Told she was IVF

[Timbuck3]

Name changed for this:
My wife and I had a child and wanted a second. Wife couldn't conceive again so we went down the IVF route and she fell pregnant. Daughter was born. Wife asked me whether we should tell daughter she was conceived using IVF and I said, Yes, definitely, but only when the time was right.
Wife has asked a few times since and I've always said not yet.
In September last year we were having a discussion, can't remember about what exactly, but it came out that my daughter knew about her being IVF. I froze! My daughter said "I've known since March. Mum told me on my 16th birthday!"
I was furious! I should have been part of that conversation! I wouldn't have told her then because she was just coming up to doing her GCSEs, but she would have been told soon enough.
When I finally calmed down enough to properly discuss this with my wife, she just said, "Sorry, I didn't think it was that big a deal". Even though I'd told her often enough that i didn't think it was the right time.

I'm not saying that it had to be when I said so, but i think a decision like this should definitely have been a joint one with almost a power of veto.
I've deleted the poll as I'm not looking for a score, but just wanted opinions because despite it being months ago, I'm still seriously pissed off about it. I know I've got to have a proper discussion with my daughter about it, and I will, but I think it would have been a lovely discussion for the three of us to have had at the right time. I've effectively had that taken away from me.

my husband told my son when I hadn’t even thought to as no big deal without me there. The wonders of science.

That the wife agreed to wait, but then didn't. That's what the OP is upset about I think.

She waited 16 bloody years, @CharlotteBog! The child should have known about 10 years before, it's a perfectly normal thing to be born by IVF.

The only reason for @Timbuck3 to object (and make it such a grand hoohah that it could derail her GCSEs - as if!) is because he thinks there's something wrong with IVF conception, or that it's shameful.

Maybe he feels it reflects on his manhood in some way.

Whatever the reason, OP's wife has waited far, far long enough to tell her daughter the minor detail that she was the result of assisted conception. When discussing her daughter's own puberty and developing body, it's natural for the subject to come up.

She was BU for telling your DD behind your back.

But you were BU for making a palaver about it in the first place.

I honestly don't see what the big deal is and why telling her had to be some sort of huge family event.

This.

Is this a joke?

Why would you wait sixteen years for a big reveal of something so fundamental?

IVF, adoption, donor gametes, secret half siblings, none of this should be a secret.

You should start talking about it when child is a baby and unable to understand, so you get used to saying it and they get used to hearing it.

Never ever any big secrets.

I'm not sure why your making this out to be a big deal. My child was conceived via ivf. I don't see any importance in telling my child he/she was conceived via ivf. It's completely irrelevant. My baby is our biological child so why does it matter how it was conceived?
Your acting like this has some major emotional consequences in life like your adopted and were not your parents or whatever. I think you need to chill out

despite it being months ago, I'm still seriously pissed off about it

From the OP.

Bit weird to react like that to be honest. Ivf isn't big deal???

I'm on your side OP. it was a discussion to be shared between you all.

Personally I wouldn't have told her at all.

Your sperm and wife's eggs... your biological child.

This isn't a fair reflection of this thread, OP. A great many posters here have accused you of no such thing, and some have been willing to share their own personal experiences from no other motive I can see other than to try to help.

On this site it's rare you'll get a consensus or have everyone immediately chipping in to endorse your position. That people disagree, or might have offered more nuanced perspectives, does not mean they are all lining up to accuse you of control freakery.

There are clearly underlying issues, though, and you clearly don't want the rot to settle further into your relationship with your wife and daughter, or you wouldn't have posted here in the first place.

I'll offer no more other than to say some introspection might be necessary, as well as a frank, honest and open-minded discussion with your wife to get to the bottom of your feelings. You've resented her for months, as you say, and this seems to me the healthiest way forward if you want to repair your marriage.

It's funny you say this about "not knowing about their conception" because mine know one was planned, one was a surprise. Same with me and my siblings - we know which of us were! It's not a big deal but it does come up naturally, same as things like knowing if their birth was vaginal/c section or how they were fed.

Imagine what a relief it'll be to them at some point to think you've never had sex, mine have said to me at different points "i know you've had sex at least twice" ... 😂🙄

1. It's not a big deal.
2. Why should you have right of veto? You were controlling and your wife waited 16 years to tell your daughter, after letting you know she wanted to do so several times previously over the years. Why does your desire not to tell her trump your wife's to do so? It's no more your information and story to share with your daughter than hers. Sorry, but where there is disagreement like this, there will always be one person who has to put up with not doing things the way they'd have liked. Your wife put up with it for years, so I guess it's your turn now!

It sounds as if you had 16 years of your choice of not telling her! It had to happen sometime, I'd have thought never making it a secret at all and saying right from the start was better timing but you got to have her entire childhood with it a secret. She is over the age of consent herself now.

As someone who was born from IVF, I think I have always know. It was never a big deal, I think I knew about IVF before I knew about conception. I was one of the earliest and remember going to a Special Baby event with Louise Brown.

It seems that, although this is not a big deal to many people, it is for OP and by not telling your daughter you have potentially made it into a big deal for her.

You weren't ready? FFS, it isn't about you @Timbuck3. The best time to tell is when the child is ready. And your daughter clearly was at 16.

YABU and a bit weird tbh. IVF is a completely standard procedure and common nowadays, so not sure what you need to discuss with your daughter?

My children were conceived with IVF and they have always known, it’s a complete non-issue.

Why are people waiting to tell their kids??? Our kids knew before they went to school that they were made in a lab - they’ve never cared and now as teens joke with their friends that they can pretend their parents never had sex 😂

Your daughter is 16. It seems like you were unlikely to ever be ready to share that information. Before I got to the comment about her age, I really was expecting that you were going to tell us that she was a lot lot younger.

Did you imagine that you would sit her down and have a family chat with her over the dinner table while all holding hands... I'm sorry if that sounds facetious but (without having read back through all your comments) did you have a plan of how you thought it would happen?

You're very upset by this yes, but you seem to have taken no consideration that she may have been very very upset at your continued silence about the matter as though it's some dirty secret. IVF is not a dirty secret and your keeping it secret and reaction to it now being open knowledge seems to speak more to it being a possible deep-rooted source of shame for you.

Perhaps you need to have a rational/non confrontational conversation with about how the conversation went down. Perhaps your wife and daughter were having a general.conversation about IVF and, for her, it was the right time. They may have been talking about social media couple "Cole and Abbie" who post regularly about their reciprocal IVF journey, warts and all (and about other things too). Perhaps your daughter was curious and asked questions and it was the right time for that conversation and evolved organically. But because your wife hasn't insisted on it being a secret, she didn't see the need or value in stopping the conversation to run it by you first 🤷🏼‍♀️

I mean you have three choices really, don't get over it, get over it or talk about it calmly with her and see if you can move on.

Is the issue @Timbuck3 that you had to have IVF due to the lack of motility of your sperm or a low sperm count or something? You seem to be very insecure and fearful about revealing the truth of this procedure for some reason. Is it because you don't want to reveal the reasons why you needed IVF as a couple?

16 years, you had enough time

@floralminimalist I think some people forget how long IVF has been around! I’m in my 50s and clearly remember Louise being born 😄

I think your wife should have laid it on the open and told you she was telling her. Or it should have always been an open fact.

She was 16. You made this into a much bigger deal than it needed to be. Putting it off and putting off made it a ‘thing’. There’s not a chance there was never the right time in 16 years.

i think you should have been aware she was going to be told and part of it. But it should have happened a long time before. It never needed to be something she needed to be sat down and told. But I think if your wife disagreed with you she should have been open about that, but it should have happened years ago.

Some children at my school were from a family of 7. None of the children could look these parents straight in the face: imagine people being so debauched as to have had sex a grand total of 7 times!

Sixteen!!! lol. Come off it.