We asked retirees what their greatest regret was. Despite the years, certain words, certain decisions still weigh heavy in their memory.
At the time of the balance sheet, there are few who have no regrets. A human life is made of assumed choices, but also for reluctantly taken, which can be imposed or suffered. When the elderly turn back on their lives, happy years are sometimes enamelled with small and large stones, like so many regrets. Regrets which often concern the choice of studies, a conflict never settled with a parent or a friend, but also, sometimes, a non-dog which has conditioned a particularly important period of their lives.
Marie-Claire, 81, says today to regret an argument with her father who was occurring when she was only 14 years old. “He was not my biological father, but I bears his name, and he was the best father there“, She recalls with emotion. However, in the midst of a teenager, she shouts him that he had nothing to say to him, because he was not his father. “Even if our relationship did not suffer, he died when I was only 20 years old. I have never forgiven myself these unhappy words“, She adds. Words that go beyond thought, that’s also what Michel, 72 years old.”My mother raised us alone, my brother and I. She did everything she could to offer us the best, but we were relatively poor. I remember telling him that I was ashamed to invite friends so the apartment was small “, he explains. Even having become grandparents, Michel and Marie-Claire are still children when they think back to their parent.
But for many of our witnesses, the regrets relate to orientation and professional life. Choices we are all confronted with and which, even if it is possible to redirect, condition a good part of our existence. Ahmed, 71, regrets for example to have left school very early to work. “I would have seen myself doing international relations studies, to become a diplomat“, He says today. A feeling shared by Lucile, 78, who believes that she could have done” much better “. “I wanted to quickly enter professional life, I did not listen to my parents who encouraged me to study”she explains. As for Bernard, 74, he has never forgotten this employee that his boss had forced him to send him back because of his handicap. “”I met him a few months later, he refused to shake my hand, “ he recalls, tears in his eyes.
And then, in the kingdom of regrets, there is all this time spent working, in defiance of family life. “”I felt like I had to work for my children, let them not miss anything, but in fact, I have not seen them grow up“, explains Alain, 74. As for Monique, 87, she tells a life spent working and the hope of being able to finally travel to retirement. But her husband died just a few months after stopping working.”When my children and grandchildren tell me “we will do it later”, I tell them that it is now that you have to enjoy life “she explains.