I’ve not posted on mumsnet before, but feel like I don’t know where else to turn for advice.
I’m a 36 year old female. My boyfriend is 33. We’ve been together four and a half years and live together in a large house (owned by him).
On our first date, I told him how much I wanted children one day. He didn’t say much but also didn’t run.
Fast forward six months and he reveals he broke up with his ex because she wanted children and he didn’t. Since breaking up with her, he’d come to realise that actually he might want children, he just doesn’t know - maybe in a couple of years. He said the ex kept pushing him to start trying, and the pressure put him off - if she’d kept quiet then maybe he’d have wanted them.
Hearing what he said about not pushing him, I quietly waited for two years before asking if he was ready. He said this was a bombshell - he’d forgotten I wanted children. He still was unsure if he wanted them, maybe he would in a couple more years. His obstacles are he thinks I’ll prioritise work over children (untrue), he thinks we don’t earn enough (untrue - we have a combined income of £130k), he thinks I’ll be neglectful and he’ll end up having to look after the baby (untrue), holidays wouldn’t be as fun, our house isn’t perfect yet (untrue, it’s beautiful), we need to be perfect together as a couple.
He says he wishes he knew if he wants them, he just needs more time to decide. He thinks there’s a good chance he might want them once the above obstacles are removed. I’ve done 4 rounds of egg freezing to buy him time. He said he’d pay half of the egg freezing, but in fact only paid £3k out of the total £24k cost. I’ve poured all my savings into making his house perfect.
For the last 2 years, I’ve tried to not talk about it, as I know the pressure makes him want it less. On the rare occasions we have talked about it, I’ve made it so clear how much I want a baby, and that I couldn’t contemplate a future without children. He has said if he has to choose between trying for a baby now or losing me, he would choose to lose me, and that my feelings and how much I want children won’t feature in his decision of whether to have children. When I’ve sometimes got hysterically upset about the issue in front of him, he says it shows l’m too unbalanced to have children.
So now I suffer in silence and hide how miserable I am. I feel so desperate for a baby. I used to have so many friends, but hearing them all talk about their babies and seeing pictures of their babies became too painful, and I’m losing touch with them all. I get up early before work every day to clean and cook, to demonstrate how good I can be at running a house, to remove that excuse for him. I struggle to sleep over the worry of not having children. When the pain becomes too much, I bite and scratch myself. I am living in limbo, just existing from day to day. I barely recognise the happy person I used to be before this happened.
I feel at 36 it’s too late for me to leave him and start again. My mum had menopause at 38, and I don’t have time to meet someone else and have a baby. I’d also be homeless if I left him, and don’t know where I’d go. I really love him, he’s my best friend, and apart from the baby issue, he’s a great person. He’s very kind, good with my elderly dad, does everything he can to help me with any problems. I couldn’t contemplate a life without him.
Sorry for the long message. I feel so alone and so at a loss as to what to do.