What is wrong with 30-something, single women?

[Male30something]

Hi there,

I hate to generalise, so I want to emphasise that what I am about to share is purely anecdotal and based on my experiences over the last couple of years. I really feel I need a female perspective hence me posting here - sorry to take up your time.

I had a couple of rewarding longterm relationships in my 20s which didn't work out for one reason or another and now aged over 30 I have started to date more seriously once again.

The problem is, single women in their 30s are totally different to 20 somethings.

I have dated semi-seriously four women in this age group over the last couple of years (one after another of course!) and I have been unable to take any of these relationships further because of one problem:

All four women are obsessed with jumping the gun and planning family/children etc. Now I appreciate women have different body pressures as they age and the fertility window is not that large, but it seems to me that all four of these lovely women value an incredible connection with a partner at a lower level than they do having children - possibly even with anyone vaguely suitable!

I haven't decided whether I want children personally, but I'm much more likely to end up wanting to have children with someone I have an amazing connection with I reckon. It is sad that so many women my age don't prioritise a loving relationship before children. All four women shared my interests eg exercise, travel, history, languages etc to varying degrees.

I'm sorry if I'm wrong on this - I'm just feeling a little dejected after a split, where for the fourth time in a row I have felt the same issues arise. I just spoke to the lovely lady in question who was upset that she will now have to wait even longer to have a child - proving my point once again. Different priorities? Where are the romantics?

I suppose a good analogy might be with career. Say there's a position you really, really, really want and you know if you don't get there by 35, it's all over and you might as well forget it.

So you're in your early 30s and for one reason or another, you're job hunting. Are you more likely to accept a job offer from a company who says (in perhaps not so many words) "We can't guarantee that promotion will lead you in this area or even happen" or the company who says "Yes absolutely, there is a clear line, all going well, from this job to that position you really want."

I mean clearly if you act like a dick then you're going to get fired, and if the company is awful then you'd probably cut your losses and leave, because just joining the company doesn't mean you're necessarily going to make it to that position in five years' time, but you can see that accepting the job from the second company would probably be a better choice than accepting the job from the first if getting to the higher position is so important to you.

Nothing much that hasn't been said but I will add that when I was in my twenties I didn't want children,or at least didn't want them THEN, and I have had 2 guys break up with me because of it, and ONE guy try his best to change my mind, and try his best to get me pregnant (hiding my pills, pulling the condom off mid-sex, guilt tripping me etc). They were in the same age-bracket as I, and I am sure there are women in their twenties who would be the same about wanting children (although thankfully not many people are as dickish as that one guy, about it)!

If a woman wants children, at any age, and she is with a man who doesn't share that massively important goal,that she is likely very passionate about, why would she stick around to see if things changed?

ESPECIALLY if she is of an age where she may not have all that much time left in which to have children?

Ha, I read back and loads of people said it better and more succinctly than me. Sorry!

I dunno, Bertie, the romance analogies don't seem to be working so worth a try for a job one!

I meant my former post about what his "maybe" means to him vs what women are likely hearing. In the first 100 posts nobody talked about this, but on this page it's all over. I hope he comes back!

he's long gone! he wasn't looking for encouragement to navel gaze. He wanted the name of a town where he could find a fresh bunch of 30 somethings who wouldn't care about missing out on motherhood.

OP, If you are in your 30s, why not go for younger women, say mid to late twenties, that way you can establish your 'deep connection' and your partner will still have time to have a family.

I would have thought by the time you are 30 you would have dated enough people to know if you click or not.

Fannying around 'getting to know them' would be a thing of the past.

I knew DH was someone I wanted to be with after prob a few days weeks. I was 26 at the time.

BertieBotts yes, I think OP has gone. Out walking the labs/writing papers, or whatever.

I think the OP didn't phrase a lot of this well and I may be reading more into this than is actually there but I get the impression that what he ACTUALLY means is that these women want to get on and start making babies really pronto.

Now, I DO understand that ageing is an issue here, of course it is, and women know they have a finite "window of opportunity". But similarly, I actually can't imagine knowing someone well enough within 6 months of a first date to want to start TTC at that point. I don't think I'd even want to move in with someone that quickly, although we're all different.

I'd want to make sure this guy was going to be a good father and can you know that after just six months? And wouldn't you want to spend at least a year or 18 months living together before throwing kids into the mix, bearing in mind in can be like throwing a grenade?

I think, if you're a 30-year old woman, it is absolutely quite right to ask the question early on: "do you want to have kids?" If the answer isn't to your liking, then you move on.

I don't think the OP understands how intense the drive to have children can be. For some people, not being able to have children is a personal tragedy and a huge grief. So it's absurd to suppose that someone who felt that way could just kick back, relax, focus on a teenage dream of earth-shaking romantic connection, and let fate decide whether they had kids or not.

The OP thinks of kids as something that he will want some day, when he's with the right person. His desire for a strong connection with a partner comes way ahead of his desire for children. There's nothing wrong with that, but he totally fails to put himself in the shoes of the women who feel differently. I'm not sure he gets that it's possible to want children more than anything else - after all, we get brought up with a very Disneyfied concept of how relationships go, whereby the One True Love comes first and everything else falls into place from there. If love for a partner does happen to be your absolute top priority, it's easy to never question whether that's how it works for everyone.

But since five years or so is a very short time to try and get from first meeting someone to having a family with them even if everything goes well, why would a woman in her 30s who desperately wanted children spend a fertile year or more with a man who was wishy-washy about them?

We tend to consider it a bit wrong to take a practical approach to romantic relationships. But people who get everything they want are lucky. People who have a time limit on what they want most don't have the luxury of those Disney priorities.

Oh god, OP so obviously a journo! Shit-stirring, lazy post full of every cliche to provoke a headline reaction and such a terribly well-thought out user name, too! Don't you do actusl interviews any more?

Swift, I was thinking similar. A journalist looking for some material.

You don't sound as if you want dc and I suspect women notice that. You sound a bit flakey not a 30 plus yr old man with drive and ambition.
Women pick up on lots of subtleties, just as men do.
Most women in their 30s would not wish to be with a guy who has minimal direction. You sound younger than you are, a bit like a new graduate.