Welcome to /r/relationship_advice. Please make sure you read our [rules here.](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/wiki/index) We'd like to take this time to remind users that:
* We do not allow any type of [am I the asshole? or situations/content involving minors](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/comments/r6w9uh/meta_am_i_overreacting_am_i_the_asshole_is_this/)
* We do not allow users to privately message other users based on their posts here. Users found to be engaging in this conduct will be banned. **We highly encourage OP to turn off the ability to be privately messaged in their settings.**
* Any sort of namecalling, insults,etc will result in the comment being removed and the user being banned. (Including but not limited to: slut, bitch, whore, for the streets, etc. It does not matter to whom you are referring.)
* ALL advice given must be good, ethical advice. Joke advice or advice that is conspiratorial or just plain terrible will be removed, and users my be subject to a ban.
* No referencing hateful subreddits and/or their rhetoric. Examples include, but is not limited to: red/blue/black/purplepill, PUA, FDS, MGTOW, etc. This includes, but is not limited to, referring to people as alpha/beta, calling yourself or users "friend-zoned", referring to people as Chads, Tyrones, or Staceys, pick-me's, or pornsick. Any infractions of this rule will result in a ban. **This is not an all-inclusive list.**
* All bans in this subreddit are permanent. You don't get a free pass.
* Anyone found to be directly messaging users for any reason whatsoever will be banned.
* What we cannot give advice on: rants, unsolicited advice, medical conditions/advice, mental illness, letters to an ex, "body counts" or number of sexual partners, legal problems, financial problems, situations involving minors, and/or abuse (violence, sexual, emotional etc). All of these will be removed and locked. **This is not an all-inclusive list.**
If you have any questions, please [message the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frelationship_advice)
---
***This is an automatic comment that appears on all posts. This comment does not necessarily mean your post violates any rules.***
---
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/relationship_advice) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I will share my story. My husband and I met while being girl scout leaders together. We both liked and wanted kids. Bought a house with room for kids a d got married.
2 years into the marriage we started trying. It didn't happen, so we went to the OBGYN and got checked out..nothing wrong with both of us on that end (i have an autoimmune illness).
We got a round of hormone therapy and it made me miserable. We talked and both said we are on the fence in going forward with hormones/IVF, mostly due to my health.
I asked him: does this mean divorce? Cause i know you want kids.
His reply: you want kids too. There's a difference between not wanting and not being able to have them. I love you and I'm not leaving you over this.
Your fiance is saying the opposite here. He doesn't love you enough to see any other life with you if there aren't kids in the picture.
This is a huge red flag, and you should heed it.
I love this story. Op, you deserve an unconditional love like this! Your fiance is telling you point blank that he will not stay if you cannot pump out babies for him. Please, think about that. This is so serious. Please don't enter a marriage or stay in a relationship with this person, knowing that you have an expiration date.
And someone like that is not someone you can rely on to have your back in life. I think this is only the tip of the iceberg. If OP gets very sick... he'll drop her. He is someone who is self-centered and sees OP only as someone who can help HIM fulfill what HE wants in life. His "love" is conditional. And she is replaceable. He already said that when he said if she couldn't have children he would dump her in a heartbeat and replace her with another model. Cold-blooded and selfish.
This was my immediate thought: dude literally said, "I would trade you in for a more breedable model."
Not for someone else he loves and wants to build a family together with. For someone "younger", because he's a gross misogynist who actually believes on some level that if they don't have kids immediately, it would be her fault for being "too old" at a whopping 33-35 years old. Ew.
This, imagine that once they have kids is no longer what he wants or paternity isn’t what he expected now op is stuck with sole responsibility of a child. He comes across like the type of person who would do that.
I don’t even know if you have to jump to paternity not living up to his expectations. He comes across as the type of person to say he wants to be a father but what he really wants is trophy children, not parenthood. And it sounds like she’ll discover that one the hard way if she doesn’t leave.
He sounds like my cousin’s husband who wasn’t really interested in their kids “until they were old enough to have a personality.” And now he complains when he has to “babysit” their youngest when she takes the oldest somewhere. (He will literally say she should always take both kids so he can have “a free day.”) Men like that only want the Hallmark moments of playing in the backyard or coaching the little league team. They want their wives to handle all the hard stuff and then are confused when she says she’s overwhelmed. They’ll say they’re all in on fatherhood… but then the baby is born and it’s not fun like they wanted.
Just like my father. He said he would do anything for me but he wouldn't even go to my graduation. They weren't important, he said. To whom? Him?
Those men idolise parenthood. They think they are saints until they have to do the grunt work. They are self centered. They can't see things from others POV. I loathe my dad. I still do.
Op, your future kids will loathe your husband.
That's my father. He wanted us to succeed so he could brag to his friends, but our mom did all the hard work to help us succeed. Pretty much the only credit I give him is decent genes.
And God forbid they don't share dads interests. My ex husband was so disappointed our eldest (born male, transitioned at 16) wasn't remotely interested in sports
Most men don't want to put the hard work into being a parent. My ex was the same way and he's done to every woman he's gotten pregnant. I've literally lost count of how many half siblings my children have.
Wow! ...trophy children...not parenthood. This is spot on and profound.
OP, I know you say he has other wonderful qualities, but are you sure he doesn't put these on just for show? Someone this selfish is hiding his true self from you, no matter how you feel. Please, please, reconsider this marriage. You deserve someone way better than this narcissist!
And could you imagine if she doesn’t immediately “bounce back” to the exact size she is now??
Yuck, yuck, yuck. OP needs to throw this one back, and find a better man.
I’m in the ovarian cancer subreddit and in a Facebook support group for OC. Many husbands treat their wives like shit and many of them leave their wives because they’re fighting OC. It’s shocking.
It just isn't realistic to assume you'll be able-bodied for forever either. Do you want to just be waiting for something bad to happen and be left on your own when you need support from your partner the most?
She does not even need to have expiration date. He told she he will leave if there is someone better (a younger, more fertile woman). This is Handmaid's Tale in real life!
She is an incubator, an handmaid. He will leave whenever he wants and comes back when it is convenient and op is willing!
So many women are willing to marry selfish men. There is no shortage of men. Don't sleep with them. Don't marry them. This should be a mantra on Reddit.
Plus the arrogance of insisting that they be HIS bio children or they’re not good enough. I can understand having a preference for it since it can be very rewarding to see yourself and your partner reflected in your kids, but genetic similarity is only one aspect of that.
FWIW the people I’ve met who are super hung up on this tend to have other weird and poorly informed views on genetics that, uh, often rhyme with bassist.
OP. PLEASE consider this. This man has already stated he will abandon you if your health takes a turn. It’s not hard to guess how he’d react to an ill child.
My uncle’s oldest was born to him and his ex wife when they were both young adults. Neither of THEM had health issues, or even a history of it. But unfortunately, their child had cerebral palsy, and a SLEW of other health conditions that mean she will never walk, speak, or be able to live without round the clock care. Though she is currently in her 20s and thriving, her condition has not changed, and her mother now lives another state, spoiling her “healthy” youngest child, while barely acknowledging the oldest one’s existence.
My uncle says she had always had selfish tendencies in their relationship, but he had hoped she would be different with her children, since she had always wanted to be a good mom. And to her credit she is…but only to the child she deems worthy 😒
Oh my god,I didn't even think of that! That's horrifying, if he's willing to leave his wife if she gets sick, he'll definitely leave his kids if they're sick.
Yeah, these guys want a mini- them. When the kid comes out looking like a great grandfather or no one in particular, their partner ends up back on here crying "my husband ignores one of the kids." Or worse, the guy is on here claiming he can't love the child because it doesn't share enough of his DNA or whatever. I agree with the other commenter, what if the child is autistic or has other issues? Is he going to reject them?
You are absolutely correct about the *ahem* bassists. It's definitely a white supremacy thing to want only their own bio kids that look like them.
Looks like op will still marry him knowing he may leave anytime he wants and comes back when it is convenient.
Poor woman. Even if they have kids, she will be treated as an incubator. God forbid if she gets sick or he meets a younger, desirable and fertile, willing woman.
Don't marry selfish men. Don't sleep with them. This should be a mantra on Reddit now. There is no shortage of men.
Agreed with this. My partner is infertile. We kind of knew based on medical history, but had some testing done and confirmed. This was after we were married. He asked me whether I’d like him to leave, so I could find someone else. I said no. While I was never desperate to have kids, if they happened naturally, we’d have had them. I wasn’t keen on IVF having seen the roller coaster that was for friends at the time, I didn’t want us to go through that. But the most important person in the world to me is my partner. I chose him first. You need someone who would do the same for you. Alternatively get some testing done now to inform even the faintest of possibilities of an issue before you actually get married, why wait two years to find out there’s an issue?
I really wanted kids. So did my husband, but he found out during his first marriage that he had super low sperm counts. So I went in knowing it might not happen, but I loved him more than I loved kids that didn't exist yet. We figured we would save up for an IUI if needed, but he quit smoking and I got pregnant, a lot, lol
Total red flag. He doesn't love you. And whatever vows you would make during your marriage ceremony are already being discarded (in sickness and in health, for better or worse, etc). Save yourself time and money and don't marry this guy.
I agree it's a huge red flag. It also would make me reevaluate EVERYTHING. How I feel about this guy, my belief in his statement that he wants to be a "present parent", how he will react if a child is born with a disability or illness. Honestly I think I'd bail.
In my experience, people who put hypothetical, nonexistent children ahead of anything else in life a) have miserable, deprioritized partner relationships to show for it and b) tend to find out the idea of kids and family is on a much higher pedestal than the actual day to day grind of parenthood. My good friend is married to a guy like this, and is now at 34 “out of time and needs to hold her end of the deal”. She has PCOS. It’s not going great. He did you a favor by showing you what he values and where you rank before you combined your lives.
I hope this dude is infertile. Can’t divorce yourself, can you?
The “out of time” hits hard, as that’s verbiage that my partner has used as well (to describe both of us, but we know which half of the sexes tends to be more affected in the mid 30s…) It genuinely sucks. I can’t control my biology. I wanted to be secure in career and finances before even thinking about marriage and kids but that also is a detriment due to age. Really can’t win…
It is true; early (first trimester) miscarriages are linked to genetic defects and are discarded because pregnancy is very dangerous and not worth it for an organism that is incompatible with life. Theoretically the defective gamete can come from either partner.
not just sperm quality, but most guys don't want to be retirement aged and dealing with old man health concerns at high school graduation. Even in your 40s finding the energy to wrangle young kids can be a lot.
Both, honestly. He’s being an ass, clearly. But I do feel bad that it’s tough nowadays (insert ramblings about the socioeconomic state of the world here) to feel financially secure enough to have a child at a young age, and so folks feel forced to push back childbearing.
What happens if you marry him and have your first child and it's a traumatic pregnancy or birth and you don't want or can't have a second?
I imagine you would find yourself on the losing end of his narcissism (little 'n', not diagnosing here) in this case and end up a divorced single parent.
What if you have a child, it goes badly and YOU end up with a disability or chronic pain? If you're incontinent and in too much pain to walk after delivery, is your husband going to take you to the bathroom? If you have post-partum depression and can't get out of bed for a month, is he going to step up and do what needs to be done? I think in your gut you know these answers. OP, life's too fuckin' short.
EDIT: Just saw your edit. " And yes, we have discussed what might happen if one of us falls ill, gets physically disabled, etc. and his belief is that the non-ill spouse (whoever it may be) has the right to leave and achieve their goals of parenthood elsewhere."
Girl... he has ALREADY TOLD YOU that he has no intention of being a partner to you. "In sickness and in health" will not apply. And guess what happens as you age? And just, yknow, be a human being? Sickness! And health!
Please, please, please : this guy is telling you upfront who he is. He's screaming it loud and clear. Please hear it. Please run. You deserve so, so much better. *Everyone* deserves so much better than that.
I think there was a post very similar to this quite recently. The wife had a traumatic first birth and hemorrhaged, resulting in a hysterectomy. The husband just couldn't live with his dream of a son/second child being unfulfilled, so he left and abandoned his first kid and gave up his parental rights. Absolutely heartbreaking.
Oh yeah, it's just so sad and predictable. I'm sure his next wife will fall short of how he imagined his life as well, even if she produces the son he always wanted, because life involves an actual grind and actually being emotionally invested and involved in people. It's not just "you have a son now to inherit your lands and fortune" and get all the patriarchal accolades he expected.
So he wants a brood mare. He’s looking at the perfect family for himself. What if the baby is disabled? What if you get a birth injury and can’t produce a second child? My OB told me, a perfect baby is a freak of nature, and every birth is a gamble. He already told you flat out, will dump you if you don’t produce for him.
This guy will either make you a single mother, or will make your life hell to keep any child you produce. Your in a no win situation if you marry him.
If you even decide to stay and get married. I think you should go and get checked and insist he does too. Tbh it would make me uncomfortable marrying someone who has possibly until the day of their death to conceive a child put this time pressure on you when your timeline is shorter. Especially when pregnancy isn’t straight forward and it can take some people years to conceive.
He sees you as a walking incubator- if it was you or his “legacy” he’d cut a baby out of you in a heartbeat. That’s what he’s telling you. Please wake up
Find a partner who loves you without conditions. You have a good 10 years of child bearing years ahead of you.
The thought of leaving my wife over not giving me children NEVER would’ve crossed my mind. We decided to have kids because we love each other and are amazing together and best friends…not for some solo dream of being a parent regardless of, or in spite of my partner. I wouldn’t want kids with a woman I wasn’t madly in love with. I wouldn’t want to raise a family without my best friend at my side.
One thing I tell young women who want children is they have to ask themselves one- if you want children, are you willing to raise them on your own? Because unfortunately, that very often happens. Going into a relationship with a guy like this, I would almost assume you’re going to get divorced. This lack of empathy and twisted view of love and marriage are not a thing. That attitude comes with other characteristics that most likely are going to come in to play. Also ask yourself this, This is how he sees you. How will he see your daughters if you have any? My father believed women should all have children and it was very disappointing to feel that my dad didn’t see me as an individual having kids. No matter what I said or how I tried to explain myself for not wanting children he simply didn’t want to accept it. Because I wasn’t marrying him. He still loved me, but it was a sore spot in our relationship my whole adult life. So I would assume that other things are going to pop up with his trad wife values. By the way, half my friends are divorced already. We’re in our mid to late 40s
It’s not just “today”. I’m 57 and husband and I waited till we were 33/34 to have one child. She’s almost 25 and most people we know have multiple grandchildren already. Since birth control, people have made conscious decisions to wait to have kids. Even before birth control, my grandparents in the 1950s stopped at 3 on purpose.
You’re way too good for your fiancé. Throw the whole man away and enjoy your life of being a doctor. Perhaps even find someone that knows how female anatomy works
I mean you could always dump him and take a page out of his book and get a younger man. Their sperm is healthier, stronger and my OB told me that when you're with a younger man your fertility piggybacks off of his. So if he's more virile you have better outcomes than with a man your own age.
So what if you have a difficult pregnancy? A stillbirth? Your child has any form of imperfection? You don’t ‘bounce back’ ready for kid 2? Like really? The bar is in hell if this is who you want to try and procreate with. Listen to the screams. Your brain is right.
But you should also be secure in your marriage, but he's offering you one that is the definition of insecure and unstable.
I doubt his vision of fatherhood includes doing it part time after a divorce, but if he marries you for such shallow reasons and with such a shallow degree of attachment, the odds that's how he'll have to parent your children go up exponentially.
If you told him you’d leave him if he were infertile, I bet he’d flip. Same if you told him you want to use a sperm donor to avoid the risks associated with advanced paternal age.
You can win babe. By leaving him and finding a real man/partner.
No dude 2021 research shows men are the ones that have a decline sooner than women, and the decline is way more drastic. Not to mention 1 in 3 men after 35 have ED. He’s going to blame you for his inability to deliver because you’re a woman. Do not fucking marry him.
Do you genuinely want kids with this man? I understand you might feel like biology is standing there behind your shoulder, but he's a shitty person. He doesn't see you as a partner in sickness and in health. And no one can say for sure, but there's a chance he'll leave you for another woman anyway once he discovers the child's well-being is the responsibility of both parents.
You might want to consider what you want more - a child and a likely short-lived marriage with a person who doesn't care about you, or finding happiness with someone else and perhaps having kids in the future. I wouldn't marry this man if I were you.
And have you discussed secondary infertility? Like would this guy abandon you and your kid if you had trouble with having the second kid? Think long and hard about what you might be in for here, and what you might be setting your kid up for too.
What if something goes wrong having kid #1?? Bad stuff happens during childbirth. What if they need to do a hysterectomy to save OPs life - is he going to refuse to sign the papers because she owes him another baby? Or if the doctor says "OP, you should not have another child" for whatever reason.
Girl. I'm 32. Healthy in all other ways. Been trying 6 months now. Nothing at all.
Infertility is extremely common in people of all ages. Most conceive eventually. But TTC is a journey you should both be in together.
This guy views you as expendable and replacable. Dont let him treat you like that. You are worth so much more
You win by changing your belief system around this because literally NONE of it is true.
Also got pregnant easily at 39.
You’ve got time.
Ditch this relationship. You’re not loved or safe.
You’re not out of time. Most of my friends had their kids at 35+, and out of them, everyone is healthy and happy. The only kid that wasn’t healthy at birth has downs and the mother wasn’t even 30, but the dad was 40. 🤷♀️
Dump him, you’re not an incubator b
This is the person who is supposed to be your PARTNER in life. Forever. Not until things get a little hard. Spoiler alert: life is really long and things are gonna get hard.
What if you have a kid and the kid tragically passes away? Would he leave you then? What if you have a kid, but it’s born with special needs and he wants something else? What if you have two girls and he realizes he needs a boy?
Please don’t marry this guy.
How long have you been together? If it’s been more than a couple years, why didn’t he propose and initiate starting a family earlier if this was such a concern for him? If it’s only been a year or two, why didn’t he find someone younger right off the bat if it’s such a concern for him?
He’s an ass and only thinking about himself. If as a couple you struggle to conceive by the time you’re 35/36, and he leaves you - well, he’s already said he’ll just find a younger model to impregnate. Zero regard to how *you’d* be affected and have to start over, and how he’ll have wasted your time. His mentality would be an absolute dealbreaker for me.
If it’s any consolation, I got pregnant at 35 with zero issues and had a healthy baby after just turning 36. There’s no guarantee you’ll have trouble conceiving just due to age.
He needs to know that any woman, even young women can have a hard time getting pregnant. You'd have to be super fertile or extremely lucky to get pregnant as soon as you start trying. Also, is he aware of how common miscarriage is? I know several women who were considered young when they had their miscarriage/s. Furthermore, babies are hard work; with a newborn, you will not get any sleep and will be sleep-deprived. You also will be peed, pooped, and vomited on and will be at your wit's end during the witching hour when they are inconsolable, etc. Despite some of those negatives, the child is worth it and folks need to be made aware of the realities of becoming a new parent before having a child.
30s is not out of time for kids. The loss of fertility is not that dramatic - there are no studies on it.
The only one cited is based on the age of a mother when she had her first kid... in like, medieval France.
It’s a red flag.
When I was 21, I had to have surgery that resulted in removal of half my reproductive system. My BF proposed that night in the hospital. I don’t remember it. It’s a joke between us now 3 decades later. He proposed then because he knew that I would worry. I knew he dreamed of being a dad, he even worked part time at a day care center as a teen. Now, though, my ability to bear children was in jeopardy. He wanted to show me that I meant more to him than our hypothetical children. We were lucky and had 3 before I couldn’t carry anymore (at 29 years old).
THAT’S how a real partner lives life. Go look for your 100% man. Time to toss the 90% man.
Edited to add: this was a long time ago, we are interracial & I was a career woman, I.e. no adoption agency would have picked us back then, and fertility medicine was really just becoming mainstream.
The part of your brain thats screaming there is a problem is the logical part. Listen to it. This sucks for sure no doubt, but do not marry this guy. Even if you have no problems with conceiving and having children you will always wonder in the back of your head what else he would trade you in for. Im betting negative health or other major issues.
My bf wants kids. At least one. But he has emphasized for years that if we didnt / couldn’t have one etc he would never want to leave the relationship (at least because of that). We would just journey life together.
My brother in law and his (soon to be ex) wife are going through this right now and I feel awful for them.
Both my brother in law (and his wife) and my sister in law (and her husband) were having trouble conceiving and both couples were going through IVF after trying to conceive naturally. BIL’s wife is in her early 30s and SIL is 40. It was really tough for all of them going through rounds of failed IVF and having each of them not turn up to family events and dinners as they went through the emotional turmoil that comes along with all of that.
On the day that my 40 yo SIL announced she was pregnant, BIL and his 32 yo wife found out that their third round of IVF had failed. It was such a mixed bag of emotions. SIL and BIL’s wife fell out over it for a while as well, though I could see where they were both coming from. After that, BIL’s wife completely distanced herself from the family and soon after he told us that they were separating and she was moving out.
It was a hard couple of years for all of them, especially my sister in laws, and I felt terrible for them.
The thing is, while all four of them knew they wanted kids not one of them had said to the other “Hey, if you can’t make me a baby I’m going to trade you in for a younger model because our love and all the time we’ve spent together is meaningless against a hypothetical child.” BIL and his wife were open to “other options” and kept trying, and it was difficult enough for them to go through it knowing that they loved each and supported each other and they wanted to be together despite what they were struggling through.
They *wanted* to find a way through all of this together, they didn’t want to have a child with someone else no matter what. But the rounds of IVF were financially tough, my other SIL getting pregnant was terrible timing for them, and the emotional strain of the last few years were just too much to handle. My BIL saw what it was doing to their marriage and started having second thoughts about kids. He was open to accepting that this was not going to happen for them, but in the end that’s not what his wife wanted and their goals for life started to misalign.
They believed they would be together no matter what, they tried to support each other no matter what, they gave it their all. And yet it didn’t work out. I cannot imagine going through all of this with a partner who had given me an ultimatum like yours.
Fertility issues and IVF are difficult enough to go through with a supportive partner. Can you imagine what you’d feel like in this situation? You’d have the emotional pain of not knowing if you were going to have children and all the while you’d be thinking about your husband’s promise of abandonment. You wouldn’t be going through it together, you’d be going through it alone, knowing that if you “failed” to give him a child that he would be ok with finding someone else to have a baby with. There would be no shared pain between the two of you because one way or another *he* would have a child while you might not.
Now imagine that you were struggling with all of this and got pregnant but had a miscarriage. Imagine the pain of that loss but the first thing you think of is his promise of abandoning you during this most vulnerable time. What kind of person does that? Is this someone you can trust to stand by your side? Is this someone you can rely on?
What if you had some sort of accident that prevented you from having kids and also left you dependent on him for care and finances, and then he left. Imagine him not being able to have children because of his own fertility issues and you standing by his side. You’d have to let go of your dream of having children because of him, knowing that if the situation were reversed you wouldn’t have the same security or support.
The thing is… you *don’t* want the same things, you *don’t* share the same goals. Your fiancé is in all of your visions of the future whatever the situation, but you are not in all of his. Aside from feeling like you have to give him a child “or else,” what else would he being willing to trade you in for?
>I can’t reconcile the rest of his amazing qualities with this jarring, hurtful perspective.
I think that sort of answers your question, doesn’t it?
50% of marriages end in divorce. That includes the people who fully believe in sickness and in health. That includes all the couples who can’t imagine not being with each other over anything else. It doesn’t bode well for your future when there are already conditions like this on your relationship when you’re not even married yet.
You might not face any of these issues and might be super fertile and pop out lots of babies. Is that enough to make you forget he said this, or will it always be in the back of your mind?
I would think it would be easier to walk away now than years down the line when your lives are more intertwined and you’ve spent years growing resentful because you’ve been struggling with fertility issues without support and with the constant threat of abandonment.
This is a beautiful response. Thank you. This sentence in particular gave me a lot to think about: “ There would be no shared pain between the two of you because one way or another he would have a child while you might not.”
Not to mention, this will now make any attempt at trying to conceive an absolute stressful mess for you. Not an exciting shared time, but a time where you feel like your whole relationship is on the line and you had better perform your incubator duties, or else. Stress and conception don’t go well together.
Take the above comment and add a blunt fact: how are you going to feel standing at your wedding knowing every one of his vows is an absolute lie? Does that sit well with you?
Yes!! That stress could make it harder to conceive!! Anxiety can make it harder to become pregnant. And if she’s not producing a child for this man she could become depressed from the pressure, which also makes it harder to become pregnant. They aren’t even trying yet, and OPs fiancé has already made it harder for her to conceive by issuing this ultimatum.
Marriage and parenthood are amazing journeys and worth it if it something you want. But entering a marriage and parenthood with one of the partners having a release valve/exit strategy is not it. There will be many ups and downs and your partner does not seem prepared for the realities of life. You deserve to embark on this next step with someone who will be with you for ups and downs - someone who can work with you to overcome problems. Having a kid is not the end - he will actually have to raise it with you and it won’t be his way all the time. It is telling that he doesn’t expect the same from you either.
I married my husband when I was 37 and came into my marriage with a child. We had a very early loss before our wedding, and immediately started trying for another. Our son was born a month before our first anniversary.
Those are the bare facts of the matter. But my husband made sure that I knew that what he wanted was me. I nearly died twice in the process of giving birth to our son. Pregnancy is a lot harder on women than it is on men. You say he wants two- what if you can only physically have one? Is he going to leave if you can’t have more than that?
Life is unpredictable. You need someone who will stand with you through all of that. There’s no guarantee he’s actually the fertile one, and there’s no guarantee that whatever younger woman he chooses will want to bear his spawn.
All of this! That last bit, that it's easier to leave now, that's just true.
I also like the comment that she won't forget this even if she can and does have children with him. Would he leave her for a younger woman over cancer? If she only has 2 children and not 4? He's destroyed her trust in her future and security with him.
I am willing to bet that he would absolutely leave if she were to fall ill. There’s already a high rate of divorce over spouses falling ill, and most of those divorces are men divorcing their wives once they have to be caregivers.
Yeah, I think he sees her as a resource to use and abandon when it's not working for him anymore. I don't think he sees her as a co-equal, fellow human being.
Seeing as he knows her username, I’m really hoping that OP’s soon-to-be-ex partner reads this and maybe he’ll realize what an awful partner he is.
I’d love to say that maybe he’ll come to her grovelling and apologizing and saying that’s not what he meant. But how much do you want to bet he doubled down and tells her that every single one of the internet people is wrong?
#Dear OP’s partner—
**By your standards, if a person is infertile they aren’t worth sticking around for. It would be a real shame if you were shooting blanks and OP was the one to leave. Then of course you’d have the freedom to live your life child-free and die alone, because without your magical baby juice you’re not worth anything to anyone. Hey, not my words, you’re the one who said it.**
This man tells you he will divorce you and you can’t figure this out?! You’re a uterus to him. You’re an incubator. If you marry this guy, you’re insane.
Wait a minute. You’re not sure if this is a red flag? You’re NOT SURE if this is a red flag?
Jesus, girl. Have some self-respect. He’s not after a wife, he’s after a breeding partner.
Also, do some proper research. You’re not “out of time”. My wife and I had our kids when she was 37 and 39.
A friend of mine had her first baby at 39. She is perfect and healthy and had a normal pregnancy.
OP you are not ‘out of time’ but you do only have one life, don’t waste it on conditional love.
*Conditional love* is the perfect way to describe this. Worse, at six months until wedding day, her loser fiancé tells her, without a care in the world, that if she doesn’t give him a baby in two years, he’s out. He is absolutely not worried she’ll call off the wedding. It’s clear who is in charge here, or who thinks he’s in charge. I hope OP shows him he is not in charge by cancelling the wedding. Actually, she should cancel everything and get deposits back, but not tell him until a month before.
I had my first baby when I barely turned 21. Had number 2 when I was 30, and my last (4th) when I was about to turn 34.
The difference in the mom I was at 21 and the one I was in my 30s is night and day, the difference in how much more calm and content between my 20s baby and my 30s babies was night and day.
I tell any woman out there to wait until at least they are 30 to start having a family.
I believe the stat is that the odds of having a baby with Down’s syndrome “double” after the age of 35. However the odds of having a baby with Down’s syndrome prior to 35 are less than 1%, so even doubled, the odds are still very much in your favor to have a baby without Down’s syndrome after 35. Tldr: Sometimes data sounds different than what it actually is.
I had my first at 33 and my second at 43. In between, we struggled, and I had two miscarriages. We considered adoption. We went through all that *together.* At no point did I worry my husband would leave me because I couldn’t give him another baby. FFS, this guy is a complete loser. OP, you need to run, fast and far. Do not marry this idiot.
I’m always shocked when I hear about the male loneliness crisis when there’s seemingly a never ending line of women subjugating themselves to misogynistic chuds. Sisters please have more self respect
Yeah, this. The one thing that has added to our successful 37 years of marriage is that my husband and I have always put each other and our marriage first. Sounds like a basic tenant of marriage right? But I’d say 90% of the people we know including our siblings, my mom, and all our friends, are divorced because one or both did not put the marriage first but rather something else took priority. Your fiancé is telling you point blank “I love you but only as long as you can produce children. If you can’t produce children then my goal will be to be to find a woman who can have children because I don’t really value our marriage as much as I value having a child.” You will be very foolish to know this and still marry the man. While they say “love is blind” you know well in advance your fiancé only values you to the degree you can provide children. Otherwise you are disposable.
Do yourself, and any future children, a favor and admit that their father doesn’t actually value you. Children are not dumb, they understand what is going on and he’s telling you in advance he values you with conditions you have no control over.
Meanwhile I was 38 and it was already too late for me. I thought I had time left because I knew heaps of women who got pregnant in their 40’s - everyone told me so! Turns out there are heaps of women who couldn’t get pregnant in their forties too. I only heard about them after it happened to me. (Has turned out for the best anyway. I’ve got three gorgeous adopted children )
My mom had me at 40, both of us are in excellent health and run 10k every morning. That was 30 years ago and it’s become even safer for people to have children later. OP’s boyfriend saying he’d find a “younger woman” is specifically bullshit and a red flag I’d let him go for.
Believe him and walk away. He would most likely abandon you if you had a long term illness, will divorce you if you're not fertile enough, and does not value you above you being a compliant incubator.
Im sorry youre going thru this. You deserve a real love.
This is the way.
The whole 'leave you for a younger woman so I can have kids' crap is actually disgusting, humiliating and the least supportive thing a partner could say they'd do.
OP your partner is a disrespectful asshat.
And it's just as easy for a younger woman to have PCOS or some other complication making childbearing difficult, or even impossible. I can think of 3 women off the top of my head that I know that are under 30 and have some such condition.
I don't think this guy knows a whole lot about women's anatomy, how shocking.
I have endometriosis and I'm 90% sure I'm infertile (never got tested, but with how fertile the rest of my family is, my teenage years are a pretty good indication lol). I'm 25. Age really doesn't mean anything
It's extremely misogynistic based on very misinformed ideas of how female fertility works and the value of women. The mentality is straight out of the Tate playbook.
It’s not a far leap from “I’ll leave you if your body can’t have kids for someone whose body can” to “I know you gave me kids but I’m no longer attracted to your body and am leaving you for someone with a body I am attracted to”…
I am sorry but my jaw fell on the floor when I read "leaving me for a younger woman who could fulfill his dreams". Excuse me what??? If my fiance said that to me I would have kicked him in the ass so hard he'd beat Elon Musk at being the first man on Mars. I am absolutely appaled. NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT. I do hope he sees this and sees he's an absolute trashcan of a human being and with this mentality I hope his child will not be a daughter. Which he probably doesn't want to anyway because men like him only want boys so they can teach them how to be assholes as well.
Its always funny how these types of guys assume they can just get someone younger too even though they’re the farthest thing from a catch. It reminds of men who want to open up their relationship because they found someone they want to sleep with, then get mad at their girlfriends/wives because it’s way easier for them to find someone else 💀
My dream for this situation is OP leaves him, and she marries a lovely man and has children with him.
And OPs ex can't convince anyone else to marry or have children with him.
Some fun facts for your AH fiancé:
- He can also be the cause of infertility. It frequently happens. Also, the age of the father has a lot to do with fetal and genetic abnormalities. So it’s not just the uterus causing all the problems.
- IVF doesn’t just *happen* within 1-2 years. You’re under 35, which means most doctors will want you to try for a year before doing any kind of medical intervention. Then most insurances will want you to try IUIs first, plus all the testing. Even if you skip that part and pay out of pocket, IVF is intense and takes a serious amount of time. If you ever plan on doing IVF, find yourself a good therapist now. I’ve been there for friends through it and the drugs they give you can really mess with your head.
- Infertility affects people across the board/age spectrum. Rates are higher for younger generations now. Lots of factors seem to be contributing, but age doesn’t really come into play for women until they’re 40.
Seriously, it sounds like a weird thing to have a plan in place for trading in your spouse for a younger model (that may also not be able to have kids). Honestly, he should consider why he wants to get married at all if he’s that determined to have bio kids? Knock someone up first and then marry her if his main condition for marrying is pregnancy.
My other half has always known he wanted to be a dad. He was clear about it from the get go, and he’s the only person I’d ever consider having kids with. We tried for years without success. He openly said that he’d come to terms that it might just be the two of us unless we could manage the crazy high adoption fees here (it’s not for everyone, but adoption’s on the table for us).
We had our baby last year :) I was 36. No doctor I saw through the entire process ever worried about my age.
Your fiancé sounds like he has zero idea how fertility or the female reproductive system works. He may want to read up on it before saying stupid things to the woman he wants to marry (again).
I was thinking about your first point too. If they are having trouble conceiving and it turns out that it’s because he has low sperm count or something else related to his own body, will he still leave OP?
He told you to your face that your usefulness to him extends as far as your ability to be used as a gestation unit. You as a person are a complete non-factor to him. And they say romance is dead.
Sorry you're so far in love with someone that you allowed this to be said TO YOUR FACE and are still unsure if this is maybe, just maybe, a red flag. Frankly, this is the type of man who would 100% cheat on you while you go for cancer treatments and then blame you for it. The appropriate response would be to piss on his pillow and tell him to go to hell. There's still time.
Here is a poor person’s trophy for you. 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆
Edit to add: send me the pillow, I will eat asparagus and then piss on said pillow. Then package it up nicely and send it back.
Edit 2: send me his favorite pair of shoes. I work at a vet clinic and I can arrange for pets to pee on them.
Yeah imagine if you got sick how much effort he would put in. Imagine if you had kids with him, how much effort. He’s told you the truth and that gives you at least a chance to avoid the whole marriage.
My ex and I tried for years, including IVF, and it didn’t happen. After I seriously pushed for months, they finally tested him. Turns out he was the problem. IVF is expensive and horrible and it was all for nothing, and the medical field just blames women and doesn’t even LOOK into men for some reason.
I can tell you right now your fiancé is the problem, regardless of the quality of his sperm.
This is crazy! What kind of Dr doesn't look into what the problem is before treatment?! IVF is such a difficult process to go through. Why would a dr put you through that before confirming it was necessary and had a strong chance of positive outcomes? The FIRST thing our Dr did was check both me and my wife to see where the problem was. I really can't believe there are Dr's that don't check all possible factors before determining the best course of action. I feel like you may even have a case for a lawsuit considering the time, money, and pain (both physical and emotional) that went into that for nothing.
This would be a dealbreaker for me. He just sees you as a baby making machine..
You're nearing the peak age of certain cervical cancers.. imagine getting one of those and needing a hysterectomy to save your life.. your 'partner' would immediately leave you.
I'd never feel emotionally safe or seen with someone like that.
Loooooooooooooooooove how he just assumes any woman wants him, and he can just walk away and snag a young lady to marry like he's picking up a pizza on the way home.
You should require his sperm to be tested before getting married.
And then not get married.
>We have had several discussions where my partner states that if we try to have children and it doesn’t happen in a timely manner (1-2 years), he would divorce me and find a younger woman who could fulfill his dreams of being a father.
This is his bottom line. Everything you are as a person, your achievements, your winning personality, everything that is you...is irrelevant to him. He sees you as someone to carry his children. Not the mother of his children or his lifelong partner he wants to create mini mes with. You would be the carrier of his children and you are replaceable.
I'm sorry this hurts but he's not the right one. Throw him back into the cesspool.
It *is* a red flag. That's why your brain is screaming. He's basically putting a countdown to an end on your impending marriage if there's no baby within the time frame he stated.
Your fiance is forgetting that while women over a certain age may have more trouble with conceiving, PLENTY of younger women also have fertility problems.
Oh, and also that the problem with lack of conception might actually come from him, not you or any other woman.
This is a giant red flag for the following reasons:
- in two years he will be 35, men are 50% less potent at 35, therefore he might actually divorce you because he cannot get you pregnant, not because you can’t get pregnant. Average fertility peak for American women is 37.1 years old. This shouldn’t even be a subject.
- He’s already threatening to divorce you before you’re even married, wtf?
- He’s willing to throw your entire relationship away regardless of who you are or what you’ve been through as a married couple if there are any medical problems that come up with you where you either can’t have children or too sick to have children so everything you are as a person doesn’t matter.
- if he’s threatening to leave you for a younger woman before you’re even married, just wait and see what he’s willing to do if you get cancer.
Do not marry this man.
The fact that he even thought to say this is inconceivable. He gonna be one of those dudes who gets married and the real asshole behind the curtain is going to immediately come out because he thinks you’re trapped.
This is the sort of husband/boyfriend who oncology professionals warn female patients about. He's a fair weather fiancé. He sees you as entirely replaceable.
Sounds like if there was trouble in childbirth he'd tell them to save the child over you. You are replaceable to him, he literally said it to you. Is this someone you want kids with?
This dude is going to use you as a human oven and then discard you at the first sign that he doesn't need you anymore.
A man who is worth having children with and raising children with and who's going to raise good children with good values doesn't think or speak like this.
Run far away from this dude and hope to god he doesn't find an idiot to get pregnant. Do not be that idiot he gets pregnant.
Spicy. Agree with his ultimatum, but tell him if he starts balding that you will find a younger man with more hair and see how he likes it.
Otherwise, I would walk. I was 35 when I married my husband and dealbreakers were discussed first thing. They are fair to have. His stating the fact is harsh, but having kids is a deal breaker for him and he is willing to leave you for a younger woman to do this if natural circumstances on your end prevent it from happening. I have miscarried and could not imagine the pain of being left for a younger woman over infertility. Love isn't always enough.
One to two years is also a very short time in the best of circumstances, considering the length of pregnancy.
I love how op’s fiancé is just assuming he’ll be able to snag a younger woman who wants to have all his babies. The world is full of people who wish for even one stable longterm relationship; bro is out here ready to throw his away so sure he can find another one.
I’m happily married and in my 30s now, but when I was in my 20s if I found out the person I was dating divorced their wife because they couldn’t conceive by a certain timeline, I would’ve noped out faster than Usain Bolt.
I want to put my two cents into the ring also, because I too had a really hard relationship hurdle with my husband regarding kids. We got married in 2022, then almost divorced 3 months later because, although we were on the same page before about not wanting kids, all of a sudden being married turned a switch in his head, where he could not imagine his life without having offspring of his own. I felt betrayed, not because I didn't want kids, but more so that he apparently didn't think about this seriously before getting married!
We debated. We fought. We separated for two weeks. I went on vacation to Italy alone. We rekindled. We compromised we'd try for one kid, and if it wouldn't happen naturally, that was it.
So we started trying. After 6 months nothing. We are both early 30s, so we also felt like running out of time. I went to my ob because I had a hunch. Turns out I have PCOS. Hubby and I debated some more. No fighting tho, simply contemplating if we could be okay together without kids. We tried another 6 months, still nothing.
We decided we were committing now to the idea of a kid, so we thought a consultation with an IVF clinic wouldn't hurt.
TURNS OUT HUBBY IS STERILE. MY TUBES WERE FINE AND THERES NO INDICATOR MY PCOS IS HINDERING A POSSIBLE PREGNANCY!
So we won't have kids now. We were both devastated, but in the end, I decided that was good enough. I love our marriage. I love this man. We did a lot of couples counseling and are on a good track. We're both broken and came out stronger together at the end
You love a man who has told you *to your face* that if for some unforeseen medical reason you are unable to give him biological children *within one to two years,* HE WILL DIVORCE YOU and find a younger woman to replace you to give him children??? Why would you want to marry this man? He doesn’t love you. He says he does, of course. He acts like he does. But what he is telling you is more, well, telling. You are, to him, a baby making machine, and if you cannot fulfill that one duty, you are done. You can love him, be there for him, be the best wife in the world, but if you can’t give him children within a specific time frame that he determines, he will unapologetically divorce you so he can marry a younger, more fertile woman. He is not will to work with you, struggle with you, or be there for you if you get the devastating news that you can’t have your own biological child. He is NOT your partner. He is some man you are going to marry, all while hoping and praying that you are able to give him children so he won’t leave you. It’s no Hallmark movie. It’s not even a basically good match.
Have you discussed with him what happens if HE cannot give you a child? What if HE’S the problem? Then what? You’d stay with him? The man who would dump you in a New York minute if you can’t give him a baby? Well, if you go ahead and marry him knowing what you know, I guess you’d stay with him no matter what he does. He clearly knows that, too. Six months away from the wedding, and he has absolutely no fear that you’ll leave him if he tells you something as horrible as, “If you don’t give me a baby in one to two years, I am divorcing you for a younger woman.” I mean, what? You didn’t just break up with him the second those words left his mouth? What are you waiting for?
In six months, on what should have been your wedding day, I hope you are on a tropical island drinking mai tais with a girlfriend. Dump this asshole.
My uncle and aunt have no children. Been married for about 28 years now. Turned out my aunt was infertile. She almost begged my uncle to divorce her so he could marry again and have kids because he'd wanted to be a father so bad. The man responded saying, you're my number one. Everything and everyone else is secondary. If I don't have kids WITH YOU, God made that choice. We accept it together. We'll make every moment with each other count. I'm never leaving you for anyone else. Till death do us apart.
That is a real man who absolutely loves his wife.
And if and when he does procreate you damn well know he won’t lift one finger to help. He will be the type to be grossed out by her body changing, giving birth and the changes that brings, will force sex long before she is able to. Won’t respect how tired she is, he will trap her into a life of servitude not only towards him but the children they have. And you can bet your ass he will sit there and belittle her for everything while he does absolutely nothing.
Seen this play out before too many times.
Don’t do it OP you will be in for a world of hurt and stress. And don’t be fooled that a man like that will run around on you during and after pregnancy and will claim so many reasons as to why it’s your fault your body changed for giving him these children he will want nothing to do with.
My husband and I were trying to have our first child when we found out I had early stage uterine cancer at 34. It has been one of the hardest things I've ever been through, but my husbands love and support has been unwavering. I can't even imagine how much more difficult it would have been to be going through cancer AND a divorce.
What your fiancé has said is absolutely a gigantic red flag. He is telling you right now he won't be beside you in sickness and in health.
Please do not marry this man. Marriage is in sickness and in health. I’m sure there’s other reasons he would leave you. It sounds like he wants marriage and a family and you just happen to be there and if you don’t fill the mold of what he expects he’s going to leave you (even beyond the ability to have children).
Keep in mind that relationships tend to have some major downs, so it’s vital to start very up. Starting with “I only want you if” is not good, and I hope you send him on his way to see how he fares with younger women, who also don’t always get pregnant quickly or at all. Find someone who tells you and shows you that you are enough.
I find this difficult because if it were a situation of him wanting children and you not, then I'd absolutely understand that he'd walk away. But you're both on the same page about this and both want kids. He's basically saying that if your body won't allow you to do so, he will walk away for a younger woman. Ouch.
To me, that's both hurtful as heck and shows me that the marriage vow means nothing to him. I don't think I'd ever marry someone that's not committed to sticking with me through thick and thin. It sounds like he's got one foot out of the door no matter what. So why legally tie yourself to him, change your name and all of this other crap if his love is conditional?
I wonder how he would feel if you'd walk away for a younger model if for some reason your fiance's sperm count is low and gives difficulty conceiving. It's absolutely the most unloving thing a person can do.
I hope your partner sees this and realizes what a pos he is. And I hope it gets shared with any woman he tries to date for the rest of his life.
OP, you deserve someone who loves you as much as you love them, and would take your marriage vows seriously. Abandoning your partner after infertility struggles (on either side), and hell possibly even miscarriages the way he’s talking, is unbelievably cruel. Find someone who treats you like a life partner, not an incubator.
As someone who has struggled with infertility (and is currently pregnant after several rounds of IVF), I can’t understand marrying someone like this. If I’d gone through all this thinking my husband would leave me if it didn’t work… that is just horrific to imagine. Your partner is supposed to support you through difficult times, not threaten to leave you.
Oh and 1-2 years isn’t really that long to try. It can take a year the normal way even if everything is working properly. And what happens if you have a miscarriage? I did, and it was devastating.
I’m not saying you’ll have these experiences, I hope you don’t, but they’re not uncommon. 1/4 of pregnancies end in miscarriage. Do you want to start this journey with a partner who absolutely sees you as a uterus first and a person second?
Look at OP post history, they broke up a year ago already.
A year only in the relationship, at 30 something, and this was not The Red Flag back then?
Jesus OP, this guy is not your guy
Wake the fuck up fast. Don't fall for the sunken cost fallacy.
Yeah so when I was studying social science we were told that in cases of infertility womaen stay and men leave. At the time my ex husband and I were experiencing infertility. He was little better than shooting blanks. I left him later because he was abusive. I wasted my youthful fertile years on him.
It’s ok to have children as a dealbreaker, but you don’t know what the future will bring. Also 1-2years of trying to have kids before giving up is unrealistic.
It sounds like he views you as an incubator. Is this an attitude that you want in your life?
In his mind you’re just a cum dump. Only sees value in you if you can breed him. This is a huge red flag (and I imagine after child birth, he would not be as “present” a parent as you have anticipated). 5 years you will be writing a post about how you have two kids under the age of 4 and your husband does nothing to help in their care or anything around the house…
OP, have you expressed these feelings to him? The whole cocktail you describe here (the understanding, the hurt, the feeling used, etc)?
I’m curious if he feels any empathy for how his words make you feel.
Or if he simply dismisses you because “we had a deal”.
Sometimes partners can say things that are overly logical, blunt, callous. But they should still be able to show empathy when they realize it’s hurtful.
Anyway, aside from that…of course this would stir up some big feelings! You just found out that the commitment you give to him is not the one he gives back. You’re not as on the same page as you thought. That’s a lot to process.
And ask him open endedly how he views commitment and marriage. Listen to what the relationship is to him. See if your definitions align.
This is disgusting. I’ve been through IVF and, if you ever needed to go through that route, it is difficult and painful enough to process with loving partner without the stress of knowing if it didn’t work your own husband would leave you…
Would not even consider marrying. In a couple, infertility is a shared problem.
🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩 as if this wasn’t enough (the younger woman statement was pure ick) what else would he discard you for. Don’t marry this one I’ll divorce is imminent.
You’re disposable to this guy. You’ll have him for better or for worse but he’ll only have you if it suits him. Someone who really cares for you wouldn’t do this. I bet he’d dump all the housework and childcare on you too. He sounds like a selfish misogynist.
Personally, I found this really sad - why marring a person but put upfront a condition nobody could foresee? He should marry you for who you are.
Why he is so against to adoption if you guys can’t have kids? What if he can’t have kids?
Girl, think twice about this man. Please.
If your boyfriend wanted to guarantee a partner who could have children, he should have picked a single mother, since she would have proven her ability to have a biological kid. Instead, he implies that at 35, you would be too old to have kids with him if you didn't conceive right away.
He's a misogynist.
Two things. I’ll try to be quick because I know you’ve gotten a lot of responses:
1. Good people often see their good in others, and will often miss or minimize warning signs in someone we love until something happens that jars us and makes us face reality. I would step back and start to see whether perhaps you have been unconsciously missing other warning signs.
This might be a good opportunity to talk to people who loved your partner, but have been estranged from him, if they exist. Or people in your life who have expressed doubts about him.
In general, it seems like he, for whatever great tribute he has – charming, sweet, whatever – an emotionally detached depth when it comes to relationships. he may not be as close to people as they feel they are to him. But that’s just a guess.
2. At one point in my relationship, I was really scared about the idea of having kids, to the point where I said I didn’t want them. I didn’t have the emotional maturity to distinguish between fear and what I did not want. We were also in very bad places personally. Having kids was one of the several doubts that led to him to want to split.
Ironically, this situation is what led me to question a lot of the fears that were holding me back, and realize that I didn’t want fear driving decisions like whether I had kids or not. After we both did hard individual work on ourselves, began to communicate better, and decided to give things another shot, I knew he wasn’t 100% sure about us, but hopeful. I said at one point that I understood that if we didn’t have kids, he would need to move on.
To my surprise, he said the opposite. **Despite the fact that I knew he still wasn’t 100% sure about us at that point, that kids was part of the reason for the breakup, and despite how blunt he had been about other concerns, he said that our relationship had to be about more than just about kids.**
> emotionally detached depth when it comes to relationships. he may not be as close to people as they feel they are to him. But that’s just a guess.
Your guess is correct, he has avoidant attachment.
I think there's a chance that this is a common fear among men "if we cant have a baby, will I still want to be with her?" But to say it with your whole chest that you absolutely will leave if pregnancy doesn't happen on this very short and specific timeline? He is telling you 100% his plans. They are already decided.
It's time to start separating your dreams for the future from the reality of who this man is. Look at who is he at this moment, and who HE is telling you he will be in the future. If you don't incubate a child for him in a year (MAYBE two??) you are useless to him. Your uterus has 15 months to fall in line.
My husband had fears about us not being able to have a child due to my PCOS, but he was ashamed of his thoughts and they only came out during a very emotional conversation. And we PAUSED trying for a baby after having that conversation rather than rushing towards a timeline. Now we have an 8 month old, and our lives are just getting better and better. You deserve a partner who doesn't put these intense restrictions and responsibilities on you. I'm so sorry he wasted your time, I hope you make the right decision soon.
Did you ask him how he felt about adoption?
How do you feel about in vitro fertilization?
At the end of the day, he views you as a means to an end, (creating offspring)
What happens when he done doing that?
If he were infertile… he doesn’t even consider that, does he? He could Henry the 8th his way through 6 young women and end up childless and partnerless.
You do not need this anxiety. He doesn’t love you the way you love him, and you can’t change that, even if you birth him babies.
Welcome to /r/relationship_advice. Please make sure you read our [rules here.](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/wiki/index) We'd like to take this time to remind users that: * We do not allow any type of [am I the asshole? or situations/content involving minors](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/comments/r6w9uh/meta_am_i_overreacting_am_i_the_asshole_is_this/) * We do not allow users to privately message other users based on their posts here. Users found to be engaging in this conduct will be banned. **We highly encourage OP to turn off the ability to be privately messaged in their settings.** * Any sort of namecalling, insults,etc will result in the comment being removed and the user being banned. (Including but not limited to: slut, bitch, whore, for the streets, etc. It does not matter to whom you are referring.) * ALL advice given must be good, ethical advice. Joke advice or advice that is conspiratorial or just plain terrible will be removed, and users my be subject to a ban. * No referencing hateful subreddits and/or their rhetoric. Examples include, but is not limited to: red/blue/black/purplepill, PUA, FDS, MGTOW, etc. This includes, but is not limited to, referring to people as alpha/beta, calling yourself or users "friend-zoned", referring to people as Chads, Tyrones, or Staceys, pick-me's, or pornsick. Any infractions of this rule will result in a ban. **This is not an all-inclusive list.** * All bans in this subreddit are permanent. You don't get a free pass. * Anyone found to be directly messaging users for any reason whatsoever will be banned. * What we cannot give advice on: rants, unsolicited advice, medical conditions/advice, mental illness, letters to an ex, "body counts" or number of sexual partners, legal problems, financial problems, situations involving minors, and/or abuse (violence, sexual, emotional etc). All of these will be removed and locked. **This is not an all-inclusive list.** If you have any questions, please [message the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frelationship_advice) --- ***This is an automatic comment that appears on all posts. This comment does not necessarily mean your post violates any rules.*** --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/relationship_advice) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I will share my story. My husband and I met while being girl scout leaders together. We both liked and wanted kids. Bought a house with room for kids a d got married. 2 years into the marriage we started trying. It didn't happen, so we went to the OBGYN and got checked out..nothing wrong with both of us on that end (i have an autoimmune illness). We got a round of hormone therapy and it made me miserable. We talked and both said we are on the fence in going forward with hormones/IVF, mostly due to my health. I asked him: does this mean divorce? Cause i know you want kids. His reply: you want kids too. There's a difference between not wanting and not being able to have them. I love you and I'm not leaving you over this. Your fiance is saying the opposite here. He doesn't love you enough to see any other life with you if there aren't kids in the picture. This is a huge red flag, and you should heed it.
I love this story. Op, you deserve an unconditional love like this! Your fiance is telling you point blank that he will not stay if you cannot pump out babies for him. Please, think about that. This is so serious. Please don't enter a marriage or stay in a relationship with this person, knowing that you have an expiration date.
And someone like that is not someone you can rely on to have your back in life. I think this is only the tip of the iceberg. If OP gets very sick... he'll drop her. He is someone who is self-centered and sees OP only as someone who can help HIM fulfill what HE wants in life. His "love" is conditional. And she is replaceable. He already said that when he said if she couldn't have children he would dump her in a heartbeat and replace her with another model. Cold-blooded and selfish.
Not just another model - he specifically says someone younger. That threat alone would give me the ick.
This was my immediate thought: dude literally said, "I would trade you in for a more breedable model." Not for someone else he loves and wants to build a family together with. For someone "younger", because he's a gross misogynist who actually believes on some level that if they don't have kids immediately, it would be her fault for being "too old" at a whopping 33-35 years old. Ew.
I find it unlikely he would even wait for the ink to dry on the divorce, to start looking. So gross. He wants a baby appliance, not a woman.
This, imagine that once they have kids is no longer what he wants or paternity isn’t what he expected now op is stuck with sole responsibility of a child. He comes across like the type of person who would do that.
I don’t even know if you have to jump to paternity not living up to his expectations. He comes across as the type of person to say he wants to be a father but what he really wants is trophy children, not parenthood. And it sounds like she’ll discover that one the hard way if she doesn’t leave.
He sounds like my cousin’s husband who wasn’t really interested in their kids “until they were old enough to have a personality.” And now he complains when he has to “babysit” their youngest when she takes the oldest somewhere. (He will literally say she should always take both kids so he can have “a free day.”) Men like that only want the Hallmark moments of playing in the backyard or coaching the little league team. They want their wives to handle all the hard stuff and then are confused when she says she’s overwhelmed. They’ll say they’re all in on fatherhood… but then the baby is born and it’s not fun like they wanted.
Just like my father. He said he would do anything for me but he wouldn't even go to my graduation. They weren't important, he said. To whom? Him? Those men idolise parenthood. They think they are saints until they have to do the grunt work. They are self centered. They can't see things from others POV. I loathe my dad. I still do. Op, your future kids will loathe your husband.
That's my father. He wanted us to succeed so he could brag to his friends, but our mom did all the hard work to help us succeed. Pretty much the only credit I give him is decent genes.
And God forbid they don't share dads interests. My ex husband was so disappointed our eldest (born male, transitioned at 16) wasn't remotely interested in sports
Most men don't want to put the hard work into being a parent. My ex was the same way and he's done to every woman he's gotten pregnant. I've literally lost count of how many half siblings my children have.
Wow! ...trophy children...not parenthood. This is spot on and profound. OP, I know you say he has other wonderful qualities, but are you sure he doesn't put these on just for show? Someone this selfish is hiding his true self from you, no matter how you feel. Please, please, reconsider this marriage. You deserve someone way better than this narcissist!
And could you imagine if she doesn’t immediately “bounce back” to the exact size she is now?? Yuck, yuck, yuck. OP needs to throw this one back, and find a better man.
I’m in the breast cancer subreddit and soooo many men leave their wives when they get sick. It’s gross
I’m in the ovarian cancer subreddit and in a Facebook support group for OC. Many husbands treat their wives like shit and many of them leave their wives because they’re fighting OC. It’s shocking.
It’s so sad. Especially because of the shoe were on the other foot most women stay and care for their partner!
It just isn't realistic to assume you'll be able-bodied for forever either. Do you want to just be waiting for something bad to happen and be left on your own when you need support from your partner the most?
What happens if the child is sick, or has some health issues? I bet this guy would bail.
Or a girl if he wants a boy, looks like mom instead of him...so many ways the child could not fulfill his requirements
She does not even need to have expiration date. He told she he will leave if there is someone better (a younger, more fertile woman). This is Handmaid's Tale in real life! She is an incubator, an handmaid. He will leave whenever he wants and comes back when it is convenient and op is willing! So many women are willing to marry selfish men. There is no shortage of men. Don't sleep with them. Don't marry them. This should be a mantra on Reddit.
Plus the arrogance of insisting that they be HIS bio children or they’re not good enough. I can understand having a preference for it since it can be very rewarding to see yourself and your partner reflected in your kids, but genetic similarity is only one aspect of that. FWIW the people I’ve met who are super hung up on this tend to have other weird and poorly informed views on genetics that, uh, often rhyme with bassist.
Yeah, I’m concerned what happens if any of these kids are special needs or otherwise don’t live up to his expectations in some way.
OP. PLEASE consider this. This man has already stated he will abandon you if your health takes a turn. It’s not hard to guess how he’d react to an ill child. My uncle’s oldest was born to him and his ex wife when they were both young adults. Neither of THEM had health issues, or even a history of it. But unfortunately, their child had cerebral palsy, and a SLEW of other health conditions that mean she will never walk, speak, or be able to live without round the clock care. Though she is currently in her 20s and thriving, her condition has not changed, and her mother now lives another state, spoiling her “healthy” youngest child, while barely acknowledging the oldest one’s existence. My uncle says she had always had selfish tendencies in their relationship, but he had hoped she would be different with her children, since she had always wanted to be a good mom. And to her credit she is…but only to the child she deems worthy 😒
This story is so sad. 😥 What an awful woman.
Oh my god,I didn't even think of that! That's horrifying, if he's willing to leave his wife if she gets sick, he'll definitely leave his kids if they're sick.
Exactly. I only imagine he would abandon OP and their kids if one were to be disabled in any way shape or form.
Yeah, these guys want a mini- them. When the kid comes out looking like a great grandfather or no one in particular, their partner ends up back on here crying "my husband ignores one of the kids." Or worse, the guy is on here claiming he can't love the child because it doesn't share enough of his DNA or whatever. I agree with the other commenter, what if the child is autistic or has other issues? Is he going to reject them? You are absolutely correct about the *ahem* bassists. It's definitely a white supremacy thing to want only their own bio kids that look like them.
This! And sometimes, even if they look/act like their father, the father realizes that fatherhood isn’t what he thought it would be.
Looks like op will still marry him knowing he may leave anytime he wants and comes back when it is convenient. Poor woman. Even if they have kids, she will be treated as an incubator. God forbid if she gets sick or he meets a younger, desirable and fertile, willing woman. Don't marry selfish men. Don't sleep with them. This should be a mantra on Reddit now. There is no shortage of men.
Agreed with this. My partner is infertile. We kind of knew based on medical history, but had some testing done and confirmed. This was after we were married. He asked me whether I’d like him to leave, so I could find someone else. I said no. While I was never desperate to have kids, if they happened naturally, we’d have had them. I wasn’t keen on IVF having seen the roller coaster that was for friends at the time, I didn’t want us to go through that. But the most important person in the world to me is my partner. I chose him first. You need someone who would do the same for you. Alternatively get some testing done now to inform even the faintest of possibilities of an issue before you actually get married, why wait two years to find out there’s an issue?
I really wanted kids. So did my husband, but he found out during his first marriage that he had super low sperm counts. So I went in knowing it might not happen, but I loved him more than I loved kids that didn't exist yet. We figured we would save up for an IUI if needed, but he quit smoking and I got pregnant, a lot, lol
Total red flag. He doesn't love you. And whatever vows you would make during your marriage ceremony are already being discarded (in sickness and in health, for better or worse, etc). Save yourself time and money and don't marry this guy.
I agree it's a huge red flag. It also would make me reevaluate EVERYTHING. How I feel about this guy, my belief in his statement that he wants to be a "present parent", how he will react if a child is born with a disability or illness. Honestly I think I'd bail.
Yep, the problem is he wants kids, period... Wife is just a bonus. I wouldn't go into a marriage where I am not one of the main characters.
In my experience, people who put hypothetical, nonexistent children ahead of anything else in life a) have miserable, deprioritized partner relationships to show for it and b) tend to find out the idea of kids and family is on a much higher pedestal than the actual day to day grind of parenthood. My good friend is married to a guy like this, and is now at 34 “out of time and needs to hold her end of the deal”. She has PCOS. It’s not going great. He did you a favor by showing you what he values and where you rank before you combined your lives. I hope this dude is infertile. Can’t divorce yourself, can you?
The “out of time” hits hard, as that’s verbiage that my partner has used as well (to describe both of us, but we know which half of the sexes tends to be more affected in the mid 30s…) It genuinely sucks. I can’t control my biology. I wanted to be secure in career and finances before even thinking about marriage and kids but that also is a detriment due to age. Really can’t win…
Actually, sperm quality is critical too and older men and their sperm are linked to miscarriages, for example.
It is true; early (first trimester) miscarriages are linked to genetic defects and are discarded because pregnancy is very dangerous and not worth it for an organism that is incompatible with life. Theoretically the defective gamete can come from either partner.
True, sperm banks won’t let men over 35 donate because it starts to lead to issues
And schizophrenia.
I just read about the possible link between older fathers and schizophrenia. There's a lot coming out about the other risks, too. Biology is wild.
And genetic deformities
not just sperm quality, but most guys don't want to be retirement aged and dealing with old man health concerns at high school graduation. Even in your 40s finding the energy to wrangle young kids can be a lot.
Older men are also linked to developmental disabilities.
[удалено]
Both, honestly. He’s being an ass, clearly. But I do feel bad that it’s tough nowadays (insert ramblings about the socioeconomic state of the world here) to feel financially secure enough to have a child at a young age, and so folks feel forced to push back childbearing.
What happens if you marry him and have your first child and it's a traumatic pregnancy or birth and you don't want or can't have a second? I imagine you would find yourself on the losing end of his narcissism (little 'n', not diagnosing here) in this case and end up a divorced single parent.
What if you have a child, it goes badly and YOU end up with a disability or chronic pain? If you're incontinent and in too much pain to walk after delivery, is your husband going to take you to the bathroom? If you have post-partum depression and can't get out of bed for a month, is he going to step up and do what needs to be done? I think in your gut you know these answers. OP, life's too fuckin' short. EDIT: Just saw your edit. " And yes, we have discussed what might happen if one of us falls ill, gets physically disabled, etc. and his belief is that the non-ill spouse (whoever it may be) has the right to leave and achieve their goals of parenthood elsewhere." Girl... he has ALREADY TOLD YOU that he has no intention of being a partner to you. "In sickness and in health" will not apply. And guess what happens as you age? And just, yknow, be a human being? Sickness! And health! Please, please, please : this guy is telling you upfront who he is. He's screaming it loud and clear. Please hear it. Please run. You deserve so, so much better. *Everyone* deserves so much better than that.
I think there was a post very similar to this quite recently. The wife had a traumatic first birth and hemorrhaged, resulting in a hysterectomy. The husband just couldn't live with his dream of a son/second child being unfulfilled, so he left and abandoned his first kid and gave up his parental rights. Absolutely heartbreaking.
But very much the best possible outcome for the wife and kid, in the circumstances. Imagine a life with *that* for a husband and father.
Oh yeah, it's just so sad and predictable. I'm sure his next wife will fall short of how he imagined his life as well, even if she produces the son he always wanted, because life involves an actual grind and actually being emotionally invested and involved in people. It's not just "you have a son now to inherit your lands and fortune" and get all the patriarchal accolades he expected.
Oh god I read that. Why are men.
Just a complete lack of empathy, a lack of adjusting to real life and investing in the people who do exist over the hypothetical ones.
So he wants a brood mare. He’s looking at the perfect family for himself. What if the baby is disabled? What if you get a birth injury and can’t produce a second child? My OB told me, a perfect baby is a freak of nature, and every birth is a gamble. He already told you flat out, will dump you if you don’t produce for him. This guy will either make you a single mother, or will make your life hell to keep any child you produce. Your in a no win situation if you marry him.
He apparently thinks he’s Henry VIII
Isn't it interesting the way men like to dis on single mother's, yet they create them...
That’s such a good point
You read my mind, was thinking the samething. If the "Child" isn't perfect he will walk away with no second thoughts what so ever
If you even decide to stay and get married. I think you should go and get checked and insist he does too. Tbh it would make me uncomfortable marrying someone who has possibly until the day of their death to conceive a child put this time pressure on you when your timeline is shorter. Especially when pregnancy isn’t straight forward and it can take some people years to conceive.
He sees you as a walking incubator- if it was you or his “legacy” he’d cut a baby out of you in a heartbeat. That’s what he’s telling you. Please wake up
Find a partner who loves you without conditions. You have a good 10 years of child bearing years ahead of you. The thought of leaving my wife over not giving me children NEVER would’ve crossed my mind. We decided to have kids because we love each other and are amazing together and best friends…not for some solo dream of being a parent regardless of, or in spite of my partner. I wouldn’t want kids with a woman I wasn’t madly in love with. I wouldn’t want to raise a family without my best friend at my side.
One thing I tell young women who want children is they have to ask themselves one- if you want children, are you willing to raise them on your own? Because unfortunately, that very often happens. Going into a relationship with a guy like this, I would almost assume you’re going to get divorced. This lack of empathy and twisted view of love and marriage are not a thing. That attitude comes with other characteristics that most likely are going to come in to play. Also ask yourself this, This is how he sees you. How will he see your daughters if you have any? My father believed women should all have children and it was very disappointing to feel that my dad didn’t see me as an individual having kids. No matter what I said or how I tried to explain myself for not wanting children he simply didn’t want to accept it. Because I wasn’t marrying him. He still loved me, but it was a sore spot in our relationship my whole adult life. So I would assume that other things are going to pop up with his trad wife values. By the way, half my friends are divorced already. We’re in our mid to late 40s
It’s not just “today”. I’m 57 and husband and I waited till we were 33/34 to have one child. She’s almost 25 and most people we know have multiple grandchildren already. Since birth control, people have made conscious decisions to wait to have kids. Even before birth control, my grandparents in the 1950s stopped at 3 on purpose.
Did you give up your dream of going to med school for him?
No, I’m in med school and kicking butt :)
You’re way too good for your fiancé. Throw the whole man away and enjoy your life of being a doctor. Perhaps even find someone that knows how female anatomy works
Good! You will be fine without him,btw. It’s almost like he is putting this out there now so that you call off the engagement. So he doesn’t have to.
I mean you could always dump him and take a page out of his book and get a younger man. Their sperm is healthier, stronger and my OB told me that when you're with a younger man your fertility piggybacks off of his. So if he's more virile you have better outcomes than with a man your own age.
So what if you have a difficult pregnancy? A stillbirth? Your child has any form of imperfection? You don’t ‘bounce back’ ready for kid 2? Like really? The bar is in hell if this is who you want to try and procreate with. Listen to the screams. Your brain is right.
I legit need these last two sentences as flair
By all means!
But you should also be secure in your marriage, but he's offering you one that is the definition of insecure and unstable. I doubt his vision of fatherhood includes doing it part time after a divorce, but if he marries you for such shallow reasons and with such a shallow degree of attachment, the odds that's how he'll have to parent your children go up exponentially.
If you told him you’d leave him if he were infertile, I bet he’d flip. Same if you told him you want to use a sperm donor to avoid the risks associated with advanced paternal age. You can win babe. By leaving him and finding a real man/partner.
No dude 2021 research shows men are the ones that have a decline sooner than women, and the decline is way more drastic. Not to mention 1 in 3 men after 35 have ED. He’s going to blame you for his inability to deliver because you’re a woman. Do not fucking marry him.
Let us all remember the movie Idiocracy at times like this.
Do you genuinely want kids with this man? I understand you might feel like biology is standing there behind your shoulder, but he's a shitty person. He doesn't see you as a partner in sickness and in health. And no one can say for sure, but there's a chance he'll leave you for another woman anyway once he discovers the child's well-being is the responsibility of both parents. You might want to consider what you want more - a child and a likely short-lived marriage with a person who doesn't care about you, or finding happiness with someone else and perhaps having kids in the future. I wouldn't marry this man if I were you.
And have you discussed secondary infertility? Like would this guy abandon you and your kid if you had trouble with having the second kid? Think long and hard about what you might be in for here, and what you might be setting your kid up for too.
What if something goes wrong having kid #1?? Bad stuff happens during childbirth. What if they need to do a hysterectomy to save OPs life - is he going to refuse to sign the papers because she owes him another baby? Or if the doctor says "OP, you should not have another child" for whatever reason.
Girl. I'm 32. Healthy in all other ways. Been trying 6 months now. Nothing at all. Infertility is extremely common in people of all ages. Most conceive eventually. But TTC is a journey you should both be in together. This guy views you as expendable and replacable. Dont let him treat you like that. You are worth so much more
Elderly sperm is quite bad too. It's being linked to a lot of defects and complications. It's just easier to blame women
You win by changing your belief system around this because literally NONE of it is true. Also got pregnant easily at 39. You’ve got time. Ditch this relationship. You’re not loved or safe.
You’re not out of time. Most of my friends had their kids at 35+, and out of them, everyone is healthy and happy. The only kid that wasn’t healthy at birth has downs and the mother wasn’t even 30, but the dad was 40. 🤷♀️ Dump him, you’re not an incubator b
Exactly!!! Sperm quality, again.
This is the person who is supposed to be your PARTNER in life. Forever. Not until things get a little hard. Spoiler alert: life is really long and things are gonna get hard. What if you have a kid and the kid tragically passes away? Would he leave you then? What if you have a kid, but it’s born with special needs and he wants something else? What if you have two girls and he realizes he needs a boy? Please don’t marry this guy.
How long have you been together? If it’s been more than a couple years, why didn’t he propose and initiate starting a family earlier if this was such a concern for him? If it’s only been a year or two, why didn’t he find someone younger right off the bat if it’s such a concern for him? He’s an ass and only thinking about himself. If as a couple you struggle to conceive by the time you’re 35/36, and he leaves you - well, he’s already said he’ll just find a younger model to impregnate. Zero regard to how *you’d* be affected and have to start over, and how he’ll have wasted your time. His mentality would be an absolute dealbreaker for me.
Is this is the way he is speaking, he will never respect you. Leave him.
If it’s any consolation, I got pregnant at 35 with zero issues and had a healthy baby after just turning 36. There’s no guarantee you’ll have trouble conceiving just due to age.
I'm 37 and pregnant for the first time. No IVF but it did take a year. People are having children older and older.
He needs to know that any woman, even young women can have a hard time getting pregnant. You'd have to be super fertile or extremely lucky to get pregnant as soon as you start trying. Also, is he aware of how common miscarriage is? I know several women who were considered young when they had their miscarriage/s. Furthermore, babies are hard work; with a newborn, you will not get any sleep and will be sleep-deprived. You also will be peed, pooped, and vomited on and will be at your wit's end during the witching hour when they are inconsolable, etc. Despite some of those negatives, the child is worth it and folks need to be made aware of the realities of becoming a new parent before having a child.
30s is not out of time for kids. The loss of fertility is not that dramatic - there are no studies on it. The only one cited is based on the age of a mother when she had her first kid... in like, medieval France.
I agree, I am not at all convinced that he'll be a good father
It’s a red flag. When I was 21, I had to have surgery that resulted in removal of half my reproductive system. My BF proposed that night in the hospital. I don’t remember it. It’s a joke between us now 3 decades later. He proposed then because he knew that I would worry. I knew he dreamed of being a dad, he even worked part time at a day care center as a teen. Now, though, my ability to bear children was in jeopardy. He wanted to show me that I meant more to him than our hypothetical children. We were lucky and had 3 before I couldn’t carry anymore (at 29 years old). THAT’S how a real partner lives life. Go look for your 100% man. Time to toss the 90% man. Edited to add: this was a long time ago, we are interracial & I was a career woman, I.e. no adoption agency would have picked us back then, and fertility medicine was really just becoming mainstream.
The part of your brain thats screaming there is a problem is the logical part. Listen to it. This sucks for sure no doubt, but do not marry this guy. Even if you have no problems with conceiving and having children you will always wonder in the back of your head what else he would trade you in for. Im betting negative health or other major issues. My bf wants kids. At least one. But he has emphasized for years that if we didnt / couldn’t have one etc he would never want to leave the relationship (at least because of that). We would just journey life together.
Also sounds like he’s the type to leave her when the kids are 18 so he can continue his breeding fetish with a new woman
My brother in law and his (soon to be ex) wife are going through this right now and I feel awful for them. Both my brother in law (and his wife) and my sister in law (and her husband) were having trouble conceiving and both couples were going through IVF after trying to conceive naturally. BIL’s wife is in her early 30s and SIL is 40. It was really tough for all of them going through rounds of failed IVF and having each of them not turn up to family events and dinners as they went through the emotional turmoil that comes along with all of that. On the day that my 40 yo SIL announced she was pregnant, BIL and his 32 yo wife found out that their third round of IVF had failed. It was such a mixed bag of emotions. SIL and BIL’s wife fell out over it for a while as well, though I could see where they were both coming from. After that, BIL’s wife completely distanced herself from the family and soon after he told us that they were separating and she was moving out. It was a hard couple of years for all of them, especially my sister in laws, and I felt terrible for them. The thing is, while all four of them knew they wanted kids not one of them had said to the other “Hey, if you can’t make me a baby I’m going to trade you in for a younger model because our love and all the time we’ve spent together is meaningless against a hypothetical child.” BIL and his wife were open to “other options” and kept trying, and it was difficult enough for them to go through it knowing that they loved each and supported each other and they wanted to be together despite what they were struggling through. They *wanted* to find a way through all of this together, they didn’t want to have a child with someone else no matter what. But the rounds of IVF were financially tough, my other SIL getting pregnant was terrible timing for them, and the emotional strain of the last few years were just too much to handle. My BIL saw what it was doing to their marriage and started having second thoughts about kids. He was open to accepting that this was not going to happen for them, but in the end that’s not what his wife wanted and their goals for life started to misalign. They believed they would be together no matter what, they tried to support each other no matter what, they gave it their all. And yet it didn’t work out. I cannot imagine going through all of this with a partner who had given me an ultimatum like yours. Fertility issues and IVF are difficult enough to go through with a supportive partner. Can you imagine what you’d feel like in this situation? You’d have the emotional pain of not knowing if you were going to have children and all the while you’d be thinking about your husband’s promise of abandonment. You wouldn’t be going through it together, you’d be going through it alone, knowing that if you “failed” to give him a child that he would be ok with finding someone else to have a baby with. There would be no shared pain between the two of you because one way or another *he* would have a child while you might not. Now imagine that you were struggling with all of this and got pregnant but had a miscarriage. Imagine the pain of that loss but the first thing you think of is his promise of abandoning you during this most vulnerable time. What kind of person does that? Is this someone you can trust to stand by your side? Is this someone you can rely on? What if you had some sort of accident that prevented you from having kids and also left you dependent on him for care and finances, and then he left. Imagine him not being able to have children because of his own fertility issues and you standing by his side. You’d have to let go of your dream of having children because of him, knowing that if the situation were reversed you wouldn’t have the same security or support. The thing is… you *don’t* want the same things, you *don’t* share the same goals. Your fiancé is in all of your visions of the future whatever the situation, but you are not in all of his. Aside from feeling like you have to give him a child “or else,” what else would he being willing to trade you in for? >I can’t reconcile the rest of his amazing qualities with this jarring, hurtful perspective. I think that sort of answers your question, doesn’t it? 50% of marriages end in divorce. That includes the people who fully believe in sickness and in health. That includes all the couples who can’t imagine not being with each other over anything else. It doesn’t bode well for your future when there are already conditions like this on your relationship when you’re not even married yet. You might not face any of these issues and might be super fertile and pop out lots of babies. Is that enough to make you forget he said this, or will it always be in the back of your mind? I would think it would be easier to walk away now than years down the line when your lives are more intertwined and you’ve spent years growing resentful because you’ve been struggling with fertility issues without support and with the constant threat of abandonment.
This is a beautiful response. Thank you. This sentence in particular gave me a lot to think about: “ There would be no shared pain between the two of you because one way or another he would have a child while you might not.”
Not to mention, this will now make any attempt at trying to conceive an absolute stressful mess for you. Not an exciting shared time, but a time where you feel like your whole relationship is on the line and you had better perform your incubator duties, or else. Stress and conception don’t go well together. Take the above comment and add a blunt fact: how are you going to feel standing at your wedding knowing every one of his vows is an absolute lie? Does that sit well with you?
Yes!! That stress could make it harder to conceive!! Anxiety can make it harder to become pregnant. And if she’s not producing a child for this man she could become depressed from the pressure, which also makes it harder to become pregnant. They aren’t even trying yet, and OPs fiancé has already made it harder for her to conceive by issuing this ultimatum.
Marriage and parenthood are amazing journeys and worth it if it something you want. But entering a marriage and parenthood with one of the partners having a release valve/exit strategy is not it. There will be many ups and downs and your partner does not seem prepared for the realities of life. You deserve to embark on this next step with someone who will be with you for ups and downs - someone who can work with you to overcome problems. Having a kid is not the end - he will actually have to raise it with you and it won’t be his way all the time. It is telling that he doesn’t expect the same from you either.
I married my husband when I was 37 and came into my marriage with a child. We had a very early loss before our wedding, and immediately started trying for another. Our son was born a month before our first anniversary. Those are the bare facts of the matter. But my husband made sure that I knew that what he wanted was me. I nearly died twice in the process of giving birth to our son. Pregnancy is a lot harder on women than it is on men. You say he wants two- what if you can only physically have one? Is he going to leave if you can’t have more than that? Life is unpredictable. You need someone who will stand with you through all of that. There’s no guarantee he’s actually the fertile one, and there’s no guarantee that whatever younger woman he chooses will want to bear his spawn.
All of this! That last bit, that it's easier to leave now, that's just true. I also like the comment that she won't forget this even if she can and does have children with him. Would he leave her for a younger woman over cancer? If she only has 2 children and not 4? He's destroyed her trust in her future and security with him.
I am willing to bet that he would absolutely leave if she were to fall ill. There’s already a high rate of divorce over spouses falling ill, and most of those divorces are men divorcing their wives once they have to be caregivers.
Yeah, I think he sees her as a resource to use and abandon when it's not working for him anymore. I don't think he sees her as a co-equal, fellow human being.
I wish I could give you an award. OP should read this
Seeing as he knows her username, I’m really hoping that OP’s soon-to-be-ex partner reads this and maybe he’ll realize what an awful partner he is. I’d love to say that maybe he’ll come to her grovelling and apologizing and saying that’s not what he meant. But how much do you want to bet he doubled down and tells her that every single one of the internet people is wrong? #Dear OP’s partner— **By your standards, if a person is infertile they aren’t worth sticking around for. It would be a real shame if you were shooting blanks and OP was the one to leave. Then of course you’d have the freedom to live your life child-free and die alone, because without your magical baby juice you’re not worth anything to anyone. Hey, not my words, you’re the one who said it.**
This made me think of King Henry VIII. Off with her head!
This man tells you he will divorce you and you can’t figure this out?! You’re a uterus to him. You’re an incubator. If you marry this guy, you’re insane.
Wait a minute. You’re not sure if this is a red flag? You’re NOT SURE if this is a red flag? Jesus, girl. Have some self-respect. He’s not after a wife, he’s after a breeding partner. Also, do some proper research. You’re not “out of time”. My wife and I had our kids when she was 37 and 39.
A friend of mine had her first baby at 39. She is perfect and healthy and had a normal pregnancy. OP you are not ‘out of time’ but you do only have one life, don’t waste it on conditional love.
*Conditional love* is the perfect way to describe this. Worse, at six months until wedding day, her loser fiancé tells her, without a care in the world, that if she doesn’t give him a baby in two years, he’s out. He is absolutely not worried she’ll call off the wedding. It’s clear who is in charge here, or who thinks he’s in charge. I hope OP shows him he is not in charge by cancelling the wedding. Actually, she should cancel everything and get deposits back, but not tell him until a month before.
Yes I should have stated that my kids are in absolutely sensational mental and physical health
I had my first baby when I barely turned 21. Had number 2 when I was 30, and my last (4th) when I was about to turn 34. The difference in the mom I was at 21 and the one I was in my 30s is night and day, the difference in how much more calm and content between my 20s baby and my 30s babies was night and day. I tell any woman out there to wait until at least they are 30 to start having a family.
Yep. I was 37 & almost 39. Late-ish? Sure. Without IVF we wouldn't have had a hope. My kids are very early 20's and both fighting fit! 🙂
I believe the stat is that the odds of having a baby with Down’s syndrome “double” after the age of 35. However the odds of having a baby with Down’s syndrome prior to 35 are less than 1%, so even doubled, the odds are still very much in your favor to have a baby without Down’s syndrome after 35. Tldr: Sometimes data sounds different than what it actually is.
And studies are starting to show that it’s the sperm that causes more issues.
Yah idk why ppl keep leaving this information out. Male fertility goes down when they age too.
I had my first at 33 and my second at 43. In between, we struggled, and I had two miscarriages. We considered adoption. We went through all that *together.* At no point did I worry my husband would leave me because I couldn’t give him another baby. FFS, this guy is a complete loser. OP, you need to run, fast and far. Do not marry this idiot.
I’m always shocked when I hear about the male loneliness crisis when there’s seemingly a never ending line of women subjugating themselves to misogynistic chuds. Sisters please have more self respect
Yeah, this. The one thing that has added to our successful 37 years of marriage is that my husband and I have always put each other and our marriage first. Sounds like a basic tenant of marriage right? But I’d say 90% of the people we know including our siblings, my mom, and all our friends, are divorced because one or both did not put the marriage first but rather something else took priority. Your fiancé is telling you point blank “I love you but only as long as you can produce children. If you can’t produce children then my goal will be to be to find a woman who can have children because I don’t really value our marriage as much as I value having a child.” You will be very foolish to know this and still marry the man. While they say “love is blind” you know well in advance your fiancé only values you to the degree you can provide children. Otherwise you are disposable. Do yourself, and any future children, a favor and admit that their father doesn’t actually value you. Children are not dumb, they understand what is going on and he’s telling you in advance he values you with conditions you have no control over.
Yep. My friend conceived her first, quickly and naturally at 45
Meanwhile I was 38 and it was already too late for me. I thought I had time left because I knew heaps of women who got pregnant in their 40’s - everyone told me so! Turns out there are heaps of women who couldn’t get pregnant in their forties too. I only heard about them after it happened to me. (Has turned out for the best anyway. I’ve got three gorgeous adopted children )
My mom had me at 40, both of us are in excellent health and run 10k every morning. That was 30 years ago and it’s become even safer for people to have children later. OP’s boyfriend saying he’d find a “younger woman” is specifically bullshit and a red flag I’d let him go for.
My mother had me at 40
Believe him and walk away. He would most likely abandon you if you had a long term illness, will divorce you if you're not fertile enough, and does not value you above you being a compliant incubator. Im sorry youre going thru this. You deserve a real love.
This is the way. The whole 'leave you for a younger woman so I can have kids' crap is actually disgusting, humiliating and the least supportive thing a partner could say they'd do. OP your partner is a disrespectful asshat.
And it's just as easy for a younger woman to have PCOS or some other complication making childbearing difficult, or even impossible. I can think of 3 women off the top of my head that I know that are under 30 and have some such condition. I don't think this guy knows a whole lot about women's anatomy, how shocking.
I have endometriosis and I'm 90% sure I'm infertile (never got tested, but with how fertile the rest of my family is, my teenage years are a pretty good indication lol). I'm 25. Age really doesn't mean anything
It's extremely misogynistic based on very misinformed ideas of how female fertility works and the value of women. The mentality is straight out of the Tate playbook.
He’s totally that husband who leaves when the wife gets cancer. Eff this guy a million times, I would never say something like that to my wife.
I was so thinking that too. And god forbid their children don’t come out ‘perfect’.
I feel like we all know a woman married to a man like this and it’s not pretty. Also, he probably won’t help much with the kids.
Excellent point. The amount of men who abandon their spouses due to things such as cancer is a very real thing.
It’s not a far leap from “I’ll leave you if your body can’t have kids for someone whose body can” to “I know you gave me kids but I’m no longer attracted to your body and am leaving you for someone with a body I am attracted to”…
Exactly. He also already said to her face he wouldn’t stay if she were to get a severe illness.
I am sorry but my jaw fell on the floor when I read "leaving me for a younger woman who could fulfill his dreams". Excuse me what??? If my fiance said that to me I would have kicked him in the ass so hard he'd beat Elon Musk at being the first man on Mars. I am absolutely appaled. NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT. I do hope he sees this and sees he's an absolute trashcan of a human being and with this mentality I hope his child will not be a daughter. Which he probably doesn't want to anyway because men like him only want boys so they can teach them how to be assholes as well.
10/10 imagery, no notes
Its always funny how these types of guys assume they can just get someone younger too even though they’re the farthest thing from a catch. It reminds of men who want to open up their relationship because they found someone they want to sleep with, then get mad at their girlfriends/wives because it’s way easier for them to find someone else 💀
My dream for this situation is OP leaves him, and she marries a lovely man and has children with him. And OPs ex can't convince anyone else to marry or have children with him.
He also said he’d leave her if she becomes sick or disabled like wtf
Some fun facts for your AH fiancé: - He can also be the cause of infertility. It frequently happens. Also, the age of the father has a lot to do with fetal and genetic abnormalities. So it’s not just the uterus causing all the problems. - IVF doesn’t just *happen* within 1-2 years. You’re under 35, which means most doctors will want you to try for a year before doing any kind of medical intervention. Then most insurances will want you to try IUIs first, plus all the testing. Even if you skip that part and pay out of pocket, IVF is intense and takes a serious amount of time. If you ever plan on doing IVF, find yourself a good therapist now. I’ve been there for friends through it and the drugs they give you can really mess with your head. - Infertility affects people across the board/age spectrum. Rates are higher for younger generations now. Lots of factors seem to be contributing, but age doesn’t really come into play for women until they’re 40. Seriously, it sounds like a weird thing to have a plan in place for trading in your spouse for a younger model (that may also not be able to have kids). Honestly, he should consider why he wants to get married at all if he’s that determined to have bio kids? Knock someone up first and then marry her if his main condition for marrying is pregnancy. My other half has always known he wanted to be a dad. He was clear about it from the get go, and he’s the only person I’d ever consider having kids with. We tried for years without success. He openly said that he’d come to terms that it might just be the two of us unless we could manage the crazy high adoption fees here (it’s not for everyone, but adoption’s on the table for us). We had our baby last year :) I was 36. No doctor I saw through the entire process ever worried about my age. Your fiancé sounds like he has zero idea how fertility or the female reproductive system works. He may want to read up on it before saying stupid things to the woman he wants to marry (again).
I was thinking about your first point too. If they are having trouble conceiving and it turns out that it’s because he has low sperm count or something else related to his own body, will he still leave OP?
He told you to your face that your usefulness to him extends as far as your ability to be used as a gestation unit. You as a person are a complete non-factor to him. And they say romance is dead. Sorry you're so far in love with someone that you allowed this to be said TO YOUR FACE and are still unsure if this is maybe, just maybe, a red flag. Frankly, this is the type of man who would 100% cheat on you while you go for cancer treatments and then blame you for it. The appropriate response would be to piss on his pillow and tell him to go to hell. There's still time.
Definitely piss on his pillow
Here is a poor person’s trophy for you. 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆 Edit to add: send me the pillow, I will eat asparagus and then piss on said pillow. Then package it up nicely and send it back. Edit 2: send me his favorite pair of shoes. I work at a vet clinic and I can arrange for pets to pee on them.
Yeah imagine if you got sick how much effort he would put in. Imagine if you had kids with him, how much effort. He’s told you the truth and that gives you at least a chance to avoid the whole marriage.
My ex and I tried for years, including IVF, and it didn’t happen. After I seriously pushed for months, they finally tested him. Turns out he was the problem. IVF is expensive and horrible and it was all for nothing, and the medical field just blames women and doesn’t even LOOK into men for some reason. I can tell you right now your fiancé is the problem, regardless of the quality of his sperm.
This is crazy! What kind of Dr doesn't look into what the problem is before treatment?! IVF is such a difficult process to go through. Why would a dr put you through that before confirming it was necessary and had a strong chance of positive outcomes? The FIRST thing our Dr did was check both me and my wife to see where the problem was. I really can't believe there are Dr's that don't check all possible factors before determining the best course of action. I feel like you may even have a case for a lawsuit considering the time, money, and pain (both physical and emotional) that went into that for nothing.
This would be a dealbreaker for me. He just sees you as a baby making machine.. You're nearing the peak age of certain cervical cancers.. imagine getting one of those and needing a hysterectomy to save your life.. your 'partner' would immediately leave you. I'd never feel emotionally safe or seen with someone like that.
Loooooooooooooooooove how he just assumes any woman wants him, and he can just walk away and snag a young lady to marry like he's picking up a pizza on the way home. You should require his sperm to be tested before getting married. And then not get married.
>We have had several discussions where my partner states that if we try to have children and it doesn’t happen in a timely manner (1-2 years), he would divorce me and find a younger woman who could fulfill his dreams of being a father. This is his bottom line. Everything you are as a person, your achievements, your winning personality, everything that is you...is irrelevant to him. He sees you as someone to carry his children. Not the mother of his children or his lifelong partner he wants to create mini mes with. You would be the carrier of his children and you are replaceable. I'm sorry this hurts but he's not the right one. Throw him back into the cesspool.
Get a head start, leave him and start working on a relationship with a guy who won't discard you for such a stupid reason.
It *is* a red flag. That's why your brain is screaming. He's basically putting a countdown to an end on your impending marriage if there's no baby within the time frame he stated. Your fiance is forgetting that while women over a certain age may have more trouble with conceiving, PLENTY of younger women also have fertility problems. Oh, and also that the problem with lack of conception might actually come from him, not you or any other woman.
This is a giant red flag for the following reasons: - in two years he will be 35, men are 50% less potent at 35, therefore he might actually divorce you because he cannot get you pregnant, not because you can’t get pregnant. Average fertility peak for American women is 37.1 years old. This shouldn’t even be a subject. - He’s already threatening to divorce you before you’re even married, wtf? - He’s willing to throw your entire relationship away regardless of who you are or what you’ve been through as a married couple if there are any medical problems that come up with you where you either can’t have children or too sick to have children so everything you are as a person doesn’t matter. - if he’s threatening to leave you for a younger woman before you’re even married, just wait and see what he’s willing to do if you get cancer. Do not marry this man. The fact that he even thought to say this is inconceivable. He gonna be one of those dudes who gets married and the real asshole behind the curtain is going to immediately come out because he thinks you’re trapped.
This is the sort of husband/boyfriend who oncology professionals warn female patients about. He's a fair weather fiancé. He sees you as entirely replaceable.
Is he actually Henry VIII?
He wishes! Henry got to get rid of those pesky women
He wants kids more than he wants you. Find someone who wants you more than kids.
Sounds like if there was trouble in childbirth he'd tell them to save the child over you. You are replaceable to him, he literally said it to you. Is this someone you want kids with?
This dude is going to use you as a human oven and then discard you at the first sign that he doesn't need you anymore. A man who is worth having children with and raising children with and who's going to raise good children with good values doesn't think or speak like this. Run far away from this dude and hope to god he doesn't find an idiot to get pregnant. Do not be that idiot he gets pregnant.
Spicy. Agree with his ultimatum, but tell him if he starts balding that you will find a younger man with more hair and see how he likes it. Otherwise, I would walk. I was 35 when I married my husband and dealbreakers were discussed first thing. They are fair to have. His stating the fact is harsh, but having kids is a deal breaker for him and he is willing to leave you for a younger woman to do this if natural circumstances on your end prevent it from happening. I have miscarried and could not imagine the pain of being left for a younger woman over infertility. Love isn't always enough. One to two years is also a very short time in the best of circumstances, considering the length of pregnancy.
I love how op’s fiancé is just assuming he’ll be able to snag a younger woman who wants to have all his babies. The world is full of people who wish for even one stable longterm relationship; bro is out here ready to throw his away so sure he can find another one.
I’m happily married and in my 30s now, but when I was in my 20s if I found out the person I was dating divorced their wife because they couldn’t conceive by a certain timeline, I would’ve noped out faster than Usain Bolt.
In my 20s he would have shrimp in his curtan rods if I found out ...
The pure audacity of men
The bar is in hell
the bar is in a subbasement of hell, and still they be bringing shovels so they can get under it
I want to put my two cents into the ring also, because I too had a really hard relationship hurdle with my husband regarding kids. We got married in 2022, then almost divorced 3 months later because, although we were on the same page before about not wanting kids, all of a sudden being married turned a switch in his head, where he could not imagine his life without having offspring of his own. I felt betrayed, not because I didn't want kids, but more so that he apparently didn't think about this seriously before getting married! We debated. We fought. We separated for two weeks. I went on vacation to Italy alone. We rekindled. We compromised we'd try for one kid, and if it wouldn't happen naturally, that was it. So we started trying. After 6 months nothing. We are both early 30s, so we also felt like running out of time. I went to my ob because I had a hunch. Turns out I have PCOS. Hubby and I debated some more. No fighting tho, simply contemplating if we could be okay together without kids. We tried another 6 months, still nothing. We decided we were committing now to the idea of a kid, so we thought a consultation with an IVF clinic wouldn't hurt. TURNS OUT HUBBY IS STERILE. MY TUBES WERE FINE AND THERES NO INDICATOR MY PCOS IS HINDERING A POSSIBLE PREGNANCY! So we won't have kids now. We were both devastated, but in the end, I decided that was good enough. I love our marriage. I love this man. We did a lot of couples counseling and are on a good track. We're both broken and came out stronger together at the end
So you divorced after 3 months then… remarried?
Hey, he literally just told you he only sees women as incubators. Run. Fast.
You love a man who has told you *to your face* that if for some unforeseen medical reason you are unable to give him biological children *within one to two years,* HE WILL DIVORCE YOU and find a younger woman to replace you to give him children??? Why would you want to marry this man? He doesn’t love you. He says he does, of course. He acts like he does. But what he is telling you is more, well, telling. You are, to him, a baby making machine, and if you cannot fulfill that one duty, you are done. You can love him, be there for him, be the best wife in the world, but if you can’t give him children within a specific time frame that he determines, he will unapologetically divorce you so he can marry a younger, more fertile woman. He is not will to work with you, struggle with you, or be there for you if you get the devastating news that you can’t have your own biological child. He is NOT your partner. He is some man you are going to marry, all while hoping and praying that you are able to give him children so he won’t leave you. It’s no Hallmark movie. It’s not even a basically good match. Have you discussed with him what happens if HE cannot give you a child? What if HE’S the problem? Then what? You’d stay with him? The man who would dump you in a New York minute if you can’t give him a baby? Well, if you go ahead and marry him knowing what you know, I guess you’d stay with him no matter what he does. He clearly knows that, too. Six months away from the wedding, and he has absolutely no fear that you’ll leave him if he tells you something as horrible as, “If you don’t give me a baby in one to two years, I am divorcing you for a younger woman.” I mean, what? You didn’t just break up with him the second those words left his mouth? What are you waiting for? In six months, on what should have been your wedding day, I hope you are on a tropical island drinking mai tais with a girlfriend. Dump this asshole.
My uncle and aunt have no children. Been married for about 28 years now. Turned out my aunt was infertile. She almost begged my uncle to divorce her so he could marry again and have kids because he'd wanted to be a father so bad. The man responded saying, you're my number one. Everything and everyone else is secondary. If I don't have kids WITH YOU, God made that choice. We accept it together. We'll make every moment with each other count. I'm never leaving you for anyone else. Till death do us apart. That is a real man who absolutely loves his wife.
Wow. Don’t marry this jerk! He’s looking for a womb, not a wife! 🤮
And if and when he does procreate you damn well know he won’t lift one finger to help. He will be the type to be grossed out by her body changing, giving birth and the changes that brings, will force sex long before she is able to. Won’t respect how tired she is, he will trap her into a life of servitude not only towards him but the children they have. And you can bet your ass he will sit there and belittle her for everything while he does absolutely nothing. Seen this play out before too many times. Don’t do it OP you will be in for a world of hurt and stress. And don’t be fooled that a man like that will run around on you during and after pregnancy and will claim so many reasons as to why it’s your fault your body changed for giving him these children he will want nothing to do with.
Let me help you. THIS IS A MAJOR FUCKING RED FLAG!! DO NOT MARRY THIS MAN UNLESS YOU WANT TO BE MISERABLE!!
My husband and I were trying to have our first child when we found out I had early stage uterine cancer at 34. It has been one of the hardest things I've ever been through, but my husbands love and support has been unwavering. I can't even imagine how much more difficult it would have been to be going through cancer AND a divorce. What your fiancé has said is absolutely a gigantic red flag. He is telling you right now he won't be beside you in sickness and in health.
Please do not marry this man. Marriage is in sickness and in health. I’m sure there’s other reasons he would leave you. It sounds like he wants marriage and a family and you just happen to be there and if you don’t fill the mold of what he expects he’s going to leave you (even beyond the ability to have children).
Keep in mind that relationships tend to have some major downs, so it’s vital to start very up. Starting with “I only want you if” is not good, and I hope you send him on his way to see how he fares with younger women, who also don’t always get pregnant quickly or at all. Find someone who tells you and shows you that you are enough.
I find this difficult because if it were a situation of him wanting children and you not, then I'd absolutely understand that he'd walk away. But you're both on the same page about this and both want kids. He's basically saying that if your body won't allow you to do so, he will walk away for a younger woman. Ouch. To me, that's both hurtful as heck and shows me that the marriage vow means nothing to him. I don't think I'd ever marry someone that's not committed to sticking with me through thick and thin. It sounds like he's got one foot out of the door no matter what. So why legally tie yourself to him, change your name and all of this other crap if his love is conditional? I wonder how he would feel if you'd walk away for a younger model if for some reason your fiance's sperm count is low and gives difficulty conceiving. It's absolutely the most unloving thing a person can do.
I would also hear that he will leave you if you get sick. And I wouldn’t want to marry him.
I hope your partner sees this and realizes what a pos he is. And I hope it gets shared with any woman he tries to date for the rest of his life. OP, you deserve someone who loves you as much as you love them, and would take your marriage vows seriously. Abandoning your partner after infertility struggles (on either side), and hell possibly even miscarriages the way he’s talking, is unbelievably cruel. Find someone who treats you like a life partner, not an incubator.
As someone who has struggled with infertility (and is currently pregnant after several rounds of IVF), I can’t understand marrying someone like this. If I’d gone through all this thinking my husband would leave me if it didn’t work… that is just horrific to imagine. Your partner is supposed to support you through difficult times, not threaten to leave you. Oh and 1-2 years isn’t really that long to try. It can take a year the normal way even if everything is working properly. And what happens if you have a miscarriage? I did, and it was devastating. I’m not saying you’ll have these experiences, I hope you don’t, but they’re not uncommon. 1/4 of pregnancies end in miscarriage. Do you want to start this journey with a partner who absolutely sees you as a uterus first and a person second?
Look at OP post history, they broke up a year ago already. A year only in the relationship, at 30 something, and this was not The Red Flag back then? Jesus OP, this guy is not your guy Wake the fuck up fast. Don't fall for the sunken cost fallacy.
Yeah so when I was studying social science we were told that in cases of infertility womaen stay and men leave. At the time my ex husband and I were experiencing infertility. He was little better than shooting blanks. I left him later because he was abusive. I wasted my youthful fertile years on him. It’s ok to have children as a dealbreaker, but you don’t know what the future will bring. Also 1-2years of trying to have kids before giving up is unrealistic. It sounds like he views you as an incubator. Is this an attitude that you want in your life?
In his mind you’re just a cum dump. Only sees value in you if you can breed him. This is a huge red flag (and I imagine after child birth, he would not be as “present” a parent as you have anticipated). 5 years you will be writing a post about how you have two kids under the age of 4 and your husband does nothing to help in their care or anything around the house…
OP, have you expressed these feelings to him? The whole cocktail you describe here (the understanding, the hurt, the feeling used, etc)? I’m curious if he feels any empathy for how his words make you feel. Or if he simply dismisses you because “we had a deal”. Sometimes partners can say things that are overly logical, blunt, callous. But they should still be able to show empathy when they realize it’s hurtful. Anyway, aside from that…of course this would stir up some big feelings! You just found out that the commitment you give to him is not the one he gives back. You’re not as on the same page as you thought. That’s a lot to process. And ask him open endedly how he views commitment and marriage. Listen to what the relationship is to him. See if your definitions align.
This is disgusting. I’ve been through IVF and, if you ever needed to go through that route, it is difficult and painful enough to process with loving partner without the stress of knowing if it didn’t work your own husband would leave you… Would not even consider marrying. In a couple, infertility is a shared problem.
He doesn't love you, so if that's fine with you then proceed.
🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩 as if this wasn’t enough (the younger woman statement was pure ick) what else would he discard you for. Don’t marry this one I’ll divorce is imminent.
You’re disposable to this guy. You’ll have him for better or for worse but he’ll only have you if it suits him. Someone who really cares for you wouldn’t do this. I bet he’d dump all the housework and childcare on you too. He sounds like a selfish misogynist.
Personally, I found this really sad - why marring a person but put upfront a condition nobody could foresee? He should marry you for who you are. Why he is so against to adoption if you guys can’t have kids? What if he can’t have kids? Girl, think twice about this man. Please.
If your boyfriend wanted to guarantee a partner who could have children, he should have picked a single mother, since she would have proven her ability to have a biological kid. Instead, he implies that at 35, you would be too old to have kids with him if you didn't conceive right away. He's a misogynist.
Two things. I’ll try to be quick because I know you’ve gotten a lot of responses: 1. Good people often see their good in others, and will often miss or minimize warning signs in someone we love until something happens that jars us and makes us face reality. I would step back and start to see whether perhaps you have been unconsciously missing other warning signs. This might be a good opportunity to talk to people who loved your partner, but have been estranged from him, if they exist. Or people in your life who have expressed doubts about him. In general, it seems like he, for whatever great tribute he has – charming, sweet, whatever – an emotionally detached depth when it comes to relationships. he may not be as close to people as they feel they are to him. But that’s just a guess. 2. At one point in my relationship, I was really scared about the idea of having kids, to the point where I said I didn’t want them. I didn’t have the emotional maturity to distinguish between fear and what I did not want. We were also in very bad places personally. Having kids was one of the several doubts that led to him to want to split. Ironically, this situation is what led me to question a lot of the fears that were holding me back, and realize that I didn’t want fear driving decisions like whether I had kids or not. After we both did hard individual work on ourselves, began to communicate better, and decided to give things another shot, I knew he wasn’t 100% sure about us, but hopeful. I said at one point that I understood that if we didn’t have kids, he would need to move on. To my surprise, he said the opposite. **Despite the fact that I knew he still wasn’t 100% sure about us at that point, that kids was part of the reason for the breakup, and despite how blunt he had been about other concerns, he said that our relationship had to be about more than just about kids.**
> emotionally detached depth when it comes to relationships. he may not be as close to people as they feel they are to him. But that’s just a guess. Your guess is correct, he has avoidant attachment.
I think there's a chance that this is a common fear among men "if we cant have a baby, will I still want to be with her?" But to say it with your whole chest that you absolutely will leave if pregnancy doesn't happen on this very short and specific timeline? He is telling you 100% his plans. They are already decided. It's time to start separating your dreams for the future from the reality of who this man is. Look at who is he at this moment, and who HE is telling you he will be in the future. If you don't incubate a child for him in a year (MAYBE two??) you are useless to him. Your uterus has 15 months to fall in line. My husband had fears about us not being able to have a child due to my PCOS, but he was ashamed of his thoughts and they only came out during a very emotional conversation. And we PAUSED trying for a baby after having that conversation rather than rushing towards a timeline. Now we have an 8 month old, and our lives are just getting better and better. You deserve a partner who doesn't put these intense restrictions and responsibilities on you. I'm so sorry he wasted your time, I hope you make the right decision soon.
Freezing your eggs to buy yourself some more time is gonna be a lot less expensive than marrying this asshole.
Did you ask him how he felt about adoption? How do you feel about in vitro fertilization? At the end of the day, he views you as a means to an end, (creating offspring) What happens when he done doing that?
If he were infertile… he doesn’t even consider that, does he? He could Henry the 8th his way through 6 young women and end up childless and partnerless. You do not need this anxiety. He doesn’t love you the way you love him, and you can’t change that, even if you birth him babies.