Husband leaving as I can't have children

[Notmyfault1]

That's it really.i can't have children,and I would struggle with raising a children due to medical issues. This is relatively new.

We have been together 10 years and married 6. Since being married I have suffered medically issues that mean that it would be dangerous for me and potential baby to be pregnant.

My husband told me at the weekend that he isnt sure he wants a life without his own children. He wants to experience of a pregnant wife and supporter her through this and bring up a child together.

I'm gutted and in pieces. It's not my fault I can't have children. But i also know that i can't really be angry at his honesty.

I asked him to leave the house for a while he can think through his emotions as I can't look at him without feeling so much pain.

Has anyone else been through this?

I dont want him to resent me so I won't beg for him to stay,but I feel so much pain.

Thankyou

So sorry OP.

Its hard when your told the future you wanted is no longer possible and I don’t blame your DH for feeling that way, thing is, even if he stays the resentment would probably build up and the relationship would end anyways. Resentment is a relationship killer.

when I was going through infertility me and my DH had many conversations on what would happen with us if my fertility treatment failed, I know he wouldn’t have left but he already had kids so wasn’t a dealbreaker for him.

Practically I would do counselling with your DH to work through all your feelings.

So your love for your husband was conditional on him being able to give you children? Genuinely quite shocked to read that. People on here always talk about having high standards in picking your life partner and my standards were to feel that I was loved unconditionally. When you commit to someone for life you're aware that you may be thrown a lot of shit you didn't plan and that may mean you don't get the life you envisaged - but that you still stick by them because they're the person you love and you're a team.

Surely all relationships are conditional on something or other? Everyone has dealbreakers…

So your love for your husband was conditional on him being able to give you children? Genuinely quite shocked to read that. People on here always talk about having high standards in picking your life partner and my standards were to feel that I was loved unconditionally. When you commit to someone for life you're aware that you may be thrown a lot of shit you didn't plan and that may mean you don't get the life you envisaged - but that you still stick by them because they're the person you love and you're a team.

This is a romantic but fairly codependent view of love. It's not all that shocking to view love and relationships as something that should be stayed in only as long as they make you happy, rather than something for which you must be willing to sacrifice absolutely everything. Many people want a romantic relationship, and children.

And for the record leaving doesn't automatically mean you don't love your partner, just that you wouldn't be happy staying with them.

Omg that’s so amazingly generous of you! I also can’t be pregnant/give birth due to medical issues, I wish I knew someone like you!

No one (adult) loves another adult unconditionally, this is a nonsense where is all this coming from

At the most extreme end love is dependent on whether someone stays sober or doesnt abuse their partner, or doesnt become a drug addict. Alcoholism and drug addiction being illnesses of course but no one would expect someone to stick with the implications of that for years and years if it was affecting how the relationship functions

Can I ask (if you want to say) what your condition - that you can’t raise a child? Wheelchair / paralysed or something more akin to MS etc?
If yours and his quality of life is massively different to what he’d imagined then as you are only 30 perhaps it isn’t so unreasonable for him to want a different future.
Its horrible though and I am so sorry for you. But I have read threads on here before where the dw is asking should she stay with a disabled dh who can’t have kids/sex/do normal things and she is told to leave and have the life she wants.
That doesn’t make it right or fair or any better but if the tables were turned I wonder how you would feel and would you want to stay?

It's reminding me- unpleasantly- of my home country India where men leave their wives for being "barren". That's considered terribly primitive but this is apparently ok..

No one (adult) loves another adult unconditionally, this is a nonsense where is all this coming from

At the most extreme end love is dependent on whether someone stays sober or doesnt abuse their partner, or doesnt become a drug addict. Alcoholism and drug addiction being illnesses of course but no one would expect someone to stick with the implications of that for years and years if it was affecting how the relationship functions

Absolutely 100%

This is such an awfully sad situation. It's horrid to think about it, but I think my DH may have done the same thing. I was fairly ambivalent about having kids when we met. Whereas to him it was an absolute given that he would have a family of his own. Some of our friends have struggled and gone down the adoption route. He was very honest (just to me) about how he wouldn't be able to do that as the children he wanted needed to be his children. Luckily we have our own DCs so all is good. But it could easily hand not been.
I also have friends who have gone to extraordinary lengths to have baby. I can't imagine having that primal need to have a child of your own, but I know some people do. So sorry OP

Agree that there is no such thing as unconditional love but alcoholics , abusers and drug addicts are responsible for their own addictions. OP isn't responsible for her infertility. I don't believe the two situations are comparable.

Alcoholics and addicts are ill. These are illnesses

Same as if someone has a MH disorder which causes them to behave in frightening or unpredicatable ways which are not healthy for the other person in the relationship. Illnesses

Just like the OP is ill.

Before you decide for absolute sure that you can't have children make an appointment with a maternal medicine obstetrician and talk through options. You can ask for a consultation through your GP.

Yes and dealbreakers are all very well when you're dating. Any dealbreaker you want is OK. But once you commit to someone, discarding them because they can't give you what you want is cruel.

I envisaged a lot of things about being with DP for the rest of my life. He's able-bodied, solvent, loves to do a lot of the same things that I do. I'm also aware that life can throw us curveballs like disability and unemployment and probably a ton more bad luck I haven't thought of. I'm not going to discard him if they happen and suddenly our life together isn't what I envisaged.

I feel so much for you OP

but I would have done the same had I discovered my husband couldn’t have children.

for the past 10 years, children aside, what has your relationship been like?

Yes and dealbreakers are all very well when you're dating. Any dealbreaker you want is OK. But once you commit to someone, discarding them because they can't give you what you want is cruel

good Lord. Seriously? We are talking about having children. People leave marriages (I have read many threads on mumsnet) where people leave their partner because they don’t fancy them anymore or they want a sexual relationship and their partner doesn’t anymore.

all valid reasons

Yes and dealbreakers are all very well when you're dating. Any dealbreaker you want is OK. But once you commit to someone, discarding them because they can't give you what you want is cruel

good Lord. Seriously? We are talking about having children. People leave marriages (I have read many threads on mumsnet) where people leave their partner because they don’t fancy them anymore or they want a sexual relationship and their partner doesn’t anymore.

all valid reasons

That’s your opinion. My DH is utterly irreplaceable, to me. Prior to our successful IVF treatment, my DH was told his sperm was not of a good enough quality to have children. It didn’t cross my mind to leave him for a child that didn’t even exist. Not for one moment. We just got on with living a good and happy life. Children are not everything.

It was only after a couple of years of clean eating and less booze that he had his sperm tested again and much to our surprise, it had improved to the point of ‘normal’.

My parents are devoted to one another and remained so even after having three children. I believe that my love for DH won’t waiver when I give birth. I think I’ll love him even more. He’s amazing.

While alcoholism and drug addiction may be illnesses, I still do not think they are comparable in ANY way to infertility.

This

I have a close friend who stayed with her partner when they found out he was infertile. He didn’t want her to go down the donor route, he didn’t want to raise someone else’s child. She was open to that but she didn’t push it.

Fifteen years later they are both miserable and lead separate lives but as a married couple. He feels he can’t leave as she made that sacrifice for her. She is too old to have children herself now now but she resents him for taking that away from her. It’s a truly toxic relationship.

It’s such a difficult situation. You’ve not presented him in the best light but I do get why he feels that way. And how heartbreaking it is for you.

So your love for your husband was conditional on him being able to give you children? Genuinely quite shocked to read that. People on here always talk about having high standards in picking your life partner and my standards were to feel that I was loved unconditionally. When you commit to someone for life you're aware that you may be thrown a lot of shit you didn't plan and that may mean you don't get the life you envisaged - but that you still stick by them because they're the person you love and you're a team

@gannett Yes, it absolutely was conditional on him being able to give me children. I wanted to have children more than I have ever wanted anything. If I couldn't have had them, I would have dealt in whatever way with that because I wouldn't have had a choice. If my husband had been made redundant or had developed a terminal illness, I'd have stuck by him so long as we had children. But, yes, children were an absolutely non-negotiable part of my love for him. If he hadn't also wanted children and hadn't also been fertile, I'd have left him and would have fallen in love with someone else in due course (because partners are, as I said, great - but it's starry-eyed bullshit to think there's just one perfect partner for anyone) who would have been willing/able to provide our own biological children. I make no apologies for this.

Well they're both sitations that no one chooses or sets out to have

But whether they are or are not comparable, again the outcome is the same, it means a life/marriage with someone that is not compatible with your life aims/desires and you'll be unhappy if you try to work through that with someone and put your own needs aside. There is no compromise with any of these situations.

For me children weren't a dealbreaker, but think that's unfair. For some people it's absolutely a huge deal, and as much as you love someone isn't something you're okay to compromise on and that's okay. It's one of those heartbreaking scenarios where it isn't anyone's fault.