Life - some questions!!

I think that I had a reasonably successful career.
I know that I tried hard to be a good mother. I don’t think I succeeded.
I think I ‘settled’ for someone who wasn’t the love of my life.
I would have liked to travel more and now there isn’t the money to do it.

I count my blessings though and am grateful for the things I have.

Regrets- not being with my father in his last weeks as I was living abroad. Also, marrying someone I wasn't really in love with.
Achievements-making a good life for myself post divorce and having a great relationship with my adult daughters and their children.

Greatest achievement? Nothing exceptional. Maybe just surviving to retirement age. Tho there seems no point most of the time.
Regrets? No point.
Wish I'd done sooner? Paid into my work pension!

P.S: Forgot to add all my youngsters and I are all in good long term recovery, happily married with families of there own. My 2nd husband is the Dad he didnt have to be to them

My adult children are first last and everything. I have an extreme story of professional middle class background which I recreated in adulthood where is under the surface there was violence, secrets and lies childhood and adulthood too.

I finally managed to leave and we went through the fires of hell with the aftermath going through the whole system of this country inc the social services and their agencies.

We came out with my family of 4 youngsters intact. An unheard of feat in England. The system is needed but the system doesn't work.

That will always stand to be my biggest achievement. You would have to have gone through it to get it.

Non children connected would be being able to develop the freelance holistic recover services I do. This is all linked to our history and is emotional and inner life whilst helping to sort out practical difficulties too with people with chaotic/difficult lives helping to empower them

Biggest regret, is not leaving the ex before I did. However I wouldn't be able to do what I do today if I had. I am only talking 4 years earlier so my youngsters would still be who they are. It's a strange one to sum up is this.

I wish I had met my 2nd husband years before we did.

They are not so much regrets as such. Observations really as I am peaceful and content with my life today

Dear Razzy. I nearly skipped your question. I like to say to myself "this is just too light-hearted..." But the truth for me is the opposite. It is far too heavy hearted. I don't like facing up to it. So, taking a deep breath and saying exactly what pours out straight away, here goes:

1. greatest achievement? Managing on my own after husband's suicide - having to move house, keep the lives of my 3 incredible children going, keep working, and finish a degree in which I got First Class Hons with First Class marks in all my exams.

2. non-kid achievement? :-) See above and take the children out of the scenario!

3. most regret? Marrying the cruel ba++ard and throwing away my life to live in the deepest pits of misery and the kind of cruel torture only others who have been through it can truly understand because you have to pretend to the world that everything is ok.

4. done earlier? should have left the cruel ba++ard long before and tried to claim a proper life for myself and the children. A life free from fear and before the children started to think his nasty, snide and sarcastic "humour" was a normal way to talk about their mother.......

Surviving an unexpected and painful divorce.

1 bringing my three children up singl handed from ages of 5 & 2 1/2 (twins). I am proud of them beyond words.

2 M’y BA with Honours which I completed last year aged 55 .

3 marrying my husband, though my children would not be the same people if I hadn’t.

4 I wish I had contacted the person who was love of my life earlier. Met as teenagers and I adored him from afar. When my husband left me the first time he had also separated from his then wife. But I thought who would want to take on someone with three children. He then remarried! About 3 years later he separated again. I had always been friends with his sister and asked her if he wanted to get in touch. He did and when we met discovered he had wanted to be with me to! Wanted to ask me out as a teenager but didn’t think my dad would let me go. Anyway we were together from that moment, June 1995 then in February 1996 he was killed in a traffic accident. We had so little time. Still on my own now through choice

1.Best achievement is my amazing family, having such a close relationship with all 3AC plus their partners, and GC’s.
2. Apart from family, climbing to the top of my career in a male dominated arena, even tho I didn’t go back to work till in my 40’s.
3. Being able to realise my dreams of travelling the globe now retired, have been everywhere my heart has led me.
Regrets:
1. not listening to my inner self and running from husband no:2 at the 1st sign of concern.
2. Never meeting my Mr Right.... but hey ho, we can’t have everything.
What I wished I’d done earlier: learned how to deal with a narcissistic mother ! I’ve got it off to a fine art now !

my main acheivement is starting my business at 21 and it still running successfully 44 years on,its kept a roof over not only our heads but the scores of folk who have worked with us over the years.
sometimes maybe that same business took precendence over everything else and thats a minor regret ..but only minor.The children didn't suffer through it and we are and always have been a happy united family.
I think the key question you missed is would you change things IF you could go back and honestly,hand on heart ,not a single thing ...of the stuff I had control of .I'm very happy with my life ,,I wish I had the power to sort my daughters health but apart from that all is good .

I wonder if the men on this forum (or the OHs of the lovely ladies here) would give the same answers?

Achieving a 2:1 BA Hons degree at the age of 53 while working and going through a horrendous divorce.

regret that two marriages failed. after 20 years have decided that a 20 year trial period with OH makes it OK to get married for a third time! Escalated by the needs of B----y Brexit and refusing to move back to a UK that is not part of EU.

Wish that I had stood up to my parents about staying on at a top private girls school that had no interest in me as I was not Oxbridge material, then I might have succeeded better somewhere else and got my degree much earlier and got on a career ladder.

However, I have on the whole so enjoyed my life and can't really regret anything. If I hadn't married first I wouldn't have had my 2DCs and they will always come first. If I hadn't married second I wouldn't have travelled the world and then eventually ended up in the place where I met my fiancé (!!!).

My greatest achievement? Bringing up a lovely, decent daughter who herself has brought up a lovely decent daughter. This, despite my horrendous childhood. I survived it - just about but still suffer the consequences. I have a lovely husband who is the opposite of my father. My childhood experiences have resulted in a total lack of confidence which has prevented me from doing so much in life. I have always just tried to 'get through it' which is a shame.

Lots of interesting questions. For me the really good bits include my children and my beautiful grandchildren who are all good friends even though one lot lives on the other side of the world.

Caring for my mother and enabling her to die at home as was her wish when dying of cancer in her 50s. Caring for my rather difficult father many years later to also be at home until a few weeks before his death.

Changing a very dysfunctional family pattern that had spanned many generations to support and enable all of the above to happen. Along the way I was also the first person in my family to finish secondary school, attend university and have a great professional career.

Lots of lovely travel. Meeting a lovely man in later life to share many things with.

Regrets, yes I've had a few. Marrying the wrong person too soon for the wrong reasons but we are still friends.

And as the old saying goes, after children, family and work, the full catastrophe as Zorba so succintly put it, I now have a garden and the time to enjoy the seasons, the colours of the light and time to read and think. Not too bad.

1.) Working successfully in a caring profession and making a valid contribution to society; being a "decent" & caring person to others. Being a young mum but managing to bringing up DS to be a "decent" and hard working person, too.
2.) Long & happy Marriage; still ongoing! Good relationships with DS, DiL & DGC, and with my other relatives. Work achievements.
3.) Teenage pregnancy (just wish I'd had DS ten years later!)
4.) Worked harder for exams & got better results. (See 3, above.)

Approaching 80, I dont want to have to think about what I have and haven't 'achieved'!
I've enjoyed life, have a happy family....that'll do

Greatest achievement is flying first class - it has been on my bucket list for quite a few years.
I most regret leaving my beloved dog behind when I left my first husband. He got rid of her within days of my departure. It's something that I have not forgiven or got over.
I wish I had saved more money when I was younger. Sometimes I wish I'd had more sexual partners. I don't know why i think that but it seems everyone does it these days so it must be a bit of feeling as though I missed out, then on other days I am so happy that I've only had a couple of partners.

my greatest achievement without doubt was becoming "mum" for two years to my 4 year old grandson when his parents divorced. His mum disappeared. His dad (my son) had a breakdown. My husband was resentful. Oh, and I was 63 and working!
My regrets? not being able to help elderly parents more. When my eldest son died perhaps I could have supported my other children differently, my son has been left with mental health issues. But I was only in my twenties.

Ooh interesting replies! Not what I would have thought either.

More replies welcome!

1) My children telling me they had a great childhood
2) Starting but not yet finishing a book, and making time for my own interests. Surviving near poverty and managing to keep our home
3) Not studying for a degree that interested me
4) Managed money matters better.

1) Successful and happy children and grandchildren. All independent and hardworking.
2) My job enabled me to help some vulnerable people move out of hospital and live a fuller and more ordinary life in the community.
3) Mistakes made in my personal life which made others unhappy
4) Travelled more

Ah! - the second thing at (3) was not insisting that my OH had proper treatment for his anxiety many many moons ago so that I and the children might have had a easier life.

1. Greatest achievement? Opening up the world of music to all those I have brought together to sing - especially those who thought they could not sing. I have (and still do) run community choirs for decades, and worked specifically with the elderly and those with mental health problems.

3. Two things - not having found a way to have any sort of decent relationship with my mother before she died. I (and many others) found her really difficult, but looking back I can see how she finished up as she was and wish I had been more forgiving.

4. Changed careers - it took me till I was 50 to take that plunge. It would have been hard to do it before because of young children. But I am very glad I did it in the end as I had 10 happy years doing photography, picture editing a magazine, arts outreach for young people and running singing workshops. A wonderful change form being a social worker - loved it to begin with as I felt I was doing some good; but in the end had just become a financial gatekeeper for the LA.

I'm very 'middling' in that my achievements have been very average and much of the bad stuff out of my control.
I passed my driving test - that was great. We never had a car in our family, we had to walk or get the bus. It's wonderful having this independence.
Finding a lovely man who became my husband, his sad death could not be helped.
I regret falling down the stairs - one small misstep which took seconds has been followed by over a year of remedial dental work - which isn't over yet. But I guess I'm a survivor.

1) I have been fortunate to have had a good and successful life, but cannot think of any achievment that stands head and shoulders above the rest.

2) Most people have children and most of them turn out well. Many of those who have problems with their children have parented well, but other things have gone wrong, so I do not see that having children and bringing them up successfully is a great achievement unless you overcame enormous odds to do so.

3) Nothing really, obviously I have done or not done things I have regretted later, but nothing that stands out and anyway I would be very wary of anyone who hadn't had any regrets

4) once again, there minor things, but nothing stands out.

Sorry about the downbeat reply.