He wants to leave if I can’t get pregnant - Content Warning (added by MNHQ concerns SA)

[fairydustforme]

I’ve (F39) been with my partner (M35) for 2.5yrs. Up until a couple of weeks ago he’s been the perfect partner. Committed, open, loyal, easy to communicate with etc. We have spoken about marriage, children etc and both were on the same page. We both wanted it all. For context I do have a DS (14) from a previous relationship, he has no contact with his father, and him and DP get on great. He had said previously that as long as we at lease tried for children then he would be happy. We’ve been going to church for months so there was a possibility we could get married there. He’s even bought a ring previously. There was zero question in my mind about his commitment to me.

I noticed he started to become a bit distant a couple of weeks ago. We moved house 9 months ago and have undertaken a huge project, one we discussed together about how hard it would be. It has been a drain on our finances but we’re starting to come out the other side and the future looks bright, so I’d assumed it was the stress of this that was causing him to be a little off.

2 days ago I asked him what was wrong as I’ve felt him being colder towards me. To start off with he said he wasn’t sure and would think about why he was behaving like he was. After a bit more pressure he admitted that he was feeling that now he’s 35 he’s panicking and realised that he desperately wants to be a biological father.

He has now said that if I can’t get pregnant then he needs to find someone who can. I would love to have a family with him and he knows this, but he’s acting so cold towards me now, won’t communicate, tells me I’m having a go at him if I ask to discuss the future etc. We had discussed IVF previously, and I’ve offered that again but he’s just shut me out and doesn’t want to discuss anything.

He knows how upset I am, and has chosen to ignore me, not ask how I’m feeling, refuses to offer any reassurance about anything and knows I’m panicking about this huge commitment we took on together, knowing that he’s probably going to leave me with the responsibility of it all. Plus leave me because I’m older now, struggling to get pregnant and is happy to just let me face the upset that not only will I not get the family I dreamt of, I get left alone with all of the future plans we made and he expects me to support him to move on with someone younger so he can have a family elsewhere. He has said if the next woman can’t get pregnant that he would do the same with her. He’s not leaving me because of me, and he wouldn’t settle for any woman if it means him not being a father.

I do understand he wants to be a father, and I want to do that too. I’m not saying I won’t have more children, it’s not my fault that it’s not happened for us yet. And I feel I can’t offer more than I have, he knows I’m all in but that isn’t good enough.

just feeling like I need to discuss somewhere and with someone as I’m unable to discuss with him, and I’m feeling pretty hurt, scared and disappointed 😞

To be fair can see his point. Not your fault or his that it hasn’t happened yet but he maybe he is thinking how he might feel as an old man if he has no bio children and grandchildren of his own. You might not be the right woman for him if his desire to be a Dad is overriding and for whatever reason it’s not happening. It’s a huge sacrifice to expect him to make otherwise imho. Playing devils advocate if it never happens, and you stay together then the resentment down the line as well as regret could be a death nail to the relationship anyways. Agree with him that’s not fair. No different to when a woman feels her bio clock ticking. Whatever other commitments you have do 💯 get why having and making a family of his own is (and perfectly normal desire) so important to him. Family (and there are different kinds) worth or can be worth more than anything else.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with choosing the possibility of a future child over a relationship which precludes having children. The OP’s partner is behaving unpleasantly, to her, refusing to talk, not responding when she offers to consider IVF etc, though.

If he wants a baby with anyone I'd let him find anyone. I wouldn't risk my body and my health to have a baby with a man that would so easily discard me. I wonder how easily he will ditch hid kid if they were ill or didn't met his expectations.

Quite simply - he’s looking for an excuse to bail out.

I don’t even think the lack of pregnancy is the reason, I think it’s an excuse he can use to bow out.

I would stop trying for a baby if it was me.

He has already checked out from your relationship. Mentally and emotionally. He's not behaving like someone who is searching for an answer. In fact, I would wonder if he has already found your replacement?

PP said: ...his first approach might've been, we've been trying for a while and it's not working, do you think it's the right time to explore IVF now?

Exactly! I have no idea why he's panicking so much. He's only 35 and his fertility has few limits. There's no reason why you couldn't have explored ART, starting with some Clomid. You might not even have needed IVF. If you went through fertility treatment and it was completely hopeless, at that point he could have had a think about whether being a biological father is the be-all and end-all for him - and it might have been. And that's OK. Plenty of women have left men who were never going to make them a mother.

But the way he has gone about this has undermined the whole relationship. He's put a wrecking ball through it when all he had to do was confide his panic and ask what you think about starting with ART. Why be so horrible? I'm so sorry, OP. It seems there's a side to him that you didn't know about. It probably would have come out at some point, and it's best that it came out now.

Agree with all this, but it's his behaviour that's the issue. Why couldn't he just have asked OP if they could start ART? They could always break up later if there's no baby and he must have one.

I suspect the answer to why he chose to wreck the relationship instead of try to proceed with ART is because he's already met someone else.

I'm so sorry and I suspect it has nothing to do with him wanting to be a father.

I'm very sorry OP, it sounds like your relationship is over.

@fairydustforme you say you both made a really big financial commitment recently which has put you both under pressure. I wonder if the pressure of all that has got him reevaluating everything and whether this is really what he wants. Ok he's verbalised it harshly but I can totally imagine if the roles were reversed and a woman's clock was ticking, posters would say move on. The bottom line @fairydustforme is that he doesnt see the relationship as enough for him any more.

My friend is similar in that they are undergoing a massive renovation plus they have found she can't have kids. Her husband is struggling and whilst he'd never leave her, the house stuff and the infertility has pushed him to depression.

OP, another thought - you could see it as quite illuminating to watch how he handles stress and less-than-ideal times. The answer is, it makes him into an unstable partner who questions his commitment to you, and in a hurtful way. Ideally, you want a partner who doesn't shake the foundations of your relationship when things aren't going his way. There was no reason for him to react like this instead of simply asking if you're ready to try ART.

This is someone who might run when the going gets tough. Take out the reasons why he's acting this way, and just focus on how he's reacted to these challenges. Not well. What happens if you face much worse stress, like a child with cancer? If he's reacted this way to you not getting pregnant even though you haven't even tried ART yet, I do question whether he's tough enough to raise a family without driving a truck through his relationship when things get hard.

I would try to mentally pan out and observe as if from above the way he's responding to this life challenge. (That is, you not getting pregnant.)

He's only 35 and you haven't even tried Clomid yet, let alone full-blown IVF. So he's hurt you quite badly for no real reason.

I would be extremely unimpressed, if I were you.

I wouldn't put up with this but women are told to leave men when they can't or won't have children so ot works both ways

Err. Did you point out you already have a child & your test came back fine aswell?!?

Honestly this may end up being the best thing because somebody this selfish is going to fucking suffer with a younger woman/multiple kids/starting from scratch

At the end of day put yourself & your current child first sort out the house incase he demands a sale & prepare to be alone if hes immature enough to leave

You started trying for a child six months into the relationship. Sounds like you moved in together pretty quickly too. Was this at his insistence or yours?

How does your son feel about this? There’s no mention of how your relationship of potential break up will affect him at a key time in his life with someone who he apparently gets on with well.

Your relationship has been built on shaky ground and your DP sounds like a bit of a manipulating nob. You might be better off without him.

Too soon to get engaged but not too soon for the much bigger commitment if having a baby @fairydustforme ?

This must be so awful for you, I’m so sorry.
You are not breeding stock. Women are not cattle. His attitude is appalling. He is already withdrawing and moving on emotionally, which frankly sounds sociopathic. I don’t think he can really love you and behave like this. Him leaving might do you a favour in the long term. I feel very sad for whoever he does have kids with (whether that’s you or not).

He’s a vile misogynist who dees women as baby farms. He has shown you that quite clearly.

Throw him back.

It's possible he did go into this in good faith and is handling it terribly now.

It's the 'how' you say things in a relationship that make it acceptable or not, far more often than the 'what'. He isn't saying 'im sorry but I've thought a lot and my priority would be a chance at a relationship with biological children of my own'.

Instead it's 'it's not happening with you so I'm going to look for a younger woman '. That's what's awful, not really his decision (even though it isn't nice to hear).

I mean, I think you both rushed into buying and renovating property together alongside TTC. Good thing is, you have your son. I hope you make a decent return on the property. Try to take this at face value and not let his shit delivery or talk of church and rings and younger women etc hurt you. He wants a child of his own, that's the bottom line, let him go.

I think that’s far more likely than some of the wilder accusations being thrown around on this thread. Absolutely he is behaving remarkably badly towards the OP now, no question, but there seems no reason to think he wasn’t entirely committed to the relationship until very recently.

And no, I don’t think that, in itself, leaving a relationship because you want to have a child is unreasonable.

Ok so a few things I guess. You said it was too soon to get engaged but you’ve been having unprotected sex the whole time you have been dating? Does he really understand what being a father is actually like? It’s very different dealing with pregnancy and a new born than it is with a 12 year old who isn’t your child. Why would you want to do that with just anyone? it’s concerning that he didn’t take time and he launched into being engaged/getting pregnant so quickly.

I think he’s thinking the grass is greener but it won’t be. it seems odd he won’t try IVF? Surely that’s the first step and if it doesn’t work then recognise the relationship won’t work.

i get that he is feeling sad but seems to want life to go much quicker than is normal. He is only 35 so has plenty of time…definitely a red flag and you’ve been together for such a short time! Does he have any friends that can give him a reality check?

My DH married me when I was 42. He would have loved a DC of his own. He took on my 2 DS's with ADHD and has been a wonderful step-dad to them both. I got pregnant but miscarried at 16 weeks and it was awful. I didn't conceive again. We fostered 2 boys and DH told me he'd rather be happily married to me with no biological DC than without me and have a baby with someone else. Your partner doesn't love you and quite honestly sounds unkind and only wants a women as a womb for his kid. I'd ask him to leave.

I would say @caringcarer your husband sounds wonderful but the OP's partner is allowed a different POV or priority for his future.

I think she should accept they tried, his wish for children of his own changed or deepened and that's actually fine. If she can accept he has handled it shittily, some things are crap in life, such as timing, but he has essentially been honest about his feelings, I think she will find it easier to move on than if she digs her heels into what he 'should' have done and ways in which he is terrible.

She did after all go full throttle into TTC with a somewhat younger man who wanted children during a stressful time in her late 30s. Not saying that was wrong, or blaming her for his behaviour now but I think she can accept this may always have always been one of several outcomes (not necessarily the callousness but him wanting a child and her not being able to conceive and that raising a quandary for him).

I think this pragmatic approach will be easier to help her move through it. 'a man who really loved me would have given up his desire to be a biological dad' probably won't. There will be a lot of cases where it isn't true. The man would just have looked for someone his own age or younger in the first place.

@TiredMummma I think he sounds a prick, don't get me wrong. But I think it's something (I won't say commendable or anything approaching that) that he is drawing a line here and not pushing the OP through IVF when they haven't been together that long and she's pushing 40. I think her main reason for continuing is a family with him, not a baby for her own sake, and I don't think it would be fair for him to expect that of her. I honestly think his most honourable move is to move on, but do it kindly and this is where he has fucked up.

Im sure that'll bring OP a lot of comfort 🙄

OP, why would you even want a baby with a man this flakey? He's not even willing to try IVF, that's not a man who loves you. Are you sure you even want a child?

Sorry but I don’t think this relationship has a future. Best to end it now.
Let him and his supersperm find someone new!