[~Christina]

Whats your biggest regret?

Mine: Not fighting hard enough 10+ years ago for a Man that really was my soulmate.

[hamster-bamster]

Mine: not admitting that I have a problem and not getting help in time when I could have avoided ruining my family life. I am without a heck of a husband and two beautiful daughters this way.

Good thread, I expect it to be a long one.

[Trippin2.0]

I regret not making the most of a r/s I had with a man I've loved since way before I ever really knew what love was... Well that ship has sailed.

[mojave_rose8]

I have a lot of regrets, but probably the worst was trying cocaine for the first (second, and third) time.

I wasn’t really addicted, and I only used it periodically for about a year, but it was the *best* I have ever felt in my life. This was about four years ago, and even today, I think about coke more than I should, and remember the absolute bliss it provided. I will never use it again, but I don’t like knowing it’s “out there” and makes one feel so good.

Ultimately, I couldn’t deal with the comedown that followed (more acute than any bipolar-related depression); in addition, I saw so many people be eaten alive by the stuff, and I knew I had to stop using pronto.

I guess getting out when I did is one of the smartest things I’ve ever done, too.

[Cotton ball]

Regrets are a non productive emotion. We are who we are. We have lived and made mistakes...dwelling on "regrets" is non productive. The trick is learning from those "regrets"...we can never go back in time. Even if we could who would know where we would be now. We must live here and now. Good or bad.. move forward and create our path.

[mojave_rose8]

Originally Posted by Cotton ball

Regrets are a non productive emotion. We are who we are. We have lived and made mistakes...dwelling on "regrets" is non productive. The trick is learning from those "regrets"...we can never go back in time. Even if we could who would know where we would be now. We must live here and now. Good or bad.. move forward and create our path.

Yes, yes, you're so right.

I am really drawn to Buddhism for this reason.

...having no self control for so long. Only suffering has forced me to change just enough to cope but the damage is done.

[Confusedinomicon]

I regret not trying hard enough for my undergrad and giving up too easily.

I also regret losing a friend, but we were on different tracks and bound to part ways. I just hate the way it happened.

[BlueInanna]

Letting the man who was my soul mate slip through my fingers 13 years ago. Because I was insecure and scared to believe. I think of him every day. And like to believe he'll come back for me.

[BlueInanna]

Originally Posted by Cotton ball

Regrets are a non productive emotion. We are who we are. We have lived and made mistakes...dwelling on "regrets" is non productive. The trick is learning from those "regrets"...we can never go back in time. Even if we could who would know where we would be now. We must live here and now. Good or bad.. move forward and create our path.

I have even more regrets than I can count, maybe I can evolve above regrets someday. Work in progress. I am a very emotional being, it is my nature. Regrets probably serve a purpose and are secondary emotion to the primary ones of fear, pain, confusion, sense of injustice. Just things that need to be processed. Are all regrets emotions? Or thoughts? I have trouble separating thoughts from emotions.

[Miss Laura]

My biggest regret is... The suicide note I wrote in work while working with a Service User. I had hit an all time low! I was too suicidal for my own good. I went off sick hours after writing the note. But unknown to me it would haunt me and cost me my job. I'm too unstable well I was back then. No matter how many times I get told 'you weren't you when you wrote it' or 'you were sick' I still regret it. I lost the trust of my colleagues and managers and also the trust of my best friends. Life was never the same again after that day and I lost a lot of things. 10 months later it came and bite me on the bum and was used against me and I lost my job!

Is it wrong I still remember what was written in the note?

Not having more time with my mum before she died.

[grey_aj]

cutting for the first time. changed me forever

[Clinte89]

Well I have many that are posted here, But Ill go with the biggest one and biggest second.

Not getting help when my ex said I should have and loosing her forever. I still miss her and love her. I drove her away I freaked out on her to much and I didnt mean to. I just did and now ill never have the chance to get the only love Ill ever truly have back.

I second ajbpdlhjsk comment, cutting changed life forever and today its all I think about.

[bluemountains]

The amount of drugs and drinking I did in my younger years, including drinking and driving. Thank God I never killed anyone, but I did almost kill myself and my friend by wrecking on a mountainside. Luckily I crashed into the part going up instead of over the side. Sadly, I still continued with my partying ways after that. Also, knowing that even today, with 4 adolescent/teenage children, I would continue the same behavior given the right opportunities.

[Moreta]

Losing my job 2 years ago, and having to be in the hospital for 3 weeks.

[hamster-bamster]

Originally Posted by BlueInanna

I have even more regrets than I can count, maybe I can evolve above regrets someday. Work in progress. I am a very emotional being, it is my nature. Regrets probably serve a purpose and are secondary emotion to the primary ones of fear, pain, confusion, sense of injustice. Just things that need to be processed. Are all regrets emotions? Or thoughts? I have trouble separating thoughts from emotions.

I used to be consumed by regret. I think part of it was my upbringing. My bp mother who was incorrectly treated by AD alone was always consumed by regret, and she shared it with me at will, even when I was little. One of the biggest regrets of her life was marrying my father. I tried pointing out to her that I, the person in whom she was confiding this regret, would not have been on this Earth had she not married my father. It did not help. It went on and on for years. I think it is really unfair to subject a growing child to this sort of sickness. I learned regret. There was nothing else to pick up from her, emotionally. Btw I agree that it is NOT clear whether regret is even an emotion.

My other problem is the blurring between remorse and regret. When I behaved badly towards my then husband, I did not feel remorse, I felt regret seeing poor consequences. I wished I could have undone harm but not out of feeling of remorse or pity for him but out of the desire not to have the consequences. Anyone else with the same problem? Maybe it is my personality disorder speaking.

Boy, Morethingswrong, thanks for the thread idea!

Prozac helps me not to feel regret but to move one. Prozac rules!

[hamster-bamster]

Originally Posted by Miss Laura

My biggest regret is... The suicide note I wrote in work while working with a Service User. I had hit an all time low! I was too suicidal for my own good. I went off sick hours after writing the note. But unknown to me it would haunt me and cost me my job. I'm too unstable well I was back then. No matter how many times I get told 'you weren't you when you wrote it' or 'you were sick' I still regret it. I lost the trust of my colleagues and managers and also the trust of my best friends. Life was never the same again after that day and I lost a lot of things. 10 months later it came and bite me on the bum and was used against me and I lost my job!

Is it wrong I still remember what was written in the note?

No it is not wrong. I sympathize. A suicide attempt (not a note - a massive attempt) cost me a cushy job too. Now I am trying SO HARD to get a similar, no, worse, job. And presently I work a low paying job without insurance or benefits, no sick days no vacation no nothing, and am HAPPY that I have it because the other option was disability which in America means poverty. Moreover, that suicide attempt as it became known to people at my former work haunts me because I could not get a job reference when I needed it applying for a very good job and because it is a small world and everyone knows everyone here and it would haunt me for ages.

I regret not going to law school as my father wished me to do. Things might have been different. But I can't complain. Life has been better to me than I deserved, perhaps.

Genetic

[roads]

I was diagnosed as chronically depressed when I was eight. I knew then that the treatment didn't work.
By the time I was in college I decided that the diagnosis was wrong. Shortly after that my husband and daughter both died and rather than getting a correct diagnosis I drink alcohol.
That's my regret.
I knew, even in my despair, that I had a choice--and I took the easy way.
If I had gotten the bipolar diagnosis then, my whole life would've been different.

But I have a diagnosis now and my life is different now.

I'm very grateful.

[regretful]

My biggest regret was following money instead of happiness. I decided, along with my wife, to start a business instead of having more children. At our ages now, we're past the time when it would be wise to have more. I think of how our one son, who is fantastic, will get along as he ages without siblings to confide in/rely on. It is a regret that has, and continues to, contribute to my depression.

[ChristySpirals]

"Are all regrets emotions? Or thoughts? I have trouble separating thoughts from emotions."

BAZINGGA!!!! You just described my biggest confusion of all that I deal with day in day out. Is there a difference? What is the difference? Which comes first, feeling or thought or vice versa?

Biggest regret would be taking on a evil step child, not trusting my gut that he was pure evil, and trying anyways to help him become a loving, kindhearted human being. Would of saved my kids and I a lot of heartache.

[Irreplaceable]

Originally Posted by hamster-bamster

I used to be consumed by regret. I think part of it was my upbringing. My bp mother who was incorrectly treated by AD alone was always consumed by regret, and she shared it with me at will, even when I was little. One of the biggest regrets of her life was marrying my father. I tried pointing out to her that I, the person in whom she was confiding this regret, would not have been on this Earth had she not married my father. It did not help. It went on and on for years. I think it is really unfair to subject a growing child to this sort of sickness. I learned regret. There was nothing else to pick up from her, emotionally. Btw I agree that it is NOT clear whether regret is even an emotion.

My other problem is the blurring between remorse and regret. When I behaved badly towards my then husband, I did not feel remorse, I felt regret seeing poor consequences. I wished I could have undone harm but not out of feeling of remorse or pity for him but out of the desire not to have the consequences. Anyone else with the same problem? Maybe it is my personality disorder speaking.

Boy, Morethingswrong, thanks for the thread idea!

Prozac helps me not to feel regret but to move one. Prozac rules!

Wow....I love this part because it is so true. Goodness...I just had this exact thought earlier this morning when I was thinking about the relationship with my father...He is also bipolar and have other mental illnesses. As a child, I was subjected to too much information....A child shouldn't have heard, saw, or knew the adult things that were going on...My dad was too honest...There were things he gave too much information on....And of course, my mother was upset about it...

[mjpurple]

I regret not getting my alcoholism/bipolar under control years ago, before I lost custody of my son

[BlueInanna]

Thanks for this thread Christina! I'm thinking wow this **** is better than Alanon! (maybe I don't need to go to it tonight - jk - I will go)

And I'm thinking about regrets as thoughts AND emotions. I think that they are/can be both. Sometimes you just think about past things, process, figure out how to do it differently in the future. But sometimes the thoughts can become intrusive and compulsive.

And then, to me, emotions are less controllable, I'm getting better and learning to reason through my emotions - so I won't do things I regret *ding-ding word of the day*.

The point I listed as my main regret I more *think* about these days. I rarely cry about it anymore, I think I have mainly accepted that it is just part of my path, my story. If I fully accept the situation would I still have regret? I wonder...

I've often been jealous before of people with no regrets But jealousy has something to teach us too, about how we would like to be, can help give us direction to the changes we want to make.