Relationship or Baby

For those saying cherish being a step mum, its nothing like the same. The closest thing I see in friends who don’t have DCs is being a dog mum tbh!! But I’d be cherishing your own life, not being a pseudo parent to someone else’s kids. Plan adventures to fill you up and nourish your soul and let you experience the world. Don’t tie yourself down to your DP’s children, all the responsibility and a fraction of the reward. Be like a lovely aunt to them, let their dad do the parenting on his time while you travel, learn, relax and make space for your own interests.

I can totally understand why you are torn on this. As someone who had DCs quite young these are my thoughts:

I had health complications after DC1’s birth which gave left me low on energy and with pain, depression etc. Obviously the fact I went on to have more DCs it wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but consider the physical toll pregnancy, birth and the possible after effects could have on your ability to solo parent. I had XH around but he wasn’t hugely helpful. But I’d have really struggled alone.

As you approach menopause and your oestrogen levels drop you can lose those nurturing feelings. Whether its because for many of us we’ve already put in years of hard work, or its a completely hormone driven shift, but a lot of us find that in our 50s we just want to be left in peace! Caring for a clingy child at my stage of life sounds hellish.

Having been a single parent to older children (mine were 6,8 & 12 when I split with their dad) wasn’t actually that hard. I did get one night a week off to go out with friends or on dates and I got financial support from their dad. You sound like you’d be ok for money, so as long as you have some practical support to give you a break you'd be fine.

However, meeting a new man late 40/early 50s is going to be haaard! Dating has changed a lot lately and many of the men on apps are married, just after sex, looking for a 3rd for their ENM open relationship, just wanting to chat and/or send photos. They’re grim.

I have met many men and would honestly say if you’ve got a decent one, keep hold of him. Of course there’s nothing to say that he’ll be the one forever but a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

Final thoughts FWIW, your DP needs to be 100% clear on the level of sacrifice you’re making for him. It may be that your resentment tarnishes the relationship or it may be that he realises how much you love him to have chosen this life. He needs to ask himself if he can really step up. I’d hate to imagine you choose him, only for him to waltz off with some 27 year old woman from the gym in a couple of years and have a baby with her.

To kind-of-quote Carrie from Sex and the City, as I can’t find the actual quote, you need to be clear on the answer to the hardest question a woman has to ask “will you love me enough to make up for the baby I didn’t have?”

@Lostcat , i don't think they are less valuable, but if one is looking at having a baby, and there is an increased risk of disability, there are considerations to factor in.

If the mother becomes a full-time carer for her child, what happens when the mother is no longer capable of doing the caring? Does anyone imagine being a frail woman in her 80s looking after an adult child (in his or her 40s or older)?
What happens when the mother dies?

Relevance?

Also it’s really not a question that can be answered in general is it?

Not least it would entirely depend on the nature of the disability wouldn’t it?
You do realise there are all kinds of disabilities and they affect people in all kinds of different ways, right?
And that disability is also a function of the social/ physical environment into which a person is born?

Secondly, how does one start weighing the question of whether it’s more “fair” for a person to exist in certain circumstances or to never exist at all? The question barely makes sense, let alone has an easily accessible answer. I’m not god and neither are you.

Most importantly none of this is relevant to my objections to the harmful and ignorant comments that people made on this thread, implying that children born with disabilities are less valuable and less worth the sacrifice than non-disabled children, and that their very existence is regrettable.

@AlertCat Because let’s be real: nobody who is imagining themselves as a parent is picturing themselves parenting a child- or an adult- with severe and lifelong additional needs.
Fantasise is the wrong word there, but when deciding to have children, I did think long and hard about if I was prepared to be a parent to a child with disabilities.
A close relative had a baby as a single mother, and despite never having complained it's been quite tough for them.

The mother had her baby in her mid-20s and it was not something at the time that could have been tested for before birth.

Yes I agree.

But don't you agree that if, for a sake of example, the couple/woman know that they have a very high probability of having a child with disability it wouldn't be faire on the future child to still actively conceive them and give birth, saying "I don't care and would love the child all the same".

I think at 43 the ship has sailed.

Of course there are fertility doctors who will quote success rates and sell you treatment. BUT they are salesmen who make their money by selling hope.

HFEA quotes a 6% pregnancy rate for embryos transferred for women aged 43 or older. And remember IVF doesn't always produce suitable embryos.

I have 2 children, but I found trying to have a baby in my 40s really difficult, and I am sure I am not alone with this. After 2 healthy pregnancies in my mid/late 30s, for me it just wasn't possible to sustain a healthy pregnancy the minute I turned 40. I had several miscarriages in the 6-10 week timeframe between the ages of 40 and 43, then nothing until at 45 I found myself pregnant again, but I got to the 12 week scan and results gave me a >50% chance of baby having down syndrome, which was subsequently confirmed by CVS, and I chose to have a termination. We didn't try IVF admittedly. Whilst there are positive stories of people having babies in their mid-40s and I really hope you get what want if you go down this route, I just wanted to give an honest account of my own experience whilst you way up the decision.

This. With bells on. 👏👏

I honestly would get a full fertility MOT for yourself before driving yourself crazy with this decision until you know how likely it will be for you

🤦🏼‍♀️.
Some one wrote: I think you would be absolutely crazy to give up a happy loving relationship to try and have a child. You may not manage to have one or, if you do, they could be disabled.

Then someone else wrote something about how OP would be incredibly lucky to find the “rare man” who would willing to take on a child who was not only fatherless but also disabled..
These weren’t the only comments.

if you think these comments are “ok” , I really can’t help you.

They don't mean what you think they mean, and they are ok

OP said, we met when I was 40 and I thought that ship had sailed anyway. I never had a burning desire to have children but kind of thought it would just happen some day.

So she’s never taken steps before now, before 40, to have a baby; and when she met her DP and he told her it was off the cards, she accepted that and had been thinking it wouldn’t happen anyway. She had passively chosen not to act, which with time-limited decisions is in fact a decision with its own consequences. That’s what I think the pp I quoted meant- she decided ages ago by not taking positive action.

By the way you are the second poster who has declared that no one imagines themself as having a disabled child. You might want to start by opening your mind an iota and rethink the universality of that assumption.

Are you suggesting that a good proportion of people do in fact fantasise about having a child with lifelong care needs, who will always require intensive input from their parents and other carers? Far be it from me to argue with someone who seems to know much more, but I’ve never met anyone who’s imagined this when planning/imagining their future family.

I have several friends with children who have life-limiting and life-changing additional needs, and I am in awe of those parents- I don’t think I would have a tenth of the resilience they have- but they didn’t anticipate this for their lives or the lives of their older children.

Actually you need to read through the comments and the thread,
that poster wrote something in response to something I wrote objecting to comments where people were saying exactly that
( OP would be a fool to chose IVF over a man because IVF might not work or the child might be disabled.)
That poster then said she was allowed to feel relieved about not having a disabled child to look after/ worry about (or words to that affect) and I agreed she was allowed and valid to feel relieved about not having a child for any reason, but that comments implying that disabled children are less valuable/ valued/ loved than non- disabled children (which several posts of this thread have declared outright- and at least one was previously endorsed by that same pp) are not ok.

this is a step in your process for coming to terms with your decision not to be a mum, which was made before you met him.
This! It may well be something you just have to go through.

OP never said this? She said the opposite in fact- that she assumed it would always happen.

It is certainly eye opening the extent to which people will make flagrantly ableist comments and then others will come along to defend them.

By the way you are the second poster who has declared that no one imagines themself as having a disabled child. You might want to start by opening your mind an iota and rethink the universality of that assumption.

You need to read back through this section of the thread. That’s not what the poster wrote or responded to.

this is a step in your process for coming to terms with your decision not to be a mum, which was made before you met him.

This! It may well be something you just have to go through.

she would be a fool to chose IVF over a man because IVF might not work or the child might be disabled. Why are you defending this?

Because let’s be real: nobody who is imagining themselves as a parent is picturing themselves parenting a child- or an adult- with severe and lifelong additional needs. The fact that this outcome is more likely the older the parents are mean it’s something which should be factored in when making a decision like this. It isn’t saying that such a child would be less loved or less intrinsically valuable. But it acknowledges that such an outcome brings a whole host of challenges that parents of children who don’t have those needs won’t ever face, and the risk should be faced with open eyes.

The comments I was objecting to were the ones telling OP , eg, she would be a fool to chose IVF over a man because IVF might not work or the child might be disabled. Why are you defending this?

@Emanwenym totally agree with you regarding the whole “woman’s fault “ thing.

@Allswellthatendswelll , they may do, but my post was re. using the term IVF when they meant AID.

@Cornflakes123 , yes, the OP is contemplating IVF with donor sperm.

I get annoyed at the wrong terms being used especially when it's related to complicated things like fertility/infertility. At least it's moved on from when I was young when it was assumed to be 'the woman's fault'.

I honestly don't think you can reasonably resent your partner for not wanting more children when he was honest with you from day one.

Honestly it's not looking like a good idea OP.

I don’t think anyone would disagree that parenting a child with disabilities is harder. And it isn’t what we imagine when we think of ourselves as parents. There are more worries for their futures, fights with local authorities to access services, frequent hospital visits and myriad other challenges which take time and emotional energy.

It isn’t unreasonable for someone to express relief at not living that life. The opinion is about themselves, not about the child.

I can really sympathise with your sadness over this, and I recognise the decision must be agonising.

In the cold light of day, I would not sacrifice your brilliant relationship for a baby. I think the regret is landing hard because you are in that season of life where the deadline is upon you. I'd worry you are basing your decisions on grief of what 'might have been', rather than the reality of relationships and child rearing.

The stark reality is that raising kids is hard, raising kids alone is even harder. It often weakens relationships and your physical health. It's expensive and full of worry, no matter how old they get. That may sound like scaremongering, but they are all perfectly plausible realities. Are you set up for a child with physical disabilities or emotional/mental incapacities?

As an outsider, my advice would be to enjoy the full life ahead of you with a wonderful partner, enough money and all the liberties of good health and freedom that life has to bring.

Lots of women who go solo do ivf and not iui as it's more likely to be successful.