He told me he wanted kids now I love him and he has changed his mind

[Kassie2222]

This is a long story but here goes…I finally plucked up the courage to try dating two years ago after many heartbreaks and scares. After two years of losing the will to live punctuated by nice but boring dates, a guy sent me a message on a dating app last Summer. It was a lovely complimentary message - a rarity on dating sites. So I matched with him to reply. I thanked him for the compliment but told him we would be incompatible as I want children and he had stated on his profile that he didn’t want anymore. He told me he did want more, but with the right person and there wasn’t an option to clarify this, so for simplicity, he selected the option that he did not want anymore. When I told him this wasn’t true, and he could in fact select the option that. he would consider having more, he seemed confused and said he hadn’t realised.

Against my better judgement, he managed to convince me to go on a date with him. We unexpectedly really hit it off. Sparks flew, I felt hope like I hadn’t experienced in years. I have significant trauma in my past and I didn’t have a relationship for years. I had been to years of expensive therapy to even get the courage to date again, so this was a thrilling, euphoric, liberating time. I did things with him I would never usually do - like stay at his house, let him prepare my food and drink, make time to see him regularly, and have unprotected relations with him. All was going really well and we had the talk and decided to be exclusive. This was also a very difficult relationship because from the beginning, he constantly compared me to his kids and emphasised that I would never come first and I would never compare to them.

This started to get me quite down. I was confused and hurt at the double standard that he wanted me to make him a priority in my life but he wouldn’t be willing to make me a priority in his at any time. It sounded like he was using his kids as an excuse to behave badly because everyone has important things in their lives, whether they have kids or not, and it felt unreasonable to me for this man to tell me that he wanted a relationship with me but expected me to settle for not being prioritised. I’m not saying I expected to come before his kids, but I don’t understand why he would set up this hierarchical system from the beginning when this is not applied to other relationships and everyone knows a romantic relationship is a relationship like any other and if it’s not prioritised, it won’t last.

Anyway, I unexpectedly found out he was exploring other options on dating sites while telling me he wanted to be exclusive and when I confronted him, he ended it over text. During the time I was shocked and heartbroken over this, I tried to reconnect with him and repair the relationship. He strung me along for four months and I later found out that, during this time, he was in another relationship and when it ended, he asked me if I’d like to meet up.

When we met up, he explained that he had been talking to someone from a dating site but only because they bonded over having kids.

We have since rekindled the relationship and we were talking again about my plan to have children of my own in the future. Out of the blue, he told me that he had a vasectomy while we were split up. I feel totally confused as if he had told me from the beginning he didn’t want kids, I would have never pursued anything with him, which I told him at the beginning.

i just feel like he never wanted kids in the first place and felt ok to mislead me about this as long as he got what he wanted. I just feel like maybe he doesn’t care about me or value me. Yet I’ve totally fallen for him and it’s so confusing how easily I’ve connected with him. He is caring and treats me decently, but I just don’t know if his motivations for this is to get things his own way.

I know I can’t persuade someone to have children with me but am I being unreasonable to feel hurt by his actions? I don’t know whether to stay with him because it’s the closest thing I have felt to a connection in years or if i am wasting my final fertile years on someone who is happy to let me do this because he already has his own kids with previous partners and he has already made it clear that I don’t fit into this picture

On a positive note, we laugh a lot, we can talk for hours, we feel comfortable with each other, but I can’t help feel he doesn’t see me as important enough to make me part of his life. Am I being unreasonable to feel this way?

I don’t know if it’s better to hold on to what I have rather than to let go of it in the hope I might meet someone who will want to have children with me knowing I may risk having nothing in the end. Bearing in mind, it has been over ten years since I last met a man I liked

You say he's a decent man but a decent man wouldn't have done this. You deserve better. Take care

Why did you choose to have unprotected sex then? Your posts are very passive.

Narcissist
Love bombing
Liar
Cheat
Puts you down

Take off your rose coloured fk glasses and realise that just because this man is occasionally nice to you, doesn't mean he isn't a snake

You are being unreasonable to even want to be with this disgrace of a man.

He's a liar, he lied to you from the start. He never wanted more children, and I would bet money that his vasectomy was done before you met.

He just wants sex, he doesn't care about you.

"He is caring and treats me decently", no he's not, and no he doesn't. He treats you rather appallingly. He has no respect for you, and remember, he's a liar. He is also controlling and manipulative.

I spotted the red flags on your post from the first paragraph. I know when you're the one in the situation, it's harder to see them waving in the air, but trust me, and countless others in here, they are most certainly waving proud.

You should never have met up with him after he last strung you along. But he did it because (and I say this gently), he smelt your wreak of desperation.

You need to END this, and BLOCK his number, so that any further attempts from him cannot make you fall back into his clutches.

He's a horrible man. And remember, he's a LIAR.

Please dump him, via text is perfectly reasonable in this situation, then immediately block his number.

@Kassie2222 - he's lying. Again.

Quotes from this website - https://www.cuh.nhs.uk/patient-information/post-vasectomy-semen-analysis-information-for-patients/

"Semen testing to confirm the absence of sperm in your semen (azoospermia) following vasectomy is an absolutely essential part of the process"

"Secondly, you need to ensure that your sample is produced no earlier than 12 weeks post vasectomy"

What are you going to do? Also don’t have unprotected sex again until you’re in a committed relationship and both ready for a baby.

Very gently, that expensive therapy hasn't worked. You had unprotected relations before you'd agreed to be exclusive, he's made it very clear where you stand in his life, yet you're begging him fir crumbs. You are worth way more than this I'm sure.

Just end it. Don't think of this and that and here and there. Just end it.

The problem for me is I’m not 100% sure he has cheated or lied. He initially denied talking to someone else while he was exclusive with me but he later said he was talking to a woman he had matched with on a dating site from way before he met me - but that he had made it clear with her that he had no interest and they were speaking as pen friends and just messaging out of politeness. I have no idea who this woman is, I only asked about this as my friend told me that a woman asked if he was single as she wouldn’t want to be upsetting anyone. It just sounded very suspicious and I was totally blindsided by it.

His reaction was another red flag because he became very cold when I asked him about it and he said there are a lot of crazy women out there. Then he guilt tripped me for not having more consideration for his kids by even asking him about it. The reaction was so confusing and he dumped me by text that night. When I contacted him to sort things out - thinking maybe there was nothing to it and I got it wrong - it was another red flag that he took no responsibility for his part in the exchange at all and blamed it all on me - again using his kids to deflect about how bad my behaviour was. He didn’t even consider that I might have been upset to hear that another woman was asking about him when he was having big commitment related conversations with me. And it definitely sounded to me like this woman had been in contact with him, so I couldn’t buy that this woman was simply “crazy”.

He led me to believe we were going to meet to sort things out in a matter of weeks. I made myself available every single evening for 4 months & eventually when we met, he told me he had started a relationship with someone else just after we split, and he had ended things and then decided to meet with me. So I guess he didn’t cheat.

i don’t even know if he lied about the kids thing but the longer I was with him, I just started to question things & I realised that anyone can say they will do anything and you will never know if they are serious until the time comes. But I’m not sure about any of this

I’m sorry OP - I sound unkind and impatient but you are deluding yourself.

That’s an extremely powerful observation. Thank you. I definitely feel that being near the end of my fertility has injected a level of desperation that I never felt before I decided I would like to have kids. I never wanted kids in my 20s or 30s and I felt powerful and in charge of my destiny. Now that I need another person to facilitate me to become a mother, I feel there’s a level of helplessness, despair and vulnerability to this situation. I joined another dating site after he dumped me and I got over a thousand requests for matches in a matter of hours, so I know there are plenty of men out there. There just doesn’t seem to be anyone suitable for me. And years of dating, finally meeting someone I like has caused me to soften and care and be affected by things that normally wouldn’t phase me. It’s caused me to break boundaries in ways I never would’ve let happen before. I feel like I’ve lost myself a bit. But your comment has really put things into perspective. I still have a choice now

WOW. This really hit hard. You’ve really hit the nail on the head. Thank you

I feel like I’m such a stereotype. I spent pretty much of most of my twenties and early thirties having zero interest in men and investing solely in my own interests and my career. I only realised the importance of a significant other after a period of two years in which one of my parents died, I lost three members of my close extended family, a best friend & my siblings all married and had babies. I realised I was never interested in a family before because I had one. Now I am looking at a future where I am nearing the end of my fertility and a future without a family sounds bleak.

I have a three professional qualifications. My career takes up a lot of my time. I’m a published author. I have lots of interests and hobbies but I want a family and a significant other. I want the intimacy and what the rest of my family have. It never bothered me being the only single one, but now I’m craving a close relationship. Maybe I’ve missed the boat

Absolutely. I would never ever date a man with kids again. The relationship is so unbelievable one sided, it’s completely unreasonable. Having kids isn’t a reason to treat people badly. Plus kids are observing how their Dad treats women and male kids are learning to model how men treat women. Little girls are learning what standards they deserve from their male role model. These “Dads” protest so much that they are good people and use their kids as props and excuses for poor behaviour, while they show a horrible example to their kids. It’s just a tale as old as time - why do we fall for the wrong people?! I’m afraid the longer I’m around him, the more I realise I keep hoping for him to care about me and learning the same disappointing lesson repeated that he doesn’t. I guess you can’t make people care when they don’t

You can go it alone, OP. If you really want children, you don’t need a man. Of course this is not to be entered into lightly but the mechanics and biology of it - you don’t have to wait to meet a man if having a child is your priority

@Kassie2222

I hope these very intuitive, clear and intelligent responses have made you determined to 100% cut yourself free of this unsuitable and emotionally defective person OP.

Also would you, as someone suggested, consider going it alone with a donor? And have you had your fertility checked and thus have a good idea of how good your chances are to have a baby? 🌹

I’m about to undergo my third egg retrieval in the Summer. Currently I have 29 eggs frozen. My goal is to get over 30 because I was told at the beginning the you need approximately 15 eggs to have a good chance that one of them will be viable. Of course, this is an average and people can have a child with fewer if the eggs are good quality. But it’s extremely uncertain until the eggs are fertilised if they will be suitable for use. And because none of mine have been fertilised yet, I could have more than enough or none at all.

Initially when I was going for my first round, they told me I was passed their age cut off point - I was waiting a long time due to Covid - but because I had loads of follicles and amazing readings on every test, they made an exception. Because I was older when I froze my eggs, I’m statistically likely to need more and there’s a chance they may not be as high quality.

One of the other red flags for me was I was dating this guy during this process and I accidentally was provided with two boxes of drawing needles instead of one box of drawing needles and one box of injecting needles. I was just saying I couldn’t believe how big the needle was and surely it wasn’t right. He shut me down completely, went cold and disengaged. I did challenge him on it and he said it was my personal choice. But I didn’t want to let that fly because if I want a biological child, there isn’t an alternative choice but to use my body in a way that he had the luxury of avoiding. His lack of empathy seriously worried me.

I just got angry. What has he had to do to become a Dad? He hasn’t endured the physical, and MH risks, the toll on the body, the pain, the cost, the time… He had a good time and a year of doing what he liked while the woman bore all the cost. I know biology isn’t a man’s fault. But men need to have more cop on, and I didn’t want to let that fly.

I find, on this journey, there is generally a lack of sensitivity. I’m frequently angered by having to sit in waiting rooms at the fertility clinic trying to avoid eye contact with men who can happily sit with their phones out while I & other women are going in to be poked with needles and have invasive procedures, while having to endure debilitating physical pain, risks to life, and to make drastic life altering changes to diet and life schedule.

I’m considering a donor although I’m extremely worried about the donor situation and wonder is it justified depriving a child of a father figure because I want a family. Although many of my female friends have told me their kids would have been better off without a Dad, as some are intentionally absent, abusive and uncaring Dads and many of my friends have ended up in the court system. It’s a difficult and lonely decision. The support groups can involve couples where I feel I can’t open up because the men don’t understand and the couples have each other.

Then there’s the practical considerations of how would I be the sole provider and work full time without any support.

I know I’m incredibly lucky in some ways though. After being infertile for a lot of my adult life, I can’t believe my luck that it still might be an option for me rather than a regret

There’s a very active UK Solo Mum by Choice group on Facebook, when I was considering/struggling with the idea I found it helpful to kind of read posts and observe the discourse to get to grips with what life is really like for these brave mums. It might help you make a decision one way or another. Some of them organise solo mum/child holidays and days out, there’s regional WhatsApp groups, and some really useful posts about how SMBC’s handle nursery/school conversations about Dad’s/conversations with the children about being donor conceived/ensuring the child has male role models, etc.

I haven’t ended up pursuing that route so far, as I’m back with a previous partner (who originally ended things because he didn’t see himself having any more children and he knew it was important to me) and we’re now TTC after he took some time to consider things and does want more.