He no longer wants kids

Although sometimes when the option is about to fall off the table you realise how important it really is to you! It’s easy to have a take it or leave it attitude when you’ve got time to play with

With kindness, your situation is very different from OP, your partner had given the green light and you have actually been doing everything you need to do to make it happen under the false belief that this is what your partner also wanted. It is utterly cruel for your partner to do this to you on the last possible day he could change his mind. After everything you've been through, I wouldn't blame you for wanting to leave, he has misled you in the worst way and kept it going long enough to trap you in a childless relationship with him. I'm so sorry that has happened to you.

OPs situation is a bit different, they've never had any firm plans to have children, all they've ever done was talk about them in the hypothetical sense, but they have never really progressed further than that and in the mean time they have both let life get in the way of their plans, and in fact for the last 18 months he has not wanted to engage in any discussions about it, and avoided it completely, if he wanted children he would have said, and I do think if children were actually a priority for OP she would have been TTC 4/5 years ago, not leaving it till 40, and 8 years together, to start seriously thinking about coming off contraception and forcing her partner to decide, it is unlikely that she would fall pregnant without intervention now, even if he did agree.

But that's 5% each month, not 5% in total. If you try for a year then it's more like 45%.

Oh OP. There's no way I could spend the rest of my life with someone who knowingly prevented me having children knowing that was what I desperately wanted. It's unforgivable.

I'd get to the Dr asap for fertility check ups and look into donor sperm. I'd rather be a single mother than never have children.

And I think the relationship is over.

Yes it’s certainly not impossible – she shouldn’t give up before even investigating where her fertility is at. However, even when someone still has a good ovarian reserve, the big factor at this age is egg quality – most eggs will not produce a live birth, which means the chances of conceiving a healthy pregnancy in any given month are low. And of course you don’t have unlimited months to try. OP still has a small window of opportunity; if it’s something she wants, her best bet is to go straight to IVF.

As others have said, if you both had REALLY wanted children you would have done more to make this happen at least 5 years ago….sometimes we think we want something but then put barriers in the way subconsciously. Either way I’d come off the pill and use condoms, the pill is thought to sometimes change how women think about partners or even the type of people we are attracted to!

He hasn't behaved well, he can change his mind later but it will be too late for you.
He should have been honest but possibly struggling with his MH has clouded the issue.
Yanbu to split, he has led you down the garden path.
You have probably supported him through his MH issues too.
So you may have given more support to him than vice versa.
Realistically, at 41, the chances of finding and commiting to a new partner and be ready and able to conceive are slim.
But that's almost a red herring, do you want to stay with DP given that he has really let you down.
Counselling may help you both.
If you split would you consider ivf with egg donation or adoption as a single mum?
Or do you love him enough to stay with him and accept DC are off the cards?
What did he say when you said you wanted to split over this?

Your partner sounds horrible, I am sorry.

I don’t think there is a future with him and I think when you are free of him you will actually find he has been bringing you down, undermining and controlling you in more ways than you currently realise.

More importantly, the issue of fertility. Previous posters are correct that many women have children in their early-mid forties, and always have. However, previous posters are also correct that the chances of conception per cycle are much lower and many women do try and not succeed at that age.

You need to work out whether you want to try for a child on your own using a donor sperm and IVF. You will need to find out more about your individual fertility but the likelihood is that you are in with a chance, how big a chance per cycle can’t be estimated at this point but it is likely to be on the lower side. Most likely, though not definitely, you would need multiple cycles to maximize your chances.

My personal view would be if you can afford it, it’s worth it. It will be tough but you have to ask yourself if you have the resources, financial, physical and emotional, for a fight that you might lose, but might win.

I agree with others come off contraception immediately.

Whereabouts in the country are you OP? Someone may be able to recommend a local fertility clinic or specialist because the first step that is certainly worth taking is to go and discuss things with them. Do not delay, and you do not have to tell your partner obviously. If you do decide to go ahead with treatment, let no one, (no one fan nothing!) persuade you to kick that down the road.

Yes, I think this depends on your GP though- some insist that you've been trying for 6/12 months or have had 2/3 miscarriages. Definitely worth a shot though.

OP what you may be experiencing is that surge of last chance hormones that women get as they reach the point where they can no longer conceive. It really intensifies the emotions. How you feel now may not be how you feel in a few years’ time.

Till now you seem to have been content to wait, which suggests that perhaps your desire for children wasn’t overwhelming. I wouldn’t overreact at this point, or do anything rash. Come off the contraception, tell him that’s what you’re doing, take your chances on getting pregnant but recognise that when this passes you might be happy as a childless couple.

My friend had a baby easily at 43 habe birth 1 month ago.

Oh OP, he may have taken away your chance. That is so unbelievably cruel of him.

Yes – although she should be able to get a full hormone panel including AMH, etc. from her GP, for free

This.

I mean who possible it is for you to have a child depends on your gentics and health - so fertility MOT tells you where you are - but you really are at last chance saloon - so you need to be very clear and very focused accept no more delays from anyone and you still might have very few options left.

Frankly I'm surpised you not already massive resentful towards him.

Yep, my mother had me when she was 43. Anything is possible, she said. And so, at the age of 37 I finally decided it was time to try and it took five years of pain and stress and medical interventions and finally I got one at 42. It was an awful journey. Late 20s is ideal, it starts plummeting in your 30s. PP don't listen to stories of pregnancies and births in your 40s and think it can work for you, mostly it can't.

He told you he didn’t want children 2 years ago when you went on the pill. You should have ended things then. 41 is quite old to start trying to have a baby, with or without your partner.

I'm going to throw out a different perspective here, I got together with a man at the age of 40 who said he didn't want kids. I'd somewhat come to terms with it given my age anyway, and didn't think it would be possible so this wasn't a big issue for me. We were using the apps as contraception, and last summer I fell pregnant, sadly miscarrying at 8 weeks. He was as sad as I was and having got to the point where it looked like it might happen, we're now properly trying- aged 41. I'm not saying your partner is the same- but it does sound like he perhaps hasn't given it much thought. In your shoes if I wanted a baby more than I wanted to be with him I'd start fertility testing (hertility is a good online service) to see what my chances were. A recent Times article indicated that chance of a live birth at 41 is 50/50 so it's far from hopeless. Good luck.

Honestly try alone if you can’t possibly afford it. Best decision of my life!

Oh sweetheart, he really has done a number on you.

I was in a sort of similar position to you in terms of age and relationship issues. I think you need to decide if this relationship or a chance of a family of your own is more important to you. Although personally, I'm not sure i could get over what your partner has done to you.

I agree that if you really want biological children, you need to start trying now and probably on your own.

I left my ex at 42 and knew the chances of success for me were slim to none (have gynae issues anyway). I decided to give myself a year of being single having been in that relationship for a very long time and was going to start the process of adopting on my own. Its totally doable - lots of people do it on their own. I unexpectedly met somebody in that year and we have decided to adopt together.

So to cut a long post short, adopting may be an possibility for you if you do have issues conceiving. You do have options if you want to be a mum x

So you will be in your 60s when your child is 20, and i wouldn't exactly call 60s old but what support will your child have as they grow when you get much older?

I mean this very kindly, but if I were in your shoes I would be going alone with donor sperm. You are very likely to experience some difficulty in getting pregnant as it is with your age alone, regardless of any other medical issues you may experience along the way. Frankly the relationship is doomed after this betrayal in my eyes anyway.

I'd rather suffer the heartbreak of the relationship breakdown now, than suffer the heartbreak of infertility AND relationship breakdown.

I think is really late to try to have children. Your eggs are probably not good quality any more, miscarriage, difficult pregnancies, birth issues, sen conditions are all the more common with age, I'm sorry, which can make the journey difficult and stressful. I wish that I had known this before I waited until I was 37 and had a long and difficult journey which required hospital treatments, cans, miscarriages etc. It was an extraordinary stressful on me and my partner, so you need to factor that in.

I think you need to take responsibility not getting on with it earlier, unless you have been delaying to please him in some way, or he has been messing around, changing his mind for a number of years.

Has he been stringing you along, purposefully concealing his desire not to have children, or has he just not prioritised it, a bit like you seem to have, and then changed his mind when you got serious about it?

Either way, you are probably going to have to get used to the fact you are probably not going to have a child and if so, is it better to do that with him, or without him? If it's without him, then don't wait around any longer. House prices are generally not going up, people do buy incomplete houses. You've got a good reason to leave, if you want to, then do it now.

For me the relationship would be over regardless of whether I were able to have a child or not. The breakdown of trust and his inability to broach the subject openly, instead hoping that avoidance and time would make the problem go away by itself, would irrevocably break the relationship. Unless you can get past that, there's no point with the "well would I rather be childless and single or childless with a partner."

Yes, he was giving signals, and maybe you should have spotted them, but I think that's giving him a pass. It was his responsibility to communicate his wishes clearly and he didn't.

I am single parent I didn’t think I would be but we split when my daughter was a baby so I don’t know anything else. There have been some tough times but I love it being just the two of us. If you want a baby so badly I would do it alone.

Her dad has a wife and another daughter but my daughter prefers to be at home because it’s peaceful.

I'm in a really similar situation to you and similarly have no idea what to do. I'm almost 41 and for the past few years partner has been saying that we will try for children (complicated by the fact that we would need to use donor sperm and possibly eggs due to my age and his indecisiveness over everything). After 3 years of doing all the research, getting tests, booking consultations, searching for donors, he decided he "wasn't ready" to go ahead – the day we had everything lined up, had signed initial contracts, and were about to pay for the treatment. That was a few months ago and I spiralled badly. I'm now trying to get myself in a better headspace and come to terms with the fact that I will never have children – largely because of his actions. It's painful. I don't know whether to leave or stay because if I leave I will have no partner, no home, and no children. If I stay I think I will resent him hugely. It's a shit situation that people don't understand unless they have been in a similar situation themselves (and a lot of the comments you get on your post will be from people who had the children they wanted when they wanted them and have no understanding of the devastation you are experiencing). I'm so sorry that you are in this position.