What have you finally made peace with?

I made peace and embraced that it is ok to be different and follow your own path.
If somebody doesnt like and accept you for who you are, it is not a healthy relationship

I made peace with life - it throws you curb balls and you manage to adapt, no matter what

sodapop

I'm resigned to the fact that most of my life is behind me now. I'm going to enjoy what's left though and not waste time on regrets.

Me too....cheers

I'm with Lucca on this. Can't come to terms with my main sadness after all these years but I've a kind of peaceful acceptance of something I cannot, nor ever have been able to, do anything about. Still irks for all sorts of (wrong) reasons though. Emotions, eh?!

I will never be able to make peace with the fact that my sister emptied my fathers bank account out when he was dying,and took everthing that was worth anything from his home.
I have however made peace with the fact that i won`t ever want to see or speak to her again.

Thank you for the thread Kandinsky. Oh! I love your name and the artist.

I'm so with Urmstongran with this. It's more to do with letting it go. As much as I want to, I bottle things up which causes me a level of anxiety I've found hard to cope with over the years.

However, I've mentally shut the door to my ex husband, who made my life and my DD's a misery. My DH has made this possible.
I never thought I could trust another man and not be scared to say how I feel, but I have. DH and I married five years ago. I regret that I could have married him 40 years ago. I finished our short relationship to go out with the man I then married ! I'm at peace now ?

Another let go is that moving to live with with my DH, I left three friends, one who I was very close too, behind. I worked with/for her. She was the head at a school I was seconded to as her Deputy. We struck a bond really quickly and the friendship grew with lots of meet ups, mini breaks, hours of chatting and masses of support. Due to the distance, it's been difficult and the bond we had, has weakened. We have the occasional chat that lasts for hours but these are few and far between. I'm sad but reconciled that we do still keep in touch. It was the choice I made but you I always used to think that somethings will continue whatever the circumstances but they don't. Ce la vi.

It's been sad to read some of the posts. Glammanana ?

I wish we could all be in that safe unthreatening place and be able cope with those curved balls Hithere.

I have made peace with the fact I did not get to the very top, career wise, I was ambitious in an disorganised way, but now know that two children arriving in quick succession and hindering it was the best thing ever to happen to me.
I have not made peace with the memory of my violent father and troubled childhood, but as someone upthread said, I do not want to go over all that now. Sometimes blocking or compartmentalising thoughts can be the best thing to do
Maybe there is something to be said for the British stiff upper lip.

The serenity prayer
Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change
The courage to change the things I can
And wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time
Enjoying one moment at a time
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace.

I don’t know that I agree with the last line but do wish I could live by the rest.
I do try and I do accept that I don’t always succeed. I have made peace with the fact that my mother was mean and nasty to me as a child. I know I did my best by her as an adult, using patience and kindness taught to me by my father. I hope I was party to helping her to be a good grandmother to my boys, they did love her, I don’t think I ever did.

The things I have made peace with:

My daughter and I will always have a different relationship and that she will never express her love for me. However, she is seeking help for her mental health issues and we are finding our way through slowly.

My mother is never going to change as she is as damaged as my daughter.

I don't have to live my life being the dutiful daughter at a cost to my own happiness and I can be grateful for the gift of my son without martyring myself for evermore.

My grandson is ASD; he is still such a pleasure anyway.

My estrangement with my father. All those years I craved his attention rather than his abandonment and it turned out that my mother was the lesser of 2 evils! I don't ever have to worry again about why he never accepted me and made me feel as if I was unloveable. Unfortunately, I don't think I will ever be at peace with the fact he turned out to be a paedophile but I am satisfied that at the age of 84 he has been imprisoned for his crimes. I have a lot to be grateful for that he left me behind as a child!

My relationship, or lack of relationship with my dad. He was quite selfish and a jack the lad. Didnt really have time for 3 children as he was busy having fun . He told us he loved us on his death bed. Through my training and job l feel l understand him and his upbringing more. He was different to other people's dad's but what he taught us was positivity and how to have fun. So lve cone to terms with it all a long time ago.

I have made peace with the fact I have been badly hurt by several people in my life and they never owned their unkind behaviour or were sorry for it. I have made peace with the fact that I let go of opportunities and dreams I had for my life. I have made peace with the fact that life did not and has not turned out for me, as I grow older, the way that I (carefully, I thought!) planned it. I have made peace with the fact that dreams have not, and most probably will not now, come true for me, where they have and will for other people I know. I try not to dwell on the past, in fact I actively turn away from it, although sadness does creep in now and again. I concentrate on the here and now, the future, my many blessings.

I have always regretted not being able to be with my parents when they died ( this due to living far away from them) but I have realised they wouldnt want me to be upset about this for te rest of my life.I think I have made peace with this.

I’m getting on a bit but completely Agee with above. A toxic unkind mother and abusive childhood and estranged from my brother. I’m only 60 but attempting to keep things in perspective. I find it hard to keep negative thoughts from coming but I’m getting there! Looking forward to future now and watching my daughters grow up.

I try to weigh up the positive sides of myself to balance regrets/guilt, but right now I can’t get past my DH being in a care home for over two years before he died some months back. It’s going to haunt me for the rest of my life.

That I will never be in touch with estranged sisters and their families.
That I will never be in a relationship again, trust is gone.
I'm finished doing the running and trying to keep friendships, they are not with my time.

There are many things in the past that still touch you no matter how old you are. I try to forget them but it is virtually impossible I can not make peace with them as they wont let me!!!!

People i know have no idea of the things that happened to me and the things i did as a consequence which i now know were wrong.

That like others my mother was cruel and abusive and a terrible mother. I could therefore not expect her to be a good grandmother to my 5 beautiful DD's. I hoped. She wasn't.
That my philandering father didn't protect me from the sexual advances of his best friend when I was in my early teens even though at the time I didn't really realise it was all kinds of wrong. Unbelievable of course in this day and age but honestly true. They were both policemen too but thankfully both now dead hence my being able to finally make peace with the facts.
That I didn't have the career I might have had because I gave it all up to stay at home and care for our eldest profoundly disabled DD1.
That said treasured and adored DD1 would never be the girl she might have been.

This is a timely thread as I'm having a bit of a wobble today. Most of the time I'm ok but just some days I think where does the unkindness come from and why. Recently I've found a lot of help reading the estrangement thread as it shows that other people also struggle.

My mum died many years ago at quite a young age and was treated badly by certain members of her family.
For so long I really struggled with anger towards them, not only for their treatment of her but also the utter lack of self awareness they displayed about their behaviour and actions.
I can recall locking myself in the loo on the day of her funeral and just wanting to rage at them all!
Time has lessened my feelings and now I simply don't care about any of them.

I've also made peace with what happened to me at the age of 12 / 13.
An older man came into my life with "flattery and understanding", he listened to me and I eventually believed, he loved and understood me.......now it's called grooming and after a lot of thought, I also know that's what it was.

The situation culminated into one particular evening when I felt, no I knew, that suddenly being the centre of this man's attention was a very bad place to be. I really didn't think I'd ever gotten over the events of that night and it stayed with me in many ways ever since.
I could go into more detail about what happened to me and the effects of the incident but won't, all I will say is that, you mature with damage not with the years and I certainly did after that.
Interestingly enough given recent events, the "male" police officers on my case treated me with the utmost kindness, respect and understanding, I was kept informed and I know they put a lot of work into what they did. The result wasn't what I wanted, it's been "filed" as it's a situation of his word against mine and of course, he's denied it.

After so many years, there's no physical evidence either and although it's hard, I do understand.In a strange way after all of this time, the officers helped me find a degree of closure and peace.
I'll forever be grateful to them.

It is remarkable just how many on GN are estranged or completely cut off from their siblings, and in a strange way this has helped me to come to terms with the fact that my brother and I will never be more than polite to each other with no attempts to meet up since the last parent's funeral. I picked over it and over it, night after night ( those dreadful 2am wide awake times), trying to work out what I had done wrong, why he seemed to dislike me so heartily, where the horrid, surprise confrontation came from which left me reeling, and I think I am finally, beginning to acknowledge that it is what it is. I regret not taking advantage of the excellent educational opportunities I had, I regret not getting married sooner and thus possibly having more children, but I recognise that compared to many, I life a charmed life with a healthy family, good close friends enough money and a warm home. Doesn't stop the 2am wake ups though.......

Dee1012 (flowers)

Our grandchildren are 8,9,11 and 13. We are 82 and have to accept that we are unlikely to see them as adults.

I try not to have regrets about anything in my past, everything that has happened has made me the person I am. However, I do sometimes wish I had done things differently or other people had behaved differently and at my age I do try to see this as "making peace with my decision" rather than regrets.

The ones that come to mind for me are:

1. Not going to France to work for a couple of years when I was 19 as my boyfriend at the time didn't want me to go (he has been my ex-boyfriend for over 30 years now so it obviously still rankles!)

2. Being effectively estranged from my brother (my only sibling) since my mother died 2 years ago - I feel he overreacted to something I did after her death (which was due to a misunderstanding between us) and refuses to give me the opportunity to make this right. He doesn't really keep in touch with me now and I have made the decision to not get upset about this anymore and make the most of the people I have around me who do love me and want to spend time with me.

3. Not having a relationship with my father for many years - there is no reason why we don't have a relationship, he just chooses not to involve me or my 3 children (and grandson) in his life and, as with my brother, I have now decided not to get upset about this and to live my life without him (I have done perfectly well without him anyway so really don't need him in my life).

I will always be sad about the situation with my dad and brother and my mum would have been horrified if she had seen the way my brother behaves but that's families for you!

I have also had the experience of my husband having a brief affair 5 years ago which completely destroyed me at the time (and still continues to have a profound effect on me) and this meant that my marriage is never going to be what I wanted/expected it to be but I have had to make decisions on how I deal with that moving forward which is another thing that I have had to make peace with/accept.

Life can be tough but it's more about how you deal with the tough things that happen rather than what happens to you

Sending love to everyone

Inner peace is a wonderful thing. accept the things you can't change and try not to let the past spoil the future. I have found that inner pace through forgiveness of myself and all the past hurts from other people help expel negative thoughts and now I am exactly where I want to be.

Second line should read peace not pace. Be happy!!

Cutting off all contact with my brother because of abusive behaviour.