AIBU to stay in marriage with issues when biological clock ticking?

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I am 33 (and a half), DH is 35, we’ve been together 10 years and married for 2.

Over the past 6 months we’ve been struggling and I’ve been having serious doubts about our marriage. About a month or so ago this blew up a bit and we came the closest we had done to splitting up but decided to keep going. We haven’t had counselling (I suggested it but he wasn’t keen) but in the past month both of us have made changes and feel like we are making progress - although the anxiety remains.

I really want children in my life. DH does not actively ‘not’ want them and always says yes he’s happy to have kids in the future…but is significantly more ambivalent and tends to in general not look ahead more than 2-3 weeks in the future at a time. This is one of the major sources of the issues in our marriage. For a year or so we’ve not been using protection but it’s not really been TTC - it’s been pretty infrequent and not timed around ovulation, he’s never been a real ‘partner’ in me trying to conceive, he says he’d be happy if I was pregnant (which I guess is evidenced by him occasionally having unprotected sex) but he’s never going to be with me pushing for it. This came up after we married because we’d both always talked idly in the future about having kids, it’s when I started wanting to get going and he was more vague/ambivalent about it that our different views became more clear.

I have PCOS and don’t expect conceiving to necessarily be easy. He knows this.

In our blow up a month ago I communicated all of the above and he said he knew he’d been a dick and would change. It’s hard to ascertain right now if that’s true or not as we are emphatically NOT TTC anyway because of the marriage issues in general and I suspect probably won’t get there for a few months.

Despite everything said above, I love DH, I love our life together, divorce would devastate me, I’m not confident I’ll find someone else. Not to mention the financial/practical impact of leaving. In an alternate universe where I knew children were guaranteed whatever happened, I know that I would give this marriage a good go before leaving, probably at least another 6 months - year.

So my question is, if I want children…. What do I do?

A) (YABU) Leave now as I’ll never be younger than I am currently, potentially throwing away chance of children ever if I don’t find someone else?

B) (YANBU) try and forget about biological clock at present and give the marriage a proper go for 6 months - a year or so with a defined end point to either be actively TTC or leave (this is definitely what I’d do if I was younger?)

Thoughts welcome

Thanks this is also helpful. A great motivator tbh is the want for a child, but it’s also that I love him personally and after ten years with him it’s very, very difficult to imagine the alternate life (not even taking to account the kind of roots that you build as a couple in that time - we own property, have pets, are entwined in each others friends and family… and the embarrassment of getting divorced after less than 2 years with no kids when I feel like everyone else on my life is waiting for me to announce a pregnancy any minute…)

Honestly you know yourself that embarrassment isn't a reason to stay in an unhappy marriage and even less of one to bring a child into an unhappy family dynamic.

I've read all your posts and i know it's easy for me to say as an outsider but I feel you should leave if you haven't sorted things within say 6 months as you say. It's not really fair on anyone involved to continue if you're not on the same page, how would your DH feel if he saw your comment about flirting with me at work I wonder? I'd be devastated if I saw my husband say that! And like PP said it's not fair on him to use him/view him solely as a sperm donor if you're only staying for the prospect of making a child knowing that you're almost certainly going to separate soon after, unless he's also on board with that for the same reason. You can get an actual donor for that purpose and that's a more honest way forward to everyone, including any future child.

I really do feel for you though and don't envy the situation you are in. I wish you the best with whatever path you take and hope you find both children and happiness.

Read What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty.
The problems you describe sound small fry to me. But having a baby is bloody hard.
It could go one of two ways, either the difficulty bonds you together and makes you think what the hell were we arguing about before.
Or it intensifies the distance between you, you resent each other and problems grow.
I'd give it 3 months and explore these issues with a counsellor before you make a decision.
Only have a child with him if after that you are sure that you're both committed to having a family and staying a family.

the embarrassment of getting divorced after less than 2 years with no kids when I feel like everyone else on my life is waiting for me to announce a pregnancy any minute…
You know this isn't a good reason to stay in a relationship that isn't right. Half of those people will be divorced in 30 years.

Op, I think you're brave to put pen to paper on your thoughts here.

I probably wasn't in a too dissimilar position to you at the same age. We'd always agreed we wanted children "one day" and I remember the "well okay then when is "one day"?" conversation when I started worrying about fertility and risks of an older pregnancy.

My husband brushed them aside. We carried on not preventing a pregnancy, but not really trying that hard either. I got secretly annoyed but let work and the comfort of life take over a bit. Then we progressed to tracking ovulation. When we were 35 I suggested getting some tests done "just in case" but expected them to all be fine given we hadn't really tried that hard. It turned out we had sperm issues and later transpired I had low egg reserve.

Since then we've been through 3 years of failed IVF and pregnancy losses. When I see the crushed look on my husband's face when I've had a negative pregnancy test, or I tell him I'm miscarrying again I know how much he wants a baby. But it took me to push it in the early years - I'm not convinced we'd have ever got started without that. I agree with the PP who said men are sometimes less good at seeing the concept of something. It could go either way - but our 3 year rollercoaster has brought us so much closer and I couldn't imagine life without him.

If I could turn back the clock to where you are now I wish I'd pushed things harder at the start and started tracking ovulation earlier. Perhaps also got our "just in case" tests earlier. Or frozen my eggs.

It might be pushing some of those routes that helps you really get to the bottom of where his head is at on this.

Wishing you all the best.

I’ve stayed in a marriage with problems. Massive problems. We went through infertility and ivf, everything fell apart, he had an affair. Just awful.

we are now out the other side and we are lucky to have two beautiful children. Everything everyone says about how hard it is is true. It’s relentless and unbelievably hard work. And this is coming from someone who desperately wanted children.

I’ve thought long and hard - and sometimes still do about whether I’ve done the “right thing” or not. There is no right or wrong really - it’s your own life. But I would say I am so grateful for my children and have a love for them like no other. Thank god I have them. I don’t regret them for a second - even if our marriage does end. Which I hope it won’t.

no relationship is perfect. Follow any relationship expert and they’ll say it takes work patience understanding. Things go wrong, life can be hard.

personally I chose to stay and right now I’m glad I did.

only you know what the right thing is for you xx

Sex once a month at your ages and 2 years into a marriage albeit you've been together a decade is worrying. I'd really try and investigate that a bit. Dh and I have 2 young kids and are permanently knackered. Up early and in the night. He really hates that our sex life has gone from 2-3 times a week to 1-2 and is constantly trying to increase it. I think you need to think hard about whether this is more of a friendship especially if you're looking for flirtation and sexual excitement elsewhere. It doesn't sound like your happy with the situation, kids or not.

I don't know if I'd get hung up on the "how often do we have sex" thing, or at least not as a marker of how good your relationship is. When you've been together 10 years, once a month is normal for plenty of couples I reckon, once you factor in busy lives, periods, illness etc. Though obviously it varies massively and that's fine.

From what you've said it sounds to me like you have a pretty good relationship (bearing in mind no one's is perfect). But it sounds like you might need to push things along a bit on the baby front. Initiate sex at the right time (no need to go into detail with partner). Get yourselves on the waiting list for fertility checks etc.

That's what I think I'd do anyway.