Partner doesn't want a second child but I cannot get over it

[Tuli666]

Hello everyone,
I am 44 and my partner is 58, though he looks (and somewhat behaves) younger than me...
We've been together 14 years and tried for a baby when I was 36 but no luck so we went for IVF and ended up with three embryos. One is not an amazing 5 year old girl, the light of our life. The other embryos are still frozen.

Since our daughter was about 1.5 I wanted to have a second child, but my partner didn't. We discussed it so much, and went through a few phases where I thought I convinced myself I am ok with it but I always come back to feeling I am just kidding myself. It has become a real issue in the past year and a half, I've become so miserable seeing everyone in my NCT and friends around having their second, I am feeling quite depressed. Having those two embryos feel like we have two other children waiting to come to us.
We've been going to therapy but it is not helping so much. I understand his reasons and they are all valid, however, I don't seem to be able to move on.

Our therapist advised us to contact the hospital to discard the embryos so we can get closure but I am devastated by the thought this is really it.
I feel like I cannot forgive my partner, who says no but still has doubts sometimes, while I am so sure of my wants and needs. It feels like he's not taking me into consideration so it hurts even more.

If anyone here been in a similar situation either with ivf or not, did you manage to have a second? One of my not so close friends told her partner either another or she leaves and now they have two. I don't want to behave that way but I also don't know how I can live the rest of my life without having another and not resenting my partner forever.

I'd be comfortable having a baby at 40. For a man around 45/46 or so I guess!

Yes, exactly. Dad was 38 when I was born which marked him out as an older dad when I was growing up - until my teens anyway when I mixed with a more middle class crowd and it was less unusual.

He died at age 81, and was ill off an on for a few years before that. But I was in my early 40s dealing with that and fit and well myself, and far more energy probably that would have in my 50s and going through menopause and trying to care for my dad. If you have kids young they might be dealing with elderly parents when they don't really have the energy themselves, being closer in age, so there are some drawbacks.

Though I do think 58 is quite different. Most people are just at a totally different life stage by then.

I’m sorry op but you’re talking about him having a baby at pretty much 60by the time this is done. I fully understand and respect his reasoning, he would be close to 80 before they were an adult.

at 44 you’re probably facing peri now, if not already in it, for me both your ages would make this not sensible.

howver if you cannot enjoy what you have and accept that, then I’m not sure what can be done.

My H is 58 and has always said if he was single he wouldn't be interested in anyone who wanted children or more children- he just feels he's beyond that stage and up at nights etc

Even if you leave your husband and decide to do it alone , I still think you are too old now OP.

He is approaching 60 and it doesn't matter what his lifestyle was like before having children, he is of an age where he might start being affected by ill health. He is being responsible, you aren't and to be honest I think you are being a little selfish here thinking he should be having a second child at his age.

Also have you considered how the child might feel having parents old enough to be grandma/grandad ? I grew up having older parents as i was the 2nd child. Granted attitudes have changed now and it seems to be the norm that parents are having children older, it was noticeably different that my parents were much older than my peers and I didn't like it when I was at school. It doesn't bother me now, but at the time it did.

I agree with this. Yes many people live to a ripe old age but many are also in very poor health. It's hard to predict. My dad was one of those ridiculously youthful, fit and healthy people until 70 and then it was one thing after another. He became disabled, was in and out of hospital throughout his 70s. He had/has no quality of life and is housebound. I wouldn't want a young child to have to live with that stress.
I'm not even 50 and could not cope with a newborn or toddler now. If your DH feels he's too old you have to respect that.

Even if you leave your husband and decide to do it alone , I still think you are too old now OP.

I’m sad to say I completely agree. I also think it’s worth looking into the effects of perimenopause, of which an intense desire to bear a child is one. I guess it’s a slightly cruel twist of nature, an instinctive ‘last chance’ as it were. But I really do think the ship has sailed. You can’t use the embryos without your husband’s agreement and it’s really too late to start again.

I think therapy, acceptance and a focus on your daughter is the best way forward.

Cant turn back the clock but it would have been great to start your family when you first got together (30/44).

Sadly now at 44/58, you are both old to be considering more babies, although not too old if you really want to. You would have to be prepared to do everything with parenting. You need his consent to go ahead, whether you stay with him or now.

I hope you resolve your dilemma. You may just need to accept your family as it is.

Well in 20+ years you might find your children say they didn’t like having an ‘older’ dad when they were young.

Yes, having children in our late 30’s and into our 40’s seems to be within the range of normal these days, but that has no bearing on how the children feel about being born to parents of that age.

I’m also not sure you’re considering the child op. When they start secondary their father will be seventy +. Older than many of the grandparents.

the fact he looks or acts younger, or what he did with his life before, doesn’t change the fact he is facing 60 right now, we can’t change the biological clock. Sadly.

hopefully he stays fit and healthy for a long long time yet, but he is entitled to not wishing to be raising a child another child through these years, he will already be 70 when his current child reaches adult hood and leaves school.

its not something to take lightly and both he and any child need to be considered.

You are both too old for the 5 year old you've already got , it would be totally selfish to have another child . It's about the children not you

My baby is 19 years old im 38 this year. No money in this world could make me want another child.
Sometimes i read posts and it's like no one is thinking it's all about the now but what about the years to come.
At 44 and 58 no way it's too old to be doing all that again.
Your both be still parenting in to your 70s dont you want your life back at some point.
Im not against older mums and dads but it seems like a trend now.

Gently, why did you wait until 36 to start having children? I struggled being pregnant at 21, surely at 44 it would cause absolute havoc on your body? It sounds really harsh but if you choose to only start trying when you’re 36 and he’s 50, it’s fairly likely you won’t be able to have any more children and if you did it would be really unfair on them.

This is really not unusual nowadays. In my circle of friends it would have been weirder having a baby at 21. I had one at 26 and everyone I knew thought that was incredibly young.

It's hardly a trend - it's not surprising people wait til later now given how expensive it is to have children and how long it takes to save to buy a property.

Well as I said, Dad was 40 when I was born and I don't have an issue with that. I have an issue with many other things but not that!

And if my DC does feel that way then they'll have lots of company as most of my friends and contemporaries are married to men of the same age or slightly older and they've either only recently had kids or are starting to have them now. It's much more normal now.

And like I said, just because it’s “normal” doesn’t mean there aren’t negative aspects to it.

It is the children of older parents that have to live with the consequences of being born into those family circumstances, not the parents.

You shouldn't have gone for someone with such a huge age gap.

Thank you for sharing this. One thing that always sticks out in this threads is the absence of any consideration for the child. A child apparently desperately longed for - yet the prospective mother never even seems to consider whether this situation would make for a happy upbringing for said child.

Imagine growing up and realising that your father was basically forced into having you or risk losing his marriage - or the alternative, which is you grow up to realise you’re the reason your parents are no longer together (and why your older sibling resents you). Sure, you might never actually tell the child in so many words that that’s the case, but kids pick up on things. They know when something is wrong.

To bring a child into such a situation isn’t fair on them, never mind anyone else. It’s putting the desire for a hypothetical child ahead of the needs of an actual, existing one - when the likelihood is that you’re creating a difficult life for the hypothetical child too.

To be honest there’s a lack of consideration when it comes to older parents having children in general. Everyone rushes to make out its perfectly fine and even advantageous to have parents who had you at 40 or even 50, but it’s a relatively recent social experiment for which we don’t have any long term idea of how it will all pan out on a mass scale.

I don't think it's unusual but I also don't think it's great. I know for a fact I'd rather have kids young and have my body snap back and be able to tolerate the sleepless nights.

I was one of those children (Dad was 40), and I'm not suffering any consequences from it. From other things but nothing to do with his age.

It's like the people who tell you they were only children and hated it and were lonely. Theirs isn't the only experience that counts and if you were going to base what you choose to do in life on what Janet1979 on the Internet's childhood was like then you would basically do nothing, ever.

Maybe this is partly springing up from those who think being in your 60s means you are elderly, ie "I wouldn't want to be dealing with teenagers in my 60s". Everyone of my generation is routinely going to be working well into their 70s. Humans are living longer now.

60 isn't elderly but it's older. Physical health and resilience at 60 is very different to 40 which is different to 20. Having a 10 year old at 70, and a 20 year old at 80 is just not appealing in the least.

I'm talking about a parent 40 years older than a child, not 60 years older.