Past behaviour regrets, changing with time, age and wisdom

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Because I've opened up and a few things on here recently some thoughts and one regret has been bugging me the past few days.

I was seeing an older woman, I was in my early 20's and she was mid 30's, best sex ever and she chased me! My regret is that I was
forced to end the relationship because there was a problem in the relationship I couldn't sort out. I had no real choice and ending
it was my only option. Even after all these years it still bothers me.
 
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Even though my life would be completely different and I wouldn't have met my fiancé, I completely regret Uni. I picked an English course I ended up hating because I was told I could get into any job with it (Yeah, OK). I wish I had picked Graphic Design, but part of me didn't think I would be good enough.
I also massively regret not living away from home for uni.
bleeping hindsight 🙄
In terms of wisdom, I feel a lot more secure with my current friendship group. I've learned so much from mistakes and arguments in previous friendships that I am over all the drama of it and just wanna live a simple life with my friends. The biggest one is making the effort with the people you care about. If there's no effort from both sides, that friendship is gonna fade fast.
 
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Ha love this topic! I think back and realise what an annoying knobhead and so blinkered to anything other that my own little world I was. I didn’t mean to be, I just lacked self awareness which has grown more over time. I cringe at a few things I’ve said and done 😬😂

I can still be obnoxious if I’m feeling that way out, but I try to keep it in check and apologise if I realise I’ve upset someone when I shouldn’t have. I hope I’m still living and learning every day.
 
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I know that when I was in my early teens I could never keep off social media (Facebook or MySpace, in particular). Always wanted to have lots and lots of virtual friends, and was stupid enough and naive enough to be far too indiscreet with my private life on a public forum such as Fb.

Got burnt a few times during sexcam conversations with what I thought were other teenaged girls, but were in fact old blokes with bogus names and profiles.

I always felt social media was like a virtual sister to me at times - always good to have close by, and sometimes open up one's feelings too, in the hope of getting some good advice by my so-called "friends". But by and large it never worked liked that, and ever since then I have very much pulled up the drawbridge to most social media platforms.
 
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I've been thinking about my past all week! Not sure why. I've got tuns of regret. I work on my own quite a lot and my thoughts run away with me. I end up cringing at certain things I've said and done!

For some reason I can't stop thinking about my first ever boyfriend. I really liked him but I was 14/15 at the time and after a year or so of being with him, I wanted to be free and single and talk to other boys I guess. I remember saying to him when we broke up that I wish we'd met when we where older. Still regard him as one of the best boyfriend I've had though. Am nearly 30 now. I keep stalking him and his wife on Facebook. I need to stop 😂 really happy for him that he is happily married now but I keep thinking in my head of sceneraios where I'd bump into him and what I would say. I haven't seen him for such a long time so I'm guessing it's just curiosity and wondering 'what if' 😏


I do this sometimes it is an awful habit. I once ended up on an Ex's mum's facebook (who i had not met) and accidently liked her pictures 😮😖
 
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This is going to sound horrible, I regret falling for my OH. We have been married for 16 years and I am pretty happy with him. But I am not happy where I ended up. He is american and I really wish I would have found a european man instead. I miss my family terribly and I don't like living in the US. I always feel like a stranger even after living here for 15 years. Unfortunately he has no desire of ever moving anywhere else. I feel stuck! So as much as I love him I don't think I would marry him if I could get a do over.
 
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I regret being so shy in my teenage/early adult years. I lost a lot of friends upon leaving school and college just because I wasn't as outgoing/extroverted as them. I was so quiet, I wouldn't dare speak to anybody new! So of course as my friends started new jobs/colleges/unis etc they were meeting tons of people and I got left behind a bit as I was such a introvert. I was ridiculously shy.

Obviously as I've moved up into the world of work I have come out of my shell a bit, I would say I'm still introverted but I'll definitely speak to new people now. Looking back, I regret not pushing myself to be more outgoing. I always look back and think that people must have looked at me as that "weird girl who never speaks" or "hides behind her friends".
 
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This is going to sound horrible, I regret falling for my OH. We have been married for 16 years and I am pretty happy with him. But I am not happy where I ended up. He is american and I really wish I would have found a european man instead. I miss my family terribly and I don't like living in the US. I always feel like a stranger even after living here for 15 years. Unfortunately he has no desire of ever moving anywhere else. I feel stuck! So as much as I love him I don't think I would marry him if I could get a do over.
How do you feel when you think of yourself in this same position 5/10 years from now?
If its the same as how you're feeling now, perhaps its time to have some discussions with your partner.
 
I regret being so shy in my teenage/early adult years. I lost a lot of friends upon leaving school and college just because I wasn't as outgoing/extroverted as them. I was so quiet, I wouldn't dare speak to anybody new! So of course as my friends started new jobs/colleges/unis etc they were meeting tons of people and I got left behind a bit as I was such a introvert. I was ridiculously shy.

Obviously as I've moved up into the world of work I have come out of my shell a bit, I would say I'm still introverted but I'll definitely speak to new people now. Looking back, I regret not pushing myself to be more outgoing. I always look back and think that people must have looked at me as that "weird girl who never speaks" or "hides behind her friends".
I don’t think that’s something to regret. That’s just who you are and there is nothing to be regretful about. I was a loud and obnoxious private school toff. People must have hated me. But it’s who I was at the time. It isn’t a reflection of who I am now x
 
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It's always human instinct to think about your past mistakes, especially when you're currently going through a bad patch like the end of a relationship. We rarely look back and reflect when things are going well for us because we don't want to be lumbered with dark thoughts while the going is good.

I always look at back through all my diaries (old style book ones) and remind myself of the many highs and lows, which all go to shape one's life and make them a better person hopefully. In some cases we keep on making the same mistakes, and try as we might we just don't know how to fix them for the next time around.

I'm currently going through a bad patch, and typically I am listening to sad songs, looking at old photos, reading old messages and so on. But I know in a few days time I will probably get through all this melancholy and move on to those highs again.

It's all a matter of degree I suppose, but I think it makes us better people in the end.
 
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Gosh, I have a few. I think my main one is the time I spent a few weeks in Spain when I was 17. It was a fantastic opportunity and I even met one of my best friends there, but I spent the entire time bitching and whining and not truly appreciating how lucky I was. I try not to be overly harsh on myself because I was in an incredibly bad patch of depression and anxiety at the time, which I wasn't dealing with and refused to acknowledge (therefore making it a whole lot worse), and because of being in such a bad mental place I can hardly remember anywhere we went or what we did. I look like such a sour puss in most of the photos too, which is a terrible look! I've definitely grown up a lot since then, and I'm dealing a lot better with my mental health besides. I rarely think "I wish I could go back and do it all better!" with things that happen in life, but if I could go back and do Spain again now then I would.
 
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I regret most of my late teens and early twenties. Stoned out of my head most days, cannot remember most of those years for the life of me, just bits and pieces. Don't know how the heck I even functioned or managed to hold down a job and relationships. I now have a big chunk of my life missing and instead of using my teens and early twenties to explore, travel and ~find myself~ I basically wasted it away. Sometimes wish I could throw my whole ass self away and start again.
 
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I don't know whether I'd say I regret this, because I love my now husband to pieces and can't imagine being with anyone else.

But I do sometimes wonder 'what if'... basically in my first year of uni I had this housemate, let's call him Dave, who I was really, really close with but initially completely as mates. We had so much in common, we were so comfortable with each other and would regularly go out and be each others wingman/woman. He got with a couple of my mates and I his (ie just drunken kisses on nights out), there was no jealousy at all.

However towards the end of 2nd year we ended up admitting we both had feelings for each other and tentatively started (what I thought was casually) dating. Despite living together we took things slow and didn't sleep with each other (just everything but lol). However this was towards the summer and we were both going home to different parts of the country. We were both not massively great at keeping in touch and during the summer I had a bit of a tryst with an older guy who turned out to be an utter dick. Went back to uni and wanted to carry things on with Dave and was truthful about what I'd been up to. Turns out Dave was extremely hurt and saw this as cheating, in hindsight I guess it was but in my defence we had never clarified what we were! Anyway we ended up drifting apart to the point where all contact cut off despite my efforts (we weren't living together in 3rd year as he was living with mates from his course and I with mine). I still occasionally stalk him on social media and wonder what if. Probably the hardest part was losing the friendship. I think I'd be such a different person (in a good way) if we were still in contact, he brought out a side of me that I don't think I've ever really seen since we stopped speaking.
 
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I find I do this most nights. If I don’t have anything else to worry about I fixate on things from the past. I can never just let myself relax it’s like I have to feel bad constantly or I feel bad for not feeling bad.
 
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I’ve decided I no longer believe in regret because at one point I was totally consumed by my mistakes which believe me, are significant. If I could turn back time, I’d go back to being 21 and do things differently and hopefully have someone to tell me that if I didn’t stop being an obnoxious, self destructive twit that things would go the way they have. That being said, I like to think these days I’m less of an obnoxious self destructive twit then I used to be so every cloud and all that.
 
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I’d be wary of someone who didn’t do this. Not saying that people should live their lives full of regrets but if someone said they honestly had no regrets or felt bad or had any self reflection on themselves and their behaviour in the last decade I would think they are either:

Lying
Have a staggering lack of self awareness
Aren’t empathetic to anybody’s feelings but their own
Immature
See themselves as perfect and beyond criticism

None of which would particularly draw me to a person and make me want to know more about them/be friends with them
 
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