If you were a teenager again would you do anything differently?

I also would socialise more.
Maybe not with the people I avoided socialising with the first time round, but I like to think I'd put myself out there more, and go the extra mile to find more people I could relate to.

would have done my Lc and got the job/career i really wanted. but no biggie:)

Be more me and not worry about trying to be "cool". Had to go to college to embrace my inner nerd. Though so many years later I still sometimes remember faux pas that were completely inconsequential, even back then

Edit: and what super furry said

I'd never have started smoking.

Given serious consideration to going into a trade. Quit school, get apprentiship, earn a few bob in Tiger times, get onto property ladder, rent out property, head to Oz, earn a few more bob, come back, then go to uni as a mature student, with having a bit of dough and a gaf behind me.

I regret so much about my teenage years, particularly in school, that it literally makes my eyes pop open at night sometimes, and I have to say out loud that I 'forgive myself', or something like that.

In first year, I was put in a secondary school where I knew nobody. A working class school. There are worse out there. I was lucky enough to have had the benefit of an excellent primary education in a public school in the Dun Laoghaire borough and I really loved learning and striving to be the best student I could be. The secondary school I went to though was completely different. It was all about being stupid and rebellious and 'I don't give a f***". Because I tried to do well, at first, I stuck out like a sore thumb and quickly became a target for abuse - verbal, punches, whatever. I am a 39 year old man now, so this was in the early 90's.

What I did (or, what I felt I had to do in order to not be killed) was reinvent myself to be the boldest, the least caring, the funniest, the hardest, the maddest person I could. I rebelled against 'learning' in order to fit in. And I completely wasted my secondary school education as a result. I was suspended. I was taken out of the highest class and put in the lowest class. When I settled too well in the lowest class, they took me out of that and put me in a different class again.

The pressure I felt was compounded by the fact that I was a gay teenager, in the closet obviously. So, I felt I had to cultivate the image of the straightest, hardest, most not-give-a-**** person I could. I am really ashamed of my teenage years. I did some embarrassing things (although I was always really a good person underneath - sticking up for the underdog etc, and I hope I didn't ever hurt anyone intentionally). But, if there was a school reunion, I would never attend because I would find it almost impossible to reconcile the person I was then with the person I am now.

It took me until I was 30 to outgrow the hangover of the decisions I made in my teenage years. I was both psychologically full of regret and, in real terms, unable to do much to create a career. As as result, I slaved in restaurants throughout my twenties (because no matter how clever you think you are, if you don't open the text books you are going to get, at best, a mediocre leaving cert).

I am in a good place now. In 2011 I went back to college. Graduated in 2015 with a First Class Honours law degree, receiving the University Scholar award twice. I qualify as a solicitor at the end of March 2019. However, having said all that, I am still left with a palpable sense of inferiority that I think I may never fully shed, and it stems from the decisions I made as a teenager that shaped my life until I was 30, and beyond. I will be interviewing for positions soon enough, and a part of me still feels like an imposter - because I am forever haunted by the spectre of my teenage years. It's a tough one to shake.

Sorry for the long winded post - I think about this a lot

wear a condom........................

Retain my confidence , sense of worth , belief in my self . In other words people , never ever , let anyone undermine who you are as a person , just believe in yourselves .

I've no regrets as what I am is what I am right now and I can accept that.
I would probably have tried to see the bigger picture with some advice given to me by not doing so I took the long way to being at the point in my thinking that I am now.

Party harder no regrets, back in the early 90s going to decent club nights(proper raves showing my age now) in Dublin and cork when I was 16 and up one of the best things I ever did ... looking back the best years of my life( wish I did more of it but as a country boy could only make it every few weeks until i hit the big 18 got a job and did every weekend), now a night out marks a 2 or 3 day hang over .... can't handle them much anymore!!!