Would you sacrifice marriage and children for love?

[Cheeeseeverywhere]

Just curious. Say if you really wanted to be married and have a child, and your partner didn't for whatever reason (just wasn't ready or didn't want the commitment). Would you be prepared to forgive and stay as a girlfriend/boyfriend forever?

Yes because I was ambivalent about having kids.

I'm now very happy I didn't have them.

@maxelly

But I would like to gently the probe the implied consensus on the thread that marriage and children are automatically/naturally things that all (or most) women would/should want and that you're 'sacrificing' something or agreeing to a lack of respect or protection in your relationship if you don't have either/both, without knowing the full circumstances.

Totally agree and I think part of the problem is that as women we are told relentlessly from infancy that this is what we are supposed to want so it’s therefore quite hard to separate what we actually want from what we think we want.

Plenty of women have children because it’s a default and discover later that it hasn’t made them happy.

I never had any desire to be married: never appealed to me in the slightest (although I did get married for practical reasons). But following my divorce marriage makes no sense to me at all at any level and wild horses wouldn’t drag me into it.

Love, marriage and children are three totally different things which can come as a package deal but in reality you are better off considering them on their individual merits to you in your circumstances. Rather than assuming they are all part of the same transaction.

No op. It’s your life. So seek what you want don’t settle for what he wants. Marriage isn’t that important to me but having children was. So I wouldn’t have settled with someone who didn’t see that in their future. Happily unmarried (although engaged) with three beautiful girls.

No.

One of my friends has but I don’t think she chose love per se. He was clear on no marriage or kids from the beginning and has stuck to it but they’ve broken up regularly as she asks him to change his mind, he says no, they split, she says oh okay then and they get back together.

I think she can’t have wanted children that much as she’s a great catch and could have found someone else to have them with. Marriage is still a bone of contention there as it doesn’t have the shelf life children do. But if he did agree all this time later I think the shine has come off it anyway as it would be him giving in. They’re both wonderful people, it’s sad.

I think I saw your other thread OP. Cut and run. Don’t waste your years.

No because I always wanted a family. If I stayed with someone knowing that would never happen the resentment would have destroyed the relationship anyway

I'd love to marry my partner, but would settle for long term relationship without it. But, if we decided to have a child, i'd want to marry first.

Most people want children because it is one of the most rewarding adventures in life.

OP do you want to expand more on your situation and people can offer you some more specific advice?

As you want DC wouldn’t increase your risk of not being able to have biological DC - with or without a partner - for this man. Unless you’d be OK with the scenarios PPs have outlined, eg you having no DC and him having them with someone else.

I'd have sacrificed children for love (it would just have been a different path) but but not marriage too.

Most people think they want children. Certainly most women. And the majority of people who have children will come to love them.

But I think it’s also true that a lot of women could have achieved far more without children than they could by having them. Children can massively limit a woman’s potential and while most people make some sort of peace with it, it’s a kind of wasted potential for many people.

Of course a major reason for this is the unwillingness of men to support women who have children. Which is a whole other thread. But I think assuming that children are always going to enhance your life is a mistake far too many women make.

I don’t think the sacrifice is relevant - it is that one partner is doing all of the sacrificing. That could be not moving abroad, not taking on a dream job - whatever it is a relationship requires compromise and if one partner isn’t willing to look beyond their own horizons then it won’t work and will only breed resentment

you would sacrifice for love but either they won’t or they don’t love you the same

No. If you want children you’d be a fool to give it up for love. They could easily dump you and decide they do want children with the next person and it could be too late for you.

I was so set on having children I made it an early relationship topic - better to
nip something in the bud early if we weren’t aligned. Fortunately we were and lucky to have children (with a few losses along the way).

Nothing could replace the hole in my heart that not having children would have left. I knew that before having children and know that even more so now

It’s a deal breaker really, isn’t it? If you wanted children then being with someone who absolutely didn’t wouldn’t be long-term.
Same for marriage, though at least with marriage you can get legal protection via wills etc.
I did want kids, DW wasn’t sure but we had them and she’s an amazing mother with no regrets…

No, I'd prefer to have children than to have a husband.

Yep I had an ex in my teens, wasn't with him a huge amount of time (friends for 3 years dated for 6 months at 17/18 so nothing hugely 'serious') but who said he absoloutly would not ever want to get married or have kids if we did talk about the future.

Pretty sure he cheated on me (couldn't prove it), then he dumped me out of the blue and got with another girl. Proudly telling everyone (shouting if from the rooftops practically) within 3 months how she was 'the one' and he was going to marry her.

Funny thing is she didn't want to get marred or have kids either, 5 years later she then broke his heart. Both have now gone on to marry and have kids with other people.

Seems he didn't want to settle with 'me' and she didn't want to settle with 'him'... all 3 of us did go on to get married and have kids though though.

I don't think any viable long term love includes significant individual sacrifices.

I would've been fine without kids, but if I was in a relationship I would definitely want marriage.

I don’t think either person in a relationship should have to sacrifice their life goals for a relationship. So no.

In my early 30's I broke up with (so far) the love of my life as he changed his mind regarding marriage and kids and it was THE most important thing in my life.
I wanted to be free to meet someone who would be a good husband and father.

Unfortunately, I'm now nearly 40 and single and childless.

Over the years since him, there have been a couple of men who would have married me and had children with me quite quickly but I didn't love them and, being honest they wouldn't have been much fun as fathers, they struggled to let go and were quite miserly. I believe in marriage for life and with these two men it felt like a death sentence.

So I could have had love but no marriage/kids.

Or marriage/kids but no love.

The pandemic stole some time from me in terms of dating which I can't get back.

And I wanted SO much to be a mother that not having kids made me suicidal around age 35.

However, I don't have any serious regrets. The love of my life would have been a terrible father. I would have been an unhappy wife and mother had I married either of the other two men, and I doubt our kids would have had happy childhoods. The sperm donor route is something that I cannot personally reconcile with my own value system and I'd find it very hard to live with myself intentionally creating a fatherless child for my own selfish reasons.

So life worked out this way, and as painful as it has been slowly seeing motherhood ebbing away from me, I've ultimately accepted it and don't regret my choices.

It was always going to be love + marriage + kids, or nothing. I've stayed free to meet the right man to have all that with. The wrong man is not worth losing that freedom for.

Having a baby in the future was a non negotiable for me. I wasn’t prepared to sacrifice that for a man.

No. Relationships should be equal. If I wanted to be married and he didn't for whatever reason (not ready, didn't want the commitment) then clearly there are not equal feelings on both sides.

The one prepared to sacrifice all for love clearly has much stronger feelings for the commitment phobic, not ready to give up their freedom other person.

That's not an equal relationship. Find someone who loves you as much as you love them. Or stay single. But don't ever make someone a priority if you are only an option to them.

Oh and my "love of my life" (so far!) ex, is nearly 40 too and still childless and he is likely to remain that way. He did marry, but before I ended things with him, seemed to change his mind re marriage and started planning to propose to me anyway though he was clear he'd never want kids and in his own words couldn't be a "traditional" husband. He hasn't been a great husband to his wife, he's leeched off her and she's ended up totally financially supporting him for no real reason except that he is a user and very selfish.

No way. I'd get rid and move on! You only get one life, don't waste it on a man child.

No.

He's stringing you along.