To be sad about reasons behind niece’s choice

[EWAB]

I know this has nothing to do with me before anyone has a go at me.

I have sadly never been close to my nieces and nephews which is a source of real sadness to me. My siblings and I are close but they haven’t been interested in bringing the children together.

My niece is 23 and has spent a long time in The States as sister’s husband often works over there. They have a very different life to us.

My niece is in London studying but is all but done bar her dissertation. She invited me and my sons out to lunch and obviously we asked her what she is doing next. She is going to pursue a doner conceived baby.

This has always been her intention as she wants her children to be only her children. She doesn’t want to share them and doesn’t want a potential stepmother in their life if a relationship broke up.

The fact that she has a fibroid has spurred her to do this about five years earlier than she planned. I am so sad about her reasons for doing this. If it was ONLY because of the fibroids I wouldn’t be that sad.

I know it’s not my business.

I did read that having a child at 35+ is equivalently risky to having one with a 1st cousin, so 23 could be considered a more sensible age to have a child.

There is no reason why a 23 can't properly think this through.

It is a very modern phenomenon for women to wait until their thirties before becoming mothers. Fifty years ago, the norm in many communities was to get married and have your first baby before the age of 25.

I am a single parent and by far the most difficult/stressful/traumatic thing about single parenting is having to make decisions with a giant fucking man baby aka my ex. (He didn’t display any of these behaviours pre parenthood I should add, they all rose to the surface when he had to prioritise someone else other than himself so it’s not a case of “picking someone decent to have a kid with”).

I say keep keeping your opinions to yourself. A very small percentage of children are on the receiving end of a picture perfect upbringing in a comfortable household where mummy and daddy are great selfless parents and love each other very much. Everyone else is wrangling some sort of bollocks. At least your niece’s child is being born to one parent who desperately wants and loves them, that’s a pretty good start.

I Also agree with a pp who said your niece has probably given you a simplified version of what she’s doing because it’s much too big a topic to unpack with an aunty you’re not even that close with. I suspect you’ve got the Not Too Close Extended Family version of whatever is going on.

Why does this make you sad? If it’s something she’s always wanted to do, it sounds like a plan. Of course she’s being forced to do it earlier than planned but it doesn’t sound like it’s out of nowhere.

Yes the ideal for kids is having two parents who are happily married/long term relationship and don’t separate, but realistically how many kids actually have that for their whole childhood?

Most people I know who have kids are either separated from the dad (who a lot of the time is useless) or in toxic relationships. Just look at a lot of the posts on here. I don’t think you should assume a child will suffer just because they are donor conceived or won’t suffer because they’re not.

Mibbes she's been on here, reading AIBU?

If people routinely waited for complete development of their frontal cortexes before having babies, the human race would never have gotten* off the ground.

*I'm Scottish - sod off, haters.

I agree that it's a wise choice. I've always said to my daughter to only have a child if she would be content to bring up that child on her own as you never know what will happen with a partner. She is doing what she wants with her life and that may seem non-traditional to some, but it's great that she has chosen this path carefully for herself and her child.

She's too young to do this imo. I was still making very immature and selfish decisions at this age.

They may well miss having a dad, especially if they have friends with loving involved fathers.

But why is it great that she’s chosen to deprive this child of ever having a father?

As someone with a small baby and a good, but not quite as helpful partner as I had hoped....fuck it, it would be easier in many ways. Like, yeah, it would be physically harder. But I also hadn't expected how hard my life would be, how easy the dad has it, and how much I'd resent that.

I have couples around me splitting up and it's awful on the children and the mothers. To have to let your child go to a useless Disney dad every few days is pretty hard.

Yes, but we’re well established now aren’t we?

How are they being deprived of something they have never had? A happy child with a great mum is far superior to a child in a unhappy home or with a shit dad. I assume, therefore, that you wouldn't like them to have two mums either?

I actually think it sounds really sensible. Too many poor people are stuck in awful relationships cause the parent of their child is awful and they can’t face having to share kids with them and potentially put their kids in danger when not with them.

if I had my time again….

I think it’s far more likely that the comment about a father is an excuse laid on top of her worries about never having children. It is a way of saying that she planned to do this anyway.

I’d have been better off doing it alone than with the absolutely useless dad my kids ended up with. In fact it would have been easier. And my kids would have missed the heartache and damage caused by him. She’s the smartest woman I’ve heard of in a long time and just because it’s not what you would chose, doesn’t mean she and her child can’t be blissfully happy.

If we're well established I reckon we can take the risk of a few women with baby fever making the leap before age 25.

I wish my mother had chosen to deprive ME of the dubious pleasure of a father.

I had my first at 23 and am still in a happy and fulfilling marriage with their very active and involved father almost 17 years later. We have a great life and a thriving family so it’s possible.

I do however have a friend who is the sole parent to two dc via donor and I find it difficult to understand her choices. She has had periods of not being in the best health, physically and mentally and is now estranged from her parents. Her children are her world but in her case it is all about control and I wonder how things will play out for her when the dc are older. Her way wasn’t for me but we are all different

From what I remember lots of people batted lots of eyelids at Ronaldo doing it.

For good reasons.

You are not wrong, OP.

All of that is irrelevant. She is incredibly selfish.

This is truly what she wants; the best thing you can do is be supportive and let her know she has family she can rely on. Being a single parent won’t be easy, but plenty of people make it work and build loving, happy families in different ways.

Surrogacy is it's own concern for me

But solo parenting, definitely not

Also everyone on here pretending they had children for completely selfless reasons and not that they selfishly wanted to be parents 😂 Utter nonsense. Get over yourselves,