I think you've asked a good question (and a hard question, in so many ways).
Life is a struggle for everyone, and it's so hard to see what the consequences of your decisions will be at the time you make them. It's easy to criticize your choices or feel bad about them after you've made them, but you might have felt the same way if you'd decided to do something else. Re-evaluating your decisions is a sign of a thinking person.
Please don't judge yourself too harshly. Just remember one thing: if you want to change the direction of your life, you can. It's just that changing will be hard (but this means that it will be like everything else in life that's worth striving for). My mom started a business in her 40s. It ended up supporting the family for 25 years.
I struggle with what I do and am very concerned that I made some very bad choices, yet don't know how I could have done things differently. So I just keep plodding. A few years ago when I didn't get a grant I wanted very badly, I put a sticky post-it on my wall that says "DON'T GIVE UP!" It's still there and I look at it all the time. A couple of years ago, my little girl wrote another sticky post-it that says, "Don'T give UP MoMMY!" and another one that says, "I love you forever." Am I being maudlin? Maybe, but I don't care. I look at them both all the time, too. They help a lot.
You're right that having kids means you have to give up a lot, but so do many other choices. But you also get a lot. Remember that.
It's perfectly reasonable to want more out of your own life than what you have right now. It's okay to re-evaluate a decision and make a change (it's often a good thing!).
Val (who keeps on plodding)
