Am I wasting my last chance at another baby?

[MayNov]

Mumsnetters, sorry this is a long one, and thank you if you read to the end. I think I know the answer, but I need some outside perspective.

I’m 37 with a 4-year-old daughter. My marriage ended shortly after she was born. Three years ago, I met my current boyfriend and was clear from the start that I wanted another baby before 40.

After six months, I fell pregnant. He asked me to have an abortion as it “wasn’t the right time.” I agreed because my finances weren’t great, and we agreed we’d try once I had a new job.

I got a job in a new town and hoped he’d follow so we could build a future properly. He didn’t visit once in a year. During that time, I cheated with my ex - which was wrong. The job didn’t work out, I moved back, and we tried again. He found out about my ex and said we’d have a “trial run” and if it works out we can start trying for a bay in December. December became February. February became “maybe baby.”

Now he says because I cheated a year ago and things aren’t great, he’s unsure about having a baby. I feel I had an abortion I didn’t really want, moved my life around, and now live with him paying rent for a house he pays mortgage for while waiting for a future he keeps postponing. He says we don’t have time alone because of my daughter, which is impacting negatively, I don’t understand why we can’t all spend time together like a family.

I feel resentful and used.

So - do I leave because he clearly won’t commit and probably never truly intended to? Or do I stay and hope he eventually means it?

Yeah but then you cheated on him and now he’s less sure about a baby, because it would be a stupid idea in this relationship. I bet he feels resentful and used too. End the relationship, move on and focus on your child.

Don't you think he deserves better too? She is the one who cheated on him with her ex after they had decided that they would try for a baby soon and after she moved away from him. I don't see what horrible thing it is he's supposed to have done other than gone off the idea of creating a family with OP.

You cheated on him. No surprise he changed his mind. You may be financially stable but you don't sound mentally stable. Please put your child first. What a shit show.

You both sound immature and as though this is a chaotic, unhealthy relationship.

Enjoy the daughter you have, put her first and put aside the idea of another child with this man.

Neither of you sound like great partners and you’re both unreasonable but I feel like the person who is most unreasonable is you OP. I can’t believe that you would consider bringing a child into this world in an unstable relationship when you have a four-year-old daughter that needs you to make sensible choices.

You sound like you could do with some therapy and you need to be single right now and focus on your daughter. At 37 yes you’re not a spring chicken anymore when it comes to fertility but I genuinely think that you do have a year to get your ducks in a row, get your head screwed on and then maybe in a years time look into having a baby by yourself if you are able to financially do that with having a four-year-old too.

I think you have two choices really:

1. tell him you are stopping your contraception and leave preventing a pregnancy in his hands; or
2. leave him and have a baby alone via a donor

Don’t count on this relationship resulting in a baby. He feels pressured and unsure due to the cheating (which he’s frankly right to feel tbh!) and you can’t rely on him to change his mind.

If having another child is your priority, you need to take it into your own hands. Whatever you do, just be honest about it.

They hadn't decided they would try for a baby soon - he had just told her to abort their baby. Then she moved for work and he never made any effort to see her, she says he didnt visit once. The 'contract' they thought they were operating within was already fatally undermined by him and his actions, or lack of. She was probably very low and vulnerable.

He says we don’t have time alone because of my daughter, which is impacting negatively, I don’t understand why we can’t all spend time together like a family.

He doesn't want your existing daughter around. He doesn't want to be a family.
Your relationship is a shitshow where he resents your existing child, don't bring another child into this. Go rent your own place instead of helping him pay down his mortgage.

No it literally says they agreed they would try for a baby once she had a job. His reasons for suggesting abortion were totally valid, only been together 6 months and didn’t have enough money to have a baby. He didn’t visit, she doesn’t say she visited him
either, and then she cheated and didn’t tell him, he ‘found out’. She is the cheat here, he didn’t force her into an abortion, she agreed to it because she knew it made sense at the time.

Agree.

If I were to move out he would be at a loss financially and I would probably be better off as I would eventually be paying towards my own mortgage.
@MayNov You know this yet you continue with this nonstarter man. Why aren't you making the sensible choice for your daughter, instead of staying in this relationship in the hopes of some future child. Why aren't you prioritising your existing child?
You KNOW this man's a nonstarter. He's future faking you.

Eek no! Future faking Fucker and totally unstable baby producing environment.

From your last paragraph he clearly doesn't want your daughter around. Leave him - she can't be second best.

What a mess.

I did have a job, and we had a combined income of £160,000 (had we combined it.) We agreed to have a baby when I changed jobs, mostly for the new maternity allowance aspect. When I moved for the new job to a different town he never visited, I visited every other weekend. After I cheated during that year we agreed that we would try again and if all went well we’d try for a baby in December. (Which is why I accepted a job back in the same town here he was and moved back in with him) In December he said February. Now he’s basically saying never but doesn’t want to break up.
I’m not sure why everyone assumes I was unemployed. I was on a good income and changed jobs for a better income and a better maternity package. Everyone keeps assuming I am neglecting my daughter because I want a second baby. I want a second baby because I love my daughter so much and have discovered that motherhood has changed my personality for the better and that I’m good at being a mother.I’m not sure why being a single mother automatically translates to unemployed and neglectful.

I think the issue here is your DP. He doesn’t make you happy. Leave and keep your baby.

The baby isn't so much an issue. Had you been in a stable relationship then another baby would make sense, but the reality is that you are not. You are in an on/off relationship where cheating has occured with a man who wants to not only not have a child with you. but also prefers to spend time with your without your existing child. It's just a big fat no, and by trying to wrangle this into something it's not and so that will work out you are not thinking about your DDs best interest. You sound almost obsessed with this idea of a baby before you are 40, but your circumstances are all wrong.

Well this is bloody foolish. Stop paying half a mortgage for a house you have no stakes in.

yes you should pay rent to live in a house if you don’t own it but this is madness.

you and your daughter are very vulnerable and you want to add a baby to the mix?!
you should be focusing on buying either into that property (will never happen, he’s not stupid) or your own and move out or at least rent it out. Before you get pregnant.

You said your aborted because your finances weren’t great. He agreed December if things were going well, clearly they aren’t going well so he’s put it off. It doesn’t mean he never wanted a baby, it means things aren’t going well

I think it's quite sensible to not bring a baby into such an unstable relationship. You seem to be minimising your role in the poor state of the relationship in the post and putting all the blame on him. If that's your attitude towards your DP it's understandable that he doesn't want to fully commit.

He doesn't want a baby with a cheat and you are surprised !

OP, you’ve been together three years, for one of those years you lived away and he didn’t come to visit you, and you cheated. That doesn’t sound stable. Maybe he was just stringing you along with the idea of a baby and never wanted one, maybe he did want one but the cheating has made him feel the relationship isn’t solid enough now, or ever.

If you want a baby then leave, and either look at having a baby on your own, or in another relationship. This isn’t the right relationship for either of you to be adding a baby to.

I had an abortion because:
he asked me to
no maternity allowance witch that employer and savings could have been higher
my daughter was only 1

He didn't suggest, the OP says he asked her to. And let her believe they'd have a future baby when I bet my bottom dollar he had no intention. His lies and betrayal came first and were greater.

She actually cheated on him, him changing his mind on having a child with someone who cheated on him is not a betrayal. It's common sense.

Yes but then why say: “ I forgive you, let’s get back together and if it all goes well let’s start trying for a baby in December or February or never but I don’t want to break up.” And before the cheating ever occurred and I did get pregnant suddenly the finances weren’t quite alright and he asked me to get an abortion. I mentioned the cheating because he keeps bringing it up and so it felt important however it doesn’t seem to be an impediment to the actual relationship, only to the commitment to a child. And there seemed to be impediments even before that.