What is the hardest decision you made in your life?

Only because I knew it would upset my mom. I had been accepted into a post-grad program and was about to move down there 500 miles away, when my mother fell ill and developed heart failure (Dr's think it was a virus) and was given a grave prognosis. Heart transplant or get her affairs in order. She was not about to have a heart transplant. As soon as I heard, I called the school and declined my placement. Mom was livid, and we got into it. I told her (or rather yelled) she did not raise a daughter who would abandon her during a crisis. She got me to talk to my advisor at the local university I had just graduated from. They found another program in a different field altogether and got me in . Grades matter! As it turned out, having an apartment in town was beneficial because my mom was always at the doctors, and my parents would stay with me. She saw me graduate from that program and nearly made it to my wedding, but fell a couple of months short. She met my husband (to be) and thought the world of him. I had her blessing. As it turns out, everything good in my life since then was a result of that decision.