You know which country got most of the exceptions, right? The UK. They got a discount on their membership, they're not in Schengen, not in the Eurozone. They got nearly everything they wanted out of the EU.
What we wanted out of the EU was a consensual free trade arrangement not to support an expansionistic political project that ultimately wants to disolve it's constituent nations.
Then if you break it down, there is the question of eurosceptics. Where is their influence? Have they ever successfully reigned in the EU or got it to reverse anything? They are represented in the parliament but it is a toothless/show organisation.