My perfect single life make me want to die

[Broken2019]

I don’t know if I can put into words how I feel. I’ve always wanted a family and to be married. Not in a fairytale way at all...I’ve just wanted a family and all the challenges and love and sleepless nights and so on that it involves.

I’m at work sat in a meeting room feeling like there is literally no point to my life. I’m earning decent money, lots spare at the end of the month and for what? I’ve done the singles holidays, I’ve done the buying designer clothes on a whim, I’ve done the appreciation of quiet nights to myself with no responsibilities. I’ve done volunteering because I have spare time. I’ve done exactly what I fucking want for what feels like forever. Selfishly, I don’t WANT to volunteer. In a bratty way I don’t WANT more holidays and child free spontaneous trips. I’m sick of it all. I find no joy in any of it because I’ve done it, over and over, for years.

I see people around me on their second move with their other half...moving out to the country, or to a bigger place with a garden. Talking about paint samples and wallpaper. I know that sounds silly but I do all those things alone and it’s shit.

I have dated, a lot. Been dating for well over a year now. Lots of nice people, nobody I was interested in. I have literally never been bothered about any of them wanting a second date. They all have wanted to meet again which probably makes me the problem and makes me feel even more than I’m destined for a life of loneliness like this.

I am dreading my birthday on Monday, really really dreading it. Once again I will be sat with my lovely parents (who I adore!) and with my sibling as his lovely other half who are on the cusp of marriage. I don’t want to wake up on my own again on my birthday. I want to wake up to the chaos of a family and kids who don’t care it’s my birthday and just want to be entertained. I’m not looking at this in an idealistic way...I’m fully aware of the really really shit parts to parenting too.

I have totally had enough. I worked hard in a career and for what? To live a life alone. I’m getting older now and less people will even be interested in me. Even if I met someone now I think I would always feel we had missed a big chunk of our life together. For the first time ever I’ve started to think I’d rather just not be here than have to be the odd one out forever. What does the future hold? Just sitting in meeting rooms at work in my designer clothes, commuting home to my perfect house with nobody in it and in between trying to fill the gap with the stuff I have done for years and am totally sick of? I just don’t want to do any of it anymore.

@whosorrynow

JOKE! you made a joke, Im grabbing my pitch fork.

Parent to be honest your post made me absolutely wince. I wasn’t going to mention it because I don’t like the pile ons but I do think it was insensitive to the point of being crass.

People who try to loftily inform the infertile or the single that kids aren’t that great anyway really need to stop. It’s akin to telling someone with a terminal illness that life can be really shit and hard.

Ok great, I'll get my trowel 😁

@theblessedcheesemaker
Go you, you really out alpha'd all the men didn't you, brain the size of a planet travel the world aced all the sports drank all the wine no wonder the men are all intimidated by you!
bless him the dead beat up to his ears in debt but he could have easily pulled a blonde bimbo (since when did blonde model types go for men who are up to their ears in debt?) but he wanted you instead

My colossal intellect has also always been a HUGE barrier in every relationship, such a handicap in life isn't it!

Me too, sorry, if only I cared about Tesco clubpoints or whats for dinner (though the latter is mightily important I must say, minestrone soup tonight)

Following on from cheese and sorry interesting points re. intelligence ... of course many women are so fucking humble.
Intelligence, perhaps true intelligence, has a modest aspect though not so much in the male persona as well as a more magnanimous, generous aspect.

I doubt any male was intimidated by my intelligence perhaps it wasn't so colossal, as it wasn't really on show, but honestly most men were not interested in my mind anyway.

We've strayed quite a long way from the OP … but the intelligence thing is an issue for me. I was pretty academic when I was young and went to Oxbridge. (I'm 56, there weren't many women there so I had a ball!) Anyway, I like men my own age but I have learnt to just keep my education completely quiet when OLD or IRL, actually even with new female friends - they can't cope with it initially, make all sorts of assumptions and feel threatened as anything. Most calm down when they get to know me. It happened nearly 40 years ago and I don't feel it has anything much to do with the person I've become, but it feels like a barrier so often.

I think it's best to be vague with OLD academic credentials. Someone I know who used OLD just used to say they had 'higher ed'. I don't see quite honestly how Oxbridge or PhD quals are relevant because it's about what someone is doing now that counts. There are people with PhDs who are as daft as brushes with no common sense and completely flaky and others who have graduated from the University of Life who are sensible and salt of the earth types.

You need to meet people then decide.

It's not either/or - either you carry on with these pointless designer clothes and meetings or you are a mother with a house full of children.

There are other routes - chuck the job, go abroad, join a voluntary project, wear what the hell you like, foster a child (God knows there are enough in need,) use those savings to break out.

These sort of stories make me so sad and angry - we con girls into thinking that exam results, high-powered careers, designer gear and all the rest of it are what really matter - they simply are not. You do not have to stay locked in this circle - you can break out. Is there nothing you have fancied doing? - learning a new language, experiencing a new culture, looking for somewhere where you are really NEEDED, not just a designer decoration.

Sorry - I may not be helping - but it is something that makes me really angry. I have a friend who is locked in just such a bind - she can open her wardrobe to show me endless piles of designer handbags, designer tart's trotters and clothes - but that is the sum total of her life.

You can do this - break out and fill your life with new things - not new bars to go to, new clothes, or new posh holidays - really new things, new experiences that are not for you in the first instance, but for people who will need you; people who do not have your privileges and whose lives you could change.

The encouragement of girls to seek the shallow rather than the real is a crime against wonderful people with so much to give.

Chuck the make-up, the bags, the gear - get out there and do some real good - you can you know, you really can. And who knows you might just meet someone who is impressed by your enterprise and wants to share his/her life with you.

I am so sorry that you feel so empty and wish you every success in moving forward. x

How many times

A single person fostering a child equates to a full time job. Yes, there are a lot of foster placements needed. The reason why they are needed is because fostering is suitable for so few people.

Indeed - as an ex social worker I am fully aware of that - but I have also seen it work very well indeed.

So OP wants a partner and family and somehow she’s going to be able to pay her mortgage on her home with a foster career allowance, and she has that child all the time so that makes meeting someone really easy and she doesn’t even get interaction at work?

No, I’m sorry, I think that’s a ridiculous suggestion.

went to Oxbridge. (I'm 56, there weren't many women there so I had a ball

Eh? If you said you were 96 I’d say ok, but you’re only 7 years older than me. Late 80s I’d have said the gender balance was about 45/55. At Oxford the last male only college went co-ed in 1986, and there were still two female only colleges.

What kind of people do you hang out with who would find an Oxbridge degree threatening?

My college had only just gone co-Ed so the split was about 20:80 in 1981. And I guess as I live in the sticks I hang out with a lot of people who didn’t go to university at all, so they come over all weird quite frankly! As I say, it was fun and set me on a good career, but now it feels like it happened to another person entirely so I keep it dialled right down.

I am not saying this is necessarily the right route for her - and I am totally aware of the problems and challenges. You are latching on to one thing, and your points are entirely valid and well known to me.

BUT - what I am saying is that she is looking at two alternatives only and that she needs to consider whether there might simply be other directions worth looking at - that it is not a simple binary choice. She is not happy with what she has at the moment and thinks parenthood would be the route to go; but maybe there are other options to help her move forward from a situation that she doe not like.

I have jumped off the wheel professionally in my time and gone off in a completely different direction that brought me great happiness.

Yes but Mis you are effectively asking the op to give up her dreams for others, which isn’t what she wants and isn’t fair.

Just came back to your thread to wish you a happy birthday x

Thank you so much x

mishappening I’m not sure I totally get your post.. throwing out designer clothes and make up...I’m not some sort of princess who can’t see beyond material things! You’re right I could pack in my job and my life where I am but that’s not the problem, I love my job, I love my home and I love where I live. What I want is someone to share these things with. It’s quite easy to spend money on a new dress for work but I would in a second choose to go without and plough my money into baby related things! And yes I know I may not be saying exactly that if the time came! But you get what I mean?

I was you aged 33. The first thing I did was realise that I had perhaps too high standards for men. I read the book Marry Him (the case for settling for mr good enough) by Lori Gottlieb and realised I rejected people for all sorts of daft reasons. So I started saying yes to second internet dates just to make sure... one of these guys I still wasn’t sure about by date 3 but on date 4 he massively relaxed and the rest is history. I’m not saying date anyone. If you don’t fancy them at all it will never work. But do look past superficial things.
I’ve been there - it is massively exhausting.
But I’m glad I kept at internet dating as it led to all my kids and a happy relationship! Btw I used to feel sick about the chances of conceiving but it was v easy in the end. You just never know

I do get what you mean Broken2019 but I suppose I am saying that your sense of dissatisfaction might be better solved by doing something that you can do - i.e. branch out a bit. You cannot conjure up a partner and family simply by wishing it so, but you can decide to do something different - even if only a sabbatical, which might give you a new perspective.

You might find counselling helpful if you feel the problem lies with your ambivalence about commitment, although you might have to shop around a bit to find the right one.

We have all had to kiss a few frogs!

Happy birthday

Why should women have to dial down their intellect to get a man or to be socially acceptable? Why shouldn't Broken have the joy of being with someone with a similar frame of reference, who gets her jokes and has read some of the same books? Marriage is a lifelong conversation - you need to hold out for someone who will still make you laugh 39 Years on. You might need to compromise on looks, finances, career choices - but if the life of the mind is important to you, you need that compatibility to make you happy.

The op should hold out for what she wants but it might not be a quick thing finding it. Which is fine but it sounds like she’s getting fed up.

Hopefully looking in different places could help

And to be blunt, if she wants kids plural, she doesn't have all the time in the world.

Look, when I was 34 I spent a year dating a guy who was my intellectual equal, who ticked all the boxes on paper. Only thing was he drove me insane with his habits. I then broadened my dating parameters and met DH who you'd never put me with on paper. Been together ten years. He's not a great intellect and yes that is exasperating sometimes but he's interested in the world, makes me laugh a lot and is kindness personified. It's really not the worst thing to have compromised on on a daily basis.