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Original poster

How to end a relationship when you love each other but have different life goals

84 replies

AllAdrift · 04/04/2018 19:25

I posted a few months ago about my desire to have children vs my long term partner feeling strongly the other way. I received lots of helpful advice at the time.

Since then, we’ve been to Relate and talked and talked. He remains resolute that he doesn’t want children. I know that if I don’t at least try, I will resent him in the future (I’m 37 so time is fast running out). We both acknowledge that if we are to remain together, one of us has to compromise. And neither of us can. We both accept that if we are set on opposing paths then we have no choice but to end our relationship. But we love each other so much, and each time we start talking about splitting up, we both end up utterly distraught. It’s like ripping off a plaster 1mm at a time and it’s having a terrible impact on my mental health (and not doing DP any good either). It’s so painful.

You were all so helpful last time. Can anyone offer any words of advice? Do we just need to tear the plaster off in one go? And if so, how? After 12 years we’ve a house and the kind of interconnected friends, finances and lives you’d expect.

OP posts:
SmileyBird · 04/04/2018 20:21

Then you need to call a estate agent tomorrow.

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:28

I would never, ever advise my child to stay with a partner and forgo his/her desire to have children. I don't think you can say that when you already have children. Having been in the OP's situation, I can hand on heart say it was the best decision I made. Like her, I would have resented my ex-h had I forgone my desire to try for children and so all the beautiful love that's all so rare would have gone down the swanny anyway.

Not to mention the number of times a woman does just this, then the relationship still breaks down, he goes on to find a younger woman and she's pregnant within months whilst the woman has no more chance of having kids.

NFW! I tell my kids to always be true to themselves first, honour themselves and what they want first before any romantic relationship because love is respect, and if you can't love and respect your own needs and wants in life, then no one else will, either.

Call the agent tomorrow. Find another place to stay for now. He'll drag his feet and not go because he wants the status quo.

It can't be that way anymore so you need to be proactive about moving on.

Original poster
AllAdrift · 04/04/2018 20:29

@dragonwarrier Thank you. This is what’s been running through my mind on a loop for the past 6 months. There are no guarantees, except that if I leave I will always know what I gave up.

OP posts:
SmileyBird · 04/04/2018 20:29

He'll drag his feet and not go because he wants the status quo

Absolutely. You have to be the driving force here.

Original poster
AllAdrift · 04/04/2018 20:31

Yes, you’re definitely right there about status quo. I know he’s hoping I will change my mind (but then I’d be lying if I said I didn’t wish the same of him).

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:32

Have you considered that if you stay there is nothing stopping him from, 5+ years down the line, changing his own mind about kids or the relationship and leaving you for or to find a younger woman, in which case you will have no relationship, no child and get to see him playing happy families with his new wife and babies? Believe me, it happens more than you think.

category12 · 04/04/2018 20:33

Has he had a vasectomy? Is he planning to?

dragonwarrior · 04/04/2018 20:33

OP I know my view is against the grain but I can only base your feelings of love on mine. My and my DH were childhood sweethearts, people always say on here "you must have discussed children before" and I always think not everyone does tbh!

donajimena · 04/04/2018 20:34

What expat said.
There is no guarantee but you must try. I also know several women who didn't attempt motherhood because of the partner and yep.. they went on to have a family with someone else. Its heart breaking situation.

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:34

I know he’s hoping I will change my mind (but then I’d be lying if I said I didn’t wish the same of him).

Of course he is, he's got it all just now. He doesn't want to flog the nice house and start over.

That's not good enough.

I will say this for my ex, he at least didn't fuck me over. We went back in forth in counselling for 2 years before we divorced until he said flat out, 'You will hate me if you don't try and I'll hate you if I give into this, so we need to divorce.' He loved me enough to let me go because to do otherwise would be selfish of him, and conversely, I had to let him go, too, as what I wanted and what he wanted were two different things.

dragonwarrior · 04/04/2018 20:35

Would you leave him if he couldn't have kids and wasn't prepared to use a donor or adopt? Would that make a difference to your decision?

happysnappysandwich · 04/04/2018 20:36

Bloody hell that's sad. I don't have any words of advice, but just wanted to say that I think you're really brave and absolutely correct to take steps now to make your future self a happier version. I hope it all works out well for you OP.

Liara · 04/04/2018 20:36

Wow, I'm so glad dh wasn't like this when I said I didn't want children. Instead, he said that it was me he wanted and my children, and if he couldn't have that then he'd rather just have me.

It meant that when I did (very!) unexpectedly get pg (10 years later!) I didn't feel like a brood mare and was happy to go along with it, as I didn't feel like having dc would break us (which I previously thought).

It hasn't broken us, btw, and I'm very glad we had them in the end. He would have loved to try for a 3rd, but I said no and he accepted that too, even though I know deep down he will always have a little longing.

relaxitllbeok · 04/04/2018 20:37

I can't imagine, having never experienced, the desire to have children separate from the desire to have them with someone... but is it a useful thought experiment to say, how would you be feeling if you had been trying for a baby for the last five years with no success? Would it make a difference if you knew you had male factor or female factor infertility? That is, among other things, if he had committed to having a child but was unable to do so, would you still be thinking of leaving him? That might help you to check whether it's really the lack of children, or his difference that leads to him not wanting children, that's the issue. There are no easy answers here.

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:37

But dragon you don't truly know what you'd have done in the OP's shoes because you have children with your husband. You were never in her position.

I had a lot of people tell me the same when I was getting divorced or 'kids aren't all they're cracked up to be' and my first though was always, 'That's rich of you, seeing as you've got kids already and I don't.'

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:42

'Would you leave him if he couldn't have kids and wasn't prepared to use a donor or adopt? Would that make a difference to your decision?'

All moot points because what if is not the same as what is. By that token would you advise your own daughter to forgo her extreme desire to have kids for a bloke when she was 37? Then have to deal with her sadness and longing as time went on, especially in the event of the relationship breaking down years later when it is too late for her to have her own children?

Personally, I teach my kids to be true to themselves and what they need and want out of life first before anything else or they're setting themselves up for misery, and that no mate or boyfriend or husband is worth compromising your life's values and goals for. There's no such thing as 'the one'. There are 7bn people in the world. There can't be any love when you're resentful, sad and lonely because you compromised a basic human life goal and need you have.

That's what my divorce and the two years before it taught me.

swimchick1980 · 04/04/2018 20:43

If you have the money, I would think about freezing your eggs. I had my AMH tested at 37 and it was within normal but at the upper end. Only a year later it had more than halved - I may be unusual but I did wish I had frozen eggs as it hadn't even occurred to me before I got that result.

Original poster
AllAdrift · 04/04/2018 20:44

@expatinscotland I have said this to him - that it will be game over for me in a couple of years whereas he could leave me for a younger woman when he’s 50 and start a family. He does acknowledge this. I know some people will read what I’ve written and think ‘well he can’t love you that much if he’s prepared to lose you rather than have a child together’, but you have to trust me that it is more about his low self-esteem and his parents’ rather dysfunctional relationship than me. I’ve been hoping that the Relate counsellor would help him work through all this, but it hasn’t so far, and he repeatedly says it would be unfair of him to get my hopes up.

@dragonwarrior - if he were unable to have children, I could make peace with that. It’s the not at least attempting it that is eating away at me. I’ve told him this too.

OP posts:
category12 · 04/04/2018 20:51

So he's aware the gates are closing on your fertility, and he has greater options - I'm really intrigued why he hasn't had a vasectomy if he's that certain.

BrandNewHouse · 04/04/2018 20:55

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

puguin86 · 04/04/2018 20:58

Hi op - this happened to my dp in the previous relationship he was in. He was 40s when he left. We met shortly after he left his ex. We now have 2 dc. He said at the time it felt like A huge leap but he was glad that he did because she was adament that she didn't want children and he had changed his mind. He made the jump because he wanted children and could see the time slipping away. He Met me and had our dc, he loves the bones of them and can't imagine a life without them.

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 20:58

'Tomorrow morning you have to get up and start to deal with the business of separating. And that's really it.'

This, indeed.

Flupi · 04/04/2018 21:07

Do you think he’d make a bad father? Why? I’m wondering if it’s fear?
It seems very very drastic to break up an otherwise happy marriage for the chance you’ll meet someone else who you love and who wants children. That surely takes time which you really don’t have.
I’ll probably get slated but why didn’t you or don’t you have a ‘happy accident ‘ ? I understand the overwhelming urge to want a baby, it hit me like that too but I think you could try to see if you could be a bit more creative in sorting out a solution. Best of luck.

swimchick1980 · 04/04/2018 21:10

Pressed post too soon. I'm heartbroken for you, it's such a sad way to end a relationship but it is the right decision. The longer you leave it, the harder it is and I age with others who have said you need to start the process tomorrow and take it from there Flowers

expatinscotland · 04/04/2018 21:11

'Do you think he’d make a bad father? Why? I’m wondering if it’s fear?
It seems very very drastic to break up an otherwise happy marriage for the chance you’ll meet someone else who you love and who wants children. That surely takes time which you really don’t have. '

She's already explained why and that they have had counselling regarding it. He did not change his mind, as is his right. And they are not married.

'I’ll probably get slated but why didn’t you or don’t you have a ‘happy accident ‘ ?'

You'd really deliberately seek to use another human being as an unwilling sperm donor? Who would willingly bring that on their own child, a parent who does not want him/her?