Why so many men seem to remarry and rudh to have more kids

[Ladnj]

My friends and I are all in our mid40s and a few are or have separated from their partners. None of my friends are interested in having more kids even if they are in a new relationship but quite a few of the blokes now have brand new families. Why? What motivates men in their mid40s, 50s go back to having babies.

My own marriage isn't going so well which made me think how weird it would be if Dh and I do split up and my kids end up with brand new brothers and sisters. How common is it?

It's the result of their affairs with women in their thirties, especially the case if the man is well off financially.

Look at Boris Johnson. He had yet another affair with a younger woman, wife divorced him and he ended up with three more children. He was PM in his fifties and lived with a toddler and a baby.

I think they feel young again with small DC. Often they are working less and can relax a bit more. I think it's terrible they just abandon their first DC so often though

I think this is spot on. They were uninvolved and uncaring in their first family set up so don't think twice about how their actions affect their current children when they go on to create a new family in their late 40s-mid-50s. Usually by saying they deserve a life too/they can't just stop living because they got divorced etc. as if that will make their existing children feel any better at all. It's all they can say because in reality we all know that having a teen in your mid-60s/70s is not something people tend to actually think is a clever idea for anyone involved.

I will flip it around, I’ll be honest, I would have had a child with my now husband if we had been younger, I was already on the brink of it even being possible when we met so my the time we were at the point where marriage and children discussions would naturally have happened I would have been close to 50, him nearly 60 and even though I’m still having periods it simply is wrong to pro create so old. We both have adult dc and are all economically independent so that wasn’t a factor, nor was our finances.

I have been thinking about this too as I have seen so many cases when men are with their new wives and with the new children now. Now they trash the ex wife, some of them don’t talk to children from their first marriage, sometimes I do think it might be better to be the second wife ? 😂

I often think the women who have additional children with new partners are trying to validate the relationship, the decision. It’s like a rubber stamp of approval.

Being a dad is a lot more fun than being a mum. And you always have the option to walk out if you get fed up

Exactly this! I don't think men see children as a risky life decision in the way women do...the can usually still work/socialise and get on with their lives without too much disruption while the mum does the lion share of the work and yes, walk away if they get really fed up.

This was exactly the situation for my Ex, who left for a woman 15 years younger, who hadn’t had her children yet. He’s now 51, with a three year old and another about to arrive. I am s, so glad it’s not me.

I think another factor is that men do less of the work for the child and don’t have to sacrifice their bodies…. And heh, if it doesn’t work out, many will simply walk away again…. So having more is not such a big deal.

This.
Traditionally high status men did this (poor ones couldn’t before the ‘benefits’ system -now they can with impunity) but protocol meant they the the original wives and kids were well provided for.
The new face of polygamy in the west is from OLD - because of hypergamy, the few ‘high status’ men (tall, good income, articulate) get all the attention and can pick and choose and so don’t need to settle for one, and the low stays men half to swipe 100 times to even get s coffee date.

I know, so strange. When married to me, my ex-husband adamantly refused to continue trying for a third (this was after we’d agreed, pre-marriage, to wanting 3 at least).

I felt he’d reneged on our agreement and it was ‘the beginning of the end’ for us.

Within 12 months of our divorce he’d remarried and his new wife was pregnant.

I’m relieved it’s not me having to go through the baby/toddler stage at 50+ and can’t imagine parenting a teenager when close to retirement. I do still have moments where I wish I’d had another though and am envious he does 🥲

It would be extremely unlikely that they are in a rush to actually have kids.

also unlikely that these men are the decent ones.

more that they’ll tolerate kids to get a younger woman, or that the reason they’re divorced is because they did fuck all parenting and wife had had enough, so they are clueless about the amount of work it entails

if I was dating, any man who is in his 40s/50s and has ‘wants kids’ on his profile would get a left swipe - not just because I don’t want dc, but more because it shows me exactly the kind of man you are, and it isn’t good.

This is one of the reasons it would take A LOT for me to divorce my husband. I do not want my children having half siblings 15 years younger than them.

I know it happens but funnily enough I can’t think of a single person I know who went on to have a new family even though I know plenty of people who are divorced or separated.

I always thought my exh might but he didn’t and to my knowledge is still single ten years after divorce as am I! (It’s not through lack of trying in his case 😐)

He most likely views that child as his second first rather than his third if that makes sense.

Loads of my friends dads married again and had babies when we were 16 to 25. And overall they were much better dads second time around.
Absolutely heartbreaking for their original kids. Most of them are no contact with their fathers now.

Are you staying in a miserable relationship simply because of that?

Totally this.

Although I know of a fair few women who do this too (the odd on IRL but mostly on here.) Reasoning is always along the lines of 'having their own little family'.

The question really should be why do younger women date old men with baggage? Do they really not think they cannot do better than someone else’s leftovers?

I can understand years ago when they needed the financial protection of marriage and a high earning male, but these days more women have good careers and can financially support themselves.

I’ve seem it a few times where a guy divorces his wife of many years to shack up with a younger woman from work, who in some cases is out-earning him. I’m not sure what she gets from all this? Unless there is such a dearth of decent men they just take whatever they can get.

No! Not at all

DH friend had a baby with a slightly younger woman after his divorce. He looks absolutely shattered....and one thing about a younger woman is they are often more likely to expect him to pitch in with housework/childcare rather than the old school model of the women doing it all.

Based on men I know who've done this, there seem to be 3 main reasons (sometimes a combination of them):

1. Younger new wife/girlfriend wants children and he wants her
2. A show of manliness/verility- getting new partner pregnant makes him feel like he's still young
3. He feels (and tells people) that his nagging/crazy etc ex wife was responsible for them not having the 'perfect' family (where she does everything and he gets to carry on doing what he likes then taking credit for the wonderful DC). Often the DC from the first marriage disagree and don't want much to do with him. New partner often puts up with doing everything because she's already agreed that ex was crazy/controlling for expecting him to do more. So in his eyes the new family proves he was right that the ex was to blame for 'ruining' the old family.

For balance, obviously not all men are like that. I know one or 2 who are great parents to their DC from the previous relationship and gave a lot of thought to the impact on them of having more children with the next wife.

I’m quite sure it’s not.
Generally, the ‘new wives’ are younger, they get all the same shit selfish behaviour from their partner as the first wife did, except they also have the complexity of dealing with a blended family, probably having a lot of the caring of original visiting DC dumped on them, and less money coming into the family if he’s not a total shit and supports his original children. She also loses that unique feeling with a partner of you doing firsts together (eg both having children for the first time). Plus, an aging partner who is hitting his sixties, when they are in their forties, possibly with his parents who, in their eighties by then, she’ll have to care for….. and if she was an affair partner, she has the permanent worry that he will do the same to her, and/or his first wife will always really be better than her.

Men don't like being by themselves.
At the other end of life , men tend to remarry sooner when their wife dies .
I used to work ( volunteer ) for a bereavement charity and it's marked at the amount of men that remarry quicker than women.

I’m more surprised by women who do similar. I would have liked to have my now H’s baby because he would be a great dad and I love him, but I didn’t rush into anything so my dc aged out of me wanting a second (I didn’t want to go back to square one just as my life was opening up), and I aged out of it being a realistic prospect. Also he never wanted to be a father! But I would have been wary even if I met him ten years earlier because of how wrong things went in my relationship with dc’s dad. I would not want to be in a position of coparenting with two different men, or if they had opposite EOW never having any time to myself. Or never having both my kids with me at the same time on a weekend or holidays. I am an over thinker though, I guess if you’re more rose-tinted those thoughts might not occur to you. Or if you’re used to someone else doing most of the parenting or acceding to what suits you, wrt contact time with kids (men, I’m looking at you) the prospect might not seem so daunting.

Isn’t it because they leave for younger women? Who then want babies?

For my older brother it went something like this:
Approaching 40 so have affair with 29 year old colleague while wife pregnant. Leave wife with newborn and toddler. Spend a few years going out boozing and pretending to be 25, see kids 2 nights a fortnight. When younger sibling (me) announces pregnancy say you would never want to go through that again and so happy that perky young GF doesn’t want kids. 4 months later GF announces ‘oops’ pregnancy. Have baby, get married, have 2 more babies. Now early 60s, older 2 kids grown up and independent, you still have young teenagers at home. 2nd wife now in 50s and looking nervous.