Man I'm seeing has 3 children with 3 different mothers. Red flag?

[tinderexplorer]

I have been on 2 dates with this man. He is 36. He has dropped a bit of a bombshell and I am not sure how to proceed. He has 3 DCs with 3 women. He said he has good relationships with each DC and loves them. They are 12, 10 and 6. I did not press him about why the relationships he had with the DCs mums didn't work out. I am now wondering what has gone on with his prior relationships. I also wonder if the DCs were planned or not. I thought there was potential after the first date but not I am not sure. It's put me off him a bit honestly.

I think the big difference here is that this is mumsnet and you’re a woman, so your circumstances don’t reflect badly on you, they’re probably the fault of the men and any man not dating you because of it is an arse.

a man with 3kids with different mums however…. Very different

Red Flag.
That would be a huge off~putting thing , sounds a bit reckless with not caring about condoms, and pretty bad at relationships!

Wow! Red bunting. Don’t get involved.

Give him a pass.

Having 3 kids by 3 women over just 6 years indicates something very flaggy: he doesn’t understand what a real relationship is / he doesn’t pick well / he hasn’t got the wit to use birth control.

Even if he’s an attentive dad, it is simply not in a child’s interests to be brought up in such complex set up, and anyone with any sense knows that and wouldn’t let it happen.

Apart from this if you get involve your whole life will be taken over by contact arrangements and god knows what.

Also he’s almost certainly broke, and will not be able to afford more kids, or many other things you might want.

Hell no.

Just, hell no.

Red bunting 😂

The small gap between each means he impregnated a new woman when his first was 12-24m, and the second was 3-4yr. At best, he's stupid. Possibly irresponsible and feckless. Think about who would do that. Why was he busy getting new women pregnant instead of raising the child/children he already had?
If this went the distance would you be happy being a stepmother to three kids? How would that fit in with you wanting your own, if you do? Would you feel secure that he wouldn't up and leave and get someone else pregnant when you're wrangling a toddler?

He makes poor choices imo and I would say the same about a woman in the same situation.

To be honest often there is a difference often the women are the ones doing the lions share if not all of the parenting for the kids. That is a big difference for me anyway. Of course there are some men who consider EOW the same as parenting the majority of the time.

This doesn’t seem like a red flag, @tinderexplorer —

It seems more like a team of red flag bearers in front of a marching band playing Hit The Road Jack (and dontcha come back no mo no mo - Hit The Road Jack and dontcha come back no mo!)

@FloydPepper

I don’t think so, if @LucyAnn35 was posting about her own situation people would hopefully be polite and positive, but they would say that yes, most potential male partners would understandably see it as a red flag, even if in some cases there might be good reasons. And whether there were good reasons or not, it’s going to be too much for many people to take on.

In the OP’s example the tiny timeframe is an extra factor. If you met a guy who’d had one kid in his teens by accident, one in his late 20s followed by divorce, one in his mid 30s followed by divorce.. it would still be a red flag, but smacks less of total recklessness.

It would be a sail boat sized red flag if a woman had three children by three different men and they all lived with their dads. And she'd dumped their fathers while they were babies. I doubt a man alive would go near her.

Not sure why people think any different?

Men do it all the time though, that's the double standard. It's not that a woman is sensibly not going to date a guy who has dumped three women at their most vulnerable and left them holding the baby. Or that he lied until after they met in person about his family situation.

He sounds like my bloody father.

The cycle doesn't stop.

I have half siblings everywhere.

Definitely don't pursue.

Red flag. For both a man and a woman frankly.

Sounds like a lot of drama, why go there if you don't have to?

One of my dating rules was never date a man with kids (I didn’t have any). I broke it once and briefly. I simply couldn’t bear the thought of my weekends being dictated by some custody arrangement . I can’t imagine trying to constantly make plans around THREE other families. It’s just a huge headache that no sane human would willingly enter into…….and that’s before we even get into the credentials (or lack of) of a man (or woman) who has managed to get themselves into the situation.

Do you have to ask?

You really need to ask?

He's not a grown up.
He ducks responsibility but doesn't mind dumping it on women he's impregnated.
He waltzes off when babies cry and nappies smell because it's all too difficult for poor ickle him.
He'd have to be earning a fortune to be fairly sharing the cost of raising children in three different households as well as running his own home. My guess is, he doesn't care too much whether the wifelets struggle as long as he has beer money.

So he’s had three children with three different women by the time he’s 30. I’d definitely want the details of how that came about and I would ask him, but really only to satisfy my curiosity, because mentally speaking I’d already have packed my bags. For all the reasons above, I’d not want to be his 4x4.

I'd judge him totally on how much effort he puts into seeing & caring for them.
It's a failsafe method of determining a man's character!

It would very much depend on whether he was active in trying to 50/50 coparent these children for me and if that had not been accepted by the mothers hence his current agreements for contact.

If he had, I'd definitely give him a chance, he deserves love as much as a mother with children by different fathers. Sex can make both sexes mindless and stupid and careless, it's not exclusive to one or the other. Mistakes are made but people shouldn't be branded forever. Yes, children by multiple partners isn't a great look for either women or men, but life moves on.

If not though and it wasn't because of obstruction by the mothers, I'd find him a bit feckless and probably not see him again.

When I met my husband, I had 3 kids by 2 men. Then we went onto have a fourth together. It's never been the case for me that men have been put off. I have qualities about me that extend beyond the fact I've got kids to different men. In fact some told me that they respected me more for the fact I effectively raised 3 children singlehandedly. Having kids has limited my options in who I dated because some men would be unsuitable to introduce to family life, but that's because I was picky from my end, never them telling me that they didn't want me.

A friend rang me to say pretty much the exact same thing. I was like omg no way. However, they actually married - and are still married 17 years later. He is a fantastic guy, has been a very involved dad with all of his children, coaches their sports etc. So I would say don't write him off.

Wouldn’t be for me! I’d say run!

Who is this 'we'? Some of us think it's the responsible and ethical choice to avoid starting a relationship with someone who has DC when you have reservations about that. It's the best thing for all parties. A man who's interested in a woman who has kids but isn't keen on that aspect of her life is doing everyone a favour if he doesn't get involved.

In answer to the OP, it would put me off. Because either he's a responsible and involved co parent and that's more baggage than I want, or he isn't and I don't want a deadbeat.

But, as you say, you effectively raised these kids alone, which is laudable. Having 3 kids by three different woman and (as far as we know) not being the resident parent to any of them is a red flag.