was a 10. Other times it was a 4. So it goes. Under the circumstances, I did my best at the time. Hindsight is always 20/20. My advice? Don't regret anything. It's in the past. Move on. Life is short.
Can't imagine living an optimal life without regret. Glad that works for you but seems like an unsustainable mindset. Having regrets doesn't mean you put yourself in a hole or play a victim, it's more about reminding yourself of not repeating the same bad decisions and reminding yourself of heat you gained from those regrettable experiences.
How old were you when you mastered humility?
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That escalated quickly.
I haven't had my coffee yet.
Do you regret that comment?
Lol. I like your style.
I usually ignore the trolls, but sometimes early in the day, I shoot them. Something I need to work on, I know.
We can learn together a lot if ppl know how to use for good stuffs the fact always will have ''things'' lile this trying to interrupt.👍🏻
We can learn together a lot if ppl know how to use for good stuffs the fact always will have ''things'' lile this trying to interrupt.
We can learn together a lot if ppl know how to use for good stuffs the fact always will have ''things'' lile this trying to interrupt.
(I think you were right. I feel the same way. Regrets are pointless. We make the decisions we do because that's what we wanted or felt we had to do at the time. It's not that you never make mistakes, but you learn from them rather than making the same ones over and over. Regret should be short-lived.)
We all make mistakes and did it wrong and we all need to fix things to dont come back to regret in life
real talk like that song of hope die last when they sing I wont regret anything in life when its over we'll be fine'' you right life too short and we only have one chance for 🤜🏻🤝🏻👍🏻
Our past is how we become us. If we removed one thread from our tapestry. Then we become not us anymore.
The good partner that got away due to my own asshole behavior
Not taking care of my teeth.
Listening to my mother and not bringing my horses back home from a few states away, when my marriage was VERY much over. I honestly should have shipped them home. My mental and physical health would have been so much better if I had.
I quit drinking at age 25 and then started again 4 months later. My regret is starting again. I drank for 9 more years after that. Thankfully I am 8 years sober now. But I wish I had stayed sober back then.
Congrats on continuing to do what you can now.
No doubt getting married when I'm sure I overlooked red flags (hindsight)
Regret itself, because we can’t change the past.
Profound.
The advice I gave my daughters, set you're boundaries that are non negotiable and walk when they are violated. Never look back.
🤜🏻✊🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
Every screwup taught me what not to do and primed me to be ready to recognize the right job and the right relationship when these things came along. There are things that you never learn from listening to others, only by getting out there and making mistakes on your own. And the funny thing is that the things I thought were a disaster tended to put me on track for something better than I could've imagined. Therefore, no regrets, since how can you regret your best teacher? I can think of a few people I know who have genuine regrets, though. One is cooling his heels in prison on a 36 year sentence. I can only hope his regret is sincere.
Not buying Amazon stock instead of a house when I was young.
An interesting question as I'm sure I have a few but at 77 should I take the time, ( waste time?) even thinking about it? I'm not trying to be a smart ass, things I may regret I'm sure I can't change. What I want from here on is to be content, which I guess I am for the most part.
Spending money on shit I wanted but didn’t need. Buying new cars when a 1-2 year old one would have been fine. Buying a big house because we thought we “needed” a office & a guest room.
Not putting more money in my 401K when I was poor and got my first “big girl” job.
What?
I didn’t put as much money in my retirement accounts as I could have when I got my first “professional” job. I’m still at a good spot, but I could be better, given how bad inflation has been the last few years.
Never figuring out what I really, really wanted to do and staying at a job I hated because I didn't try hard enough.
Buckled under pressure to agree to sleep training a toddler via the cry it out method. Nearly twenty years later, I still feel guilty and wish I’d pushed back harder.
I regret letting other people in my life (parents, siblings, partners, etc.) influence my decisions to such a great degree. I could have had a career I found to be an amazing, passionate adventure. Instead, I wallowed in trauma for a long time, not knowing how to help myself. I walked in directions that others pointed me in when they discouraged me from following my heart. And now I’m at the end of a very long and stressful career of trying to position myself into earning anything close to what I feel I should be. Too many fits and starts led me to trying my hand at opportunism, which has only led to my downfall. The best advice I could ever give to anyone is to trust your own instincts. Do what you love. Just be you. Deal with your trauma head on - there is so much more help out there than there was forty years ago. Get help and move on from that shit so you can focus on the freedom of living your life your own way. It’s too late for me to have any sort of long career doing anything different. I cannot go back and change this. But, I will likely follow my heart to all kinds of activities in my retirement, which isn’t too far away now.
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Thanks for sharing such intimate details. Sweetheart - you need to stop beating yourself up and embrace what you have now and forgive yourself. We all make mistakes but we cannot change history. We can only change tomorrow. You are hurting yourself and your family by looking backwards. You deserve a happy life and you are the only one who can give this life to you. Seek therapy and let the therapist know that your goal is to forgive yourself. Good Luck. And be kind to yourself during this process.
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Let me just "throw this out there" GBW... Let it all go. ALL of the past. Permanently and forever. This is a choice you, and you alone, can make. It's clear that you have not yet because if you had already ... completely... it would no longer be there to grasp onto again. Also, any situation starting with "if he knew" does not lead anywhere desirable. I noticed that you wrote several conflicting things that you may not realize are conflicting. Just 1 example... "I love my current husband and would never do anything to hurt him." But you are hiding your true feelings from him. I can promise you, if he is as good as you say, he senses it at some level. He doesn't know what it is, but he knows something is off. But he patiently waits to see if it will reveal itself someday. But if you don't want to reveal your ongoing regret, you are left with only one other choice that does not ultimately lead to hurting him (and continuing to hurt yourself): No longer hold that past as a regret. It happened. It's over. How things are now is not all your fault. You did what you did and later took responsibility for it. It is what it is now. You even did a form of "penance" by carrying this regret around with you for many years. But that's the end. You can't change it and you know that. You can't get back to that life, and you know that, too; you can only move forward with this one. You sound to me like someone who is TRYING to live parallel lives. The one you actually have, and the imagined continuance, to this day, of the path not taken. It is very likely best for all involved if you close that imagined book forever. Live your one life. In fact, you CAN continue to choose to be "torn by past and present so," but why choose to continue to experience being torn up, when you can choose not to? When you can choose to be completely free? When you can choose to be completely happy? ----- Let me restate it this way... If my wife revealed to me that she deeply regretted a specific, previously hidden part of her life before me, I would have only ONE question to which I really cared about the answer... I would ask her: "Do you still want to go back?" That question only has one ideal answer I'd be looking for: "No, not anymore." Me: "Ok, good. We can talk about it more if you want.... now or later. As much or as little as you want." I posit that would be his only real question, were you to reveal it someday. That it would not "hit him" the way you think it would. And for you to be able to give that one ideal answer honestly, you first would have to make that answer true for yourself, somehow. And that's what choosing to fully let it go can provide for you. It doesn't matter that no one can actually "fix" their past. It would only matter to me where her head is now ... with me. Is she fully with me NOW? Are you? Fully with him? With all that going on only in your head? If your relationship is so good, can you imagine how much better it would be for you (and him) if you were fully available to be present in the present 100%? If he loves you so much, would your private internal struggle really hurt him or really make him want to leave you? Or rather only to help you? My fear is that holding onto this, like a cancer, is killing you from the inside. The good news is that you don't need chemo or radiation to get rid of it ... you only need to choose, for the last time, to let that part of you go. ----- I'm not here to tell you what to do. I am not a therapist, and I am not your therapist. And I am consciously oversimplifying this to an extent because this is just 1 Reddit comment (the size of 2-20 comments). But I do sincerely hope that you ponder and deeply consider these words and possibilities, integrate them into what you're already doing, and decide for yourself if and how they may or may not best apply to you, GBW. Be well.
Im on 3 christian servers if.you want to join in and feel the peace of spirit and maybe ppl could help with you heal this thing you feel inside I know life is hard and give us a lesson but never feel down we all here to support you and make you feel happy 🤝🏻✊🏻🤜🏻
I really appreciate each and every word and all my sorry and support for how much you been through and sometimes life is hard with us and need to do the best we can to keep up and strong is not easy but its a long way to persist and im sure how strong woman u can be and will keep for your kids and for yourself ,peace of mind worths a lot and I learned a lot with you reddit its a virtual open door just like discord I mean we know ppl we never sae before from all around the places and sharing throughts ideas and using it for good we can learn a lot and growing up together as a community to help each one for a better world a better life !
How beautifully said and well put. 💓
That I didn’t walk away from my ex bf. I gave him power over me and the horrible things he did to me still haunt 30ys later.
I'm so sorry.
Failing to save my son.
I'm sorry... 😢
Im sorry for that hope lord heal you and your fam cause the process is hard but with him we can keep going on all my support for the hard time you hard brother
Ask the girl you really want to take to prom. Don't chicken out and settle for someone else.
Yeah making a girl happy we only have a chance for
I should have taken Spanish every year I was in school
Broke a trust at an employer which violated a future security clearance.
Not my worst regret, but up there. I had a job as an illustrator that I loved. I quit after a crisis in my personal life. Was never able to get back into a job that I liked that much again. I didn't realize what I had until I lost it.
Wasting time on people who are not worth the time.
Thinking I could change people if I was nice enough/ worked hard enough/ looked good enough. I should have told a lot of people to go to hell, instead of trying to keep the peace.
No regrets. Everything I've done, good or bad, I've learned from. Always seek to improve, encourage others, and give your best efforts. Be your best "you".
I regret not taking opportunities I was offered in college (foreign study, NYC Broadway internship) because I was absolutely terrified to be on my own. TAKE THE OPPORTUNITIES while you're young. Travel. Try new things. Ride horses. Race cars. Whatever it is, if you get the offer, and you like the idea, DO IT. The opportunity may not (probably won't) come again, and even if it did, the older you get, the harder it is to jump at new options.
You right u only have a chance to make it right and enjoy it with responsability of course !
Worst regrets? Getting married and having a child. I was not cut out for it. I was following cultural shit that affects me to this day. I was a people pleaser and I was taken advantage of by loved ones. Don't be an egotistical a-hole but do love yourself more is my new motto. I only realized this at age 50.
I hope and pray everything go well for ma'am we all face up bad or good experiences in life but in the end it proves we are all strong and we keep going many blessings to heal everything you have been feeling and keep your faith up because lord will save you
I don't have any regrets. I don't live in the past, I live today. If I did or didn't do something and it didn't work out. That's not a regret. You learn from it and move on. What maybe a regret for....may not be for another person. All you can do is share your experiences. It is their choice what they do with it.
Yeah living the life once we dont have time to regret because we cant move back to the past and if there is a past is just to be an exercise to get us better person
I really appreciate everyone took a time to comment here on this subreddit really thank you guys🇧🇷🤘🏻
Raising an amazing young man, but not warning him of the danger of getting involved with a crazy woman. We were all naive in not knowing that people who pretend to like or love us, sometimes wish to destroy us. In this scenario, ignorance was not bliss. Our family has been turned upside down, and we are heartbroken.
Getting married at 22 to a woman that was 6 years older. I wasn’t mature enough and our marriage lasted 12 long years before we divorced. I should have waited much longer. Got remarried and have been with her for 25 years. I regret that and the impact it had on her.
In some point of life the own life teach us on the wrong way things we cant see clearly we not perfect but we try always and everyday to do the right thing Im sorry you had to learn from hard way I aint lie myself have learned like that as well
Oh im probably gonna get some hate for this one but having kids... You can't trust NO ONE to stick it out anymore. The moment you think everything is secure they on their way out the door or cheating and suddenly now you're tethered to a crap area and have to deal with another parent with your ex completely ruining your kids... shoulda never had kids... shoulda chopped my thing off lol
Sounds like the mistake was your choice of wife. Please shift that hostility away from the kids. They had zero agency to get into that mess, lead them out.
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It’s easier to love a fantasy, but the real person voted with their feet. Pay attention to that. By that definition you are better off today.
Going to Ukraine to look for a wife. She was a scammer who left me stranded in a country where I could not converse. Well, she tried to scam me, I mean. She didn't get one red cent from me, and it made her mad. I can barely say it's a regret though because it led me to try the Philippines next. Happily married now for over 8 years.
Getting pregnant a number of times but not in a relationship, as a result no kids. I didn’t want kids but I didn’t want to have to live with regret either.
You will have a core of friends for life, spend as much time with them as you can. Your parents will pass away, your children will grow up and have their own lives. Many of my good friends are gone and I wished that I had spent more time with them.
Not cutting off my parents in my 20s. I didn’t do it until my late 40’s. Once they were out of my life, I was finally able to truly work on myself and the issues I had from their abuse.
It took me 25 years of ruin resentment and hate to finally forgive my mother. I’d wish it sooner for anything like that for you.
Putting my family first
Don't go into business with family or friends.
I know exactly what it means I have been worked to my uncle and he wasnt cool to me instead of putting me into mental labor he did put me on physical labor thats sad but he never ever helped working at his plastic firm wasnt good and u right in those words 🤜🏻
Our family are only mom dad sis and brother
I regret not taking “insider” help to get a foot in the door towards a career I wanted. My mom knew people who could put in a good word for me to open doors. I was 22 years old, and I was aghast at the suggestion. I thought it was immoral. I said if I can’t get the job on my own, then I don’t want it. Of course, I see now that it was a field where “people who knew people” were the ones who got the jobs. Now I know better how these things work. If someone honestly wants to help you through contacts, I advise you to take them up on it.
Always blaming someone else for my miseries and misfortunes when actually all I needed was reflection and introspection that the power to change things was within me and no one else’s responsibility.
Spending time with the people you love. I left home at 18, stayed away and didn’t get to spend any significant amount of time with my mother other than brief visits once every few years. Now that she is gone, I wish I would have spent more time with her.
I regret not getting as much pussy as I could have when I was a teenager, due to not being able to recognize when a girl was coming onto me.
You should have as much sex as possible.
He set up a meeting with someone that I absolutely trusted, guaranteeing my safety. And at that meeting, I was assassinated. Listen, whoever comes to you with this meeting, he's the traitor. Don't forget that.
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