If you haven’t done it by 50 you never will.

Your DB is very happy with his lot. He has a friends and family wrapped around his finger angsting about him - I suspect he loves this attention. He clearly doesn’t want a family. How is he with your DCs - and the DCs of the women he dates?

Leave him to it. And leave your Mum to her pearl clutching - stop putting the emotional energy into this denial nonsense.

Maybe he’s happier living on his own. And that’s ok.

Some people dont want marriage.
Im one of them I've never wanted to be married, I also like my own space, so I dont live with anyone.

Hmm. So am avoidant man in his 50s wants a wife and kids. Except isn’t willing to commit to anyone but strings women along for up to 2 years at a time. Because he hasn’t met “the one”. Ok!

Well if by a family he is looking for his own biological children he is looking for someone 15-20 years younger. What is so great about him that a woman of that age will want to be with someone so much older? Is he financially affluent and able to provide really well? Is he willing to make the necessary lifestyle changes and accommodations that would involve being a committed husband and father?

Do men of that age suddenly meet someone special and settle down to family life, yes occasionally but really edge cases.

Some men want to have a wife and children. Some men want to be a husband and father. Sounds like your brother is the former. He is saying he wants a family like people say they want to be thin, but it takes constant work and self improvement and self denial and prioritisation to get there.

I met DH at 39 after being single since my teens! Things moved quickly and it did take some adapting and adjusting but were mostly in a good place.

Your brother is too old to have a family.

Yeah this is a really good point.

I have a friend who's 51 and he would like to marry and have kids (he was previously married for a few years when he was about 40; now divorced).

But it really worries him that, for this kind of future, he'd have to be looking to date a woman who's significantly younger than him. Especially when you consider that you're probably going to need at least a couple of years between first meeting them and starting to try for a family. So is he going to be one of the guys who goes on dating apps looking for a woman 15-20 years younger than him? Not a good look. He's not keen on being that guy. Even if you explain you're hoping to start a family eventually, it's not necessarily very romantic to start off suggesting that you're after a younger woman for breeding purposes. And trying to meet someone organically IRL who's that much younger isn't so easy either.

Not saying that it can't happen or never happens, but it definitely doesn't help your chances.

My mum met and fell madly in love with a man in her 60s, she behaved like a teenager in the early days of dating him! Tbf she’d been married twice before for more than a decade each, but I think some people do find it easier to fall in love at any age. I’m very jealous of those people. I’m in my late 30s and my longest relationship is only 4 years. I’m a single mum now and would love to find another partner but I’ve been single for 5 years, lots of dating but I just cannot find anyone I like enough to commit to a relationship. I sometimes wonder if I ever will

My uncle married for the first time at 70 and he had never lived with a woman before. He had at least one long term relationship and lots of less longer term ones but had never taken that step. He said after 50 he had loads more opportunities with women as his peers divorced. He married a widow and is now very happy living near his step-grandchildren.

Does he live by himself or with your mum?

i think it’s probably not likely but also not impossible. An aunt (well second aunt) was 60 before she met a man worth sharing a home with.

My mum and dad met the respective “loves of their lives” post divorce in their 40/50s, but they were married to one another for decades so I suppose it’s different. They did love one another but honestly they’re better as friends. My step dad has no kids and only had one long term relationship before my mum which lasted 3 years, he didn’t think he would ever meet anyone or get married. He’s ben with my mum for like 16 years now I think. From the sounds of it though your brother maybe has some problems that prohibit him from finding real love.

I met my DH when I was in my 30s and he was in his late 40s. We have two DC (adopted after difficulties with several pregnancies). But he'd been in a LDR for some years hoping to commit further but his ex didn't want to.
He'd lived on his own but was a very organised and good housekeeper and an adventurous traveller so I had no doubts about him being adaptable. But there was also the willingness to commit.

Doesn’t matter how fit they are now, what happens when they are 15 or 16 and they want late night lifts and he’s late 70s

Look up emotionally avoidant attachment styles.

he might say he wants a family, but he is killing very precious time with women that he doesn’t see a future with. My guess would be is he wants a family in the same way I want to be Prime Minister. It’s a nice idea, but not something he is yearning for or desperate to make happen.

he’s saying he wants a family, but the way he is spending his now limited time suggests otherwise

I agree it's not great, but he is actually very fit ( body and looks😀) for his age and his wife is early or mid 40s now.

My uncle’s bil married for the first time in his early 60’s, nobody thought he was even interested in relationships! Met a lady through his running club of a similar age and clicked. My uncle himself remarried (disastrous first short marriage) in his late 50’s but they had been together 15 years, of his in laws none have had children, 4 siblings, my dc are beneficiaries I’m told (my siblings haven’t had dc either)

That is unbelievably selfish, wow! Trying for a baby in his 60s????

It’s none of your business! I expect your brother would be horrified that his sister is debating his love life online with strangers

it can take until later life to meet the one.

I don't believe that there is ever 'the one'. Relationships about compromises and finding someone you can see yourself grow with and want similar things from life.

Once you let this idea of the 'the one' go then there are many more possibilities.

It might not be The Trauma, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t over-picky and unrealistic anyway.

He says he wants a family, but actually he seems wedded to the idea of a family, without any of the messy reality of it. Are you able to refuse to go along with the notion that he is sad about wanting a family. If you look at other aspects of his life you will see that they are precisely to his suiting, and actually everyone playing along with the fib that he just hasn’t met the right one makes it worse. That suggests he will stay exactly the same and some woman will bend herself as needed to accommodate his preferences. What is his response to being asked about the accommodations he is prepared to make.

The correct answer is one of very few options: he is delusional about what he is being to the table, he is profoundly avoidant in his attachment and has close to zero capability of dealing with issues and lastly his life is great and he is just pretending that he wants it to be different. If you say the two year shelf life if the relationships is constant then he probably likes the easy part, and as soon as it gets in any way tricky he’s out of there. He’s not husband material and he’s definitely not father material with that attitude.

He would have said he hadn't met the one. He seemed hopeful if he met someone, but when it came to the crunch - like having to move in together - even when they had spent a lot of time at each others places. Once a girlfriend moved away for work - he could have easily gone too - then it became clear no commitment and it ended - other times there was drama and he wouldn't want to sort this out / stick with any situation (I know I don't know all the ins and outs of it but this is what it seemed like from outside) as if the desire for relationship did not override some compromises he perhaps could have made. I do think now he wouldn't consider living far away from my parents, he did move home for many years, he is now long term living next door. He has lived a couple of miles away. He isn't dependent on them for practical things, they are company and he does do things to support and help them on a daily basis. I think earlier in his life he might have considered moving further away but now he has no plans to/ I just can't imagine it so over time this has increasingly limited who he could end up with.

He often deflects or avoids talking about it now. He would now say he is now remaining single and that relationships would just bring strife/ disrupt his peace (not those words but similar sentiment) and I've not heard of him being on a date past 5 + years at least. This example of my brother is that it did change - at a certain point he wasn't eternally hopeful and I would say he is accepting now.

My son is 30, no trauma but recently diagnosed with AuDHD.
Great job, friends, life but is definitely cautious about committing to a relationship. His routine suits him so well it would take an understanding person to fit in.

Yes I wondered if there was a bit of that.

I have a long time friend (from the age of 10 and we are in our 50s now) who could never settle down. But the women he thought he was after were really just fantasies.... he was obsessed with Delta Goodrem and would genuinely moan (in his 40s) 'why can't I meet a woman like that?'. He was sincere about it. He wanted the looks, the money, the talent when frankly he was just a normal bloke who never really held down a job for long either because he felt he was worth more and better than whatever it was he was doing (despite not putting in the hard yards). I was sure he'd never - well- grow up tbh.

He did though in the end. Met a wonderful normal woman with a good normal job and they are blissfully happy with two gorgeous toddlers. It's like he had to get out of thinking as women as trophies that propped up his ego and essentially 'got real' about it all.

It fell into place for him- but I suspect it may not for alot of people who have just absorbed various fantasies about what their perfect person is like.

I know someone who met his wife mid 50s she was late 30s. Got married and have 2 kids now and trying for a third. He is over 60 now. He needs to want all this though and have the motivation to make this happen. Maybe he is happy the way things are for him.